pour raconter

okay, great. now i live in paris, across the street from a cafe that sells small chocolate cakes and chevre chaud (my favorite) until midnight. there is mostly outdoor seating, and there are always fifteen or so men in their fifties wearing tortoise shell glasses and heather grey jackets using free wifi on their macbook pros while smoking gauloises and alternating between glasses of red wine and cafe noir, depending on the hour. it is perfect. if we leave the lights on at night, everyone in this cafe can see us in our living room. sometimes i hold my computer up to this window, to show people "what paris looks like", and sometimes these men in their fifties can see my computer screen and wave at me, but usually they just furrow their brow and continue typing. i think they are all food bloggers, but probably not actually.

mostly i cannot believe how beautiful this city is.

mornings i wake up at 7:45 so i can buy a pain au chocolat and eat a yoghurt on the metro before i get to french class, in the 20e arrondissement. i am in a class that is far too difficult for me, which at first was nice because it meant the school thought i was better at speaking french than i actually am, but turned into a bad thing because now i am the dumbest person in the class. i am used to being not the dumbest person, so this was very difficult to adjust to. additionally, there is a twenty-something italian businessman in the class who has taken to mocking me while i am "turned around", and taps his fingers very loudly on the desk while i am struggling to conjugate the subjunctive, and his gaudy rolex knocks on the desk when he does this, and i do not understand how an "adult" can be so "immature," like clearly i don't belong in the class, but when i ask them to switch me, they tell me that i "parles tres bien, tu dois rester ici pour le semaine prochain justement, et puis, nous pouvons parler." so i'm SORRY, italian man whose name i don't even remember because it doesn't even matter, but i am TRYING.

after french, my art classes begin. these are incredible. i am taking 18 credits, and oberlin will only take 16 of those, if any, but i don't even care because for the first time in my life i am really interested in the things i am learning. like, the other day in my contemporary french art class, we went to see dynasty, an exhibition of "up-and-coming" french artists in their twenties, which was split between the musée d'art moderne and palais du tokyo, and like, that was class. it was incredible.

we made some friends, too. i am not really sure of how it happenned, but they are from palaseiau, which i guess is like the new jersey of paris, and manchester, which is somewhere in england i guess.  they do things like drink bottles of wine and play gutiar on the banks of various channels and stuff.

it's all happening very fast, but i will try and keep track of most of it here. tonight is our second friday, and we are going to have dinner at cite universite with the rest of the humans on our program, before going out somewhere or other. okay, now i am going to finish doing my laundry, which cost 7 euros for a load. it is very expensive in paris, did i mention that? the food is great and everyone is beautiful and you will spend 30 euros every day just by breathing. also, euros are worth more than dollars; that is important to remember. 1 euro does not equal one dollar. good? okay, great. a demain!!