For years I have been obsessed (well, maybe not obsessed exactly, maybe more like "recurrently titillated") by accounts of foreigners in France. Especially Paris. I blame Hemingway.
In particular, I love it when foreigners explain the mystery that is the French(wo)man and his/her unique vision du monde. I'm not being ironic, I do actually find it eye-opening. In fact, I have a little project sous le coude that is not entirely unrelated to this issue. But more about that later.
So after the NY Times' Guide to the French, I bring you culinary author David Lebovitz's "15 Things I'd Miss About Paris If I Moved Away" (go read the detail on his blog, you'll love it):
1. The dorky sense of fashion (prevalent in a slightly older segment of the population)
2. The lack of wacky diets and exercise freaks (we love carbs and fatty cheeses)
3. Vélib' (Res confession time: I still haven't tried it, being more of a (fabulous) shoe on sidewalk kinda girl)
4. Les jeunes hommes with impossibly small waistlines (well, ummm, actually I prefer my men not to be thinner than me...)
5. The brusque-ness (yes)
6. The sense of humour (sometimes)
7. The butter (especially if employed in the making of a croissant)
8. The cheap (and drinkable) wine (obviously)
9. The lack of beating-around-the-bush (or "turning around the pot", as I like to call it; goes with the brusque-ness, if you're thinking something, just say it!)
10. You can get anything you want by flirting (in fact, sometimes the only way to get what you want is by flirting; consider it a rite of passage)
11. The volatility (for those puritan Anglos who may not have heard of it, it's called "passion"; the Spanish will know what I'm talking about)
12. Dining in restaurants (especially with cheap and drinkable wine)
13. Cafés (toujours)
14. Cutting in line (what line?)
and
15. The bakeries (ok, now I've gone and made myself hungry)
Now it's your turn. If you're a foreigner in Paris, or used to be a foreigner in Paris (interpret that how you wish), what are the things you'd miss?
Jul 11, 2009
SPF - Apologies for the fromage
Don’t feel guilty if you don’t know what you want to do with your life. The most interesting people I know didn’t know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives; some of the most interesting 40 year olds I know still don’t.
- Baz Luhrmann
I know you've been hurting, but I've been waiting to be there for you...
- Nigel Swanston, Tim Cox
Jul 9, 2009
Alpha-ville
I've always worked in a male-dominated environment. In fact, I've mostly grown up, studied and socialised in male-dominated environments as well. Sometimes it feels like my environment is so male-dominated, that even the girls are guys.
When I say male, I don't mean just physiologically having all the right bits, or being loud, brash, football-loving, beer-drinking hooligans (though sometimes they are). No, when I say male, I mean alpha-male.
As in:
Emotions are for pansies
Abuse just makes you stronger
I make all the obligatory, PC noises about work-life balance but balance is for pansies
I bring my blackberry into the delivery room
I'm on a conference call when I go into surgery
I show up to work straight from my mother's funeral
I eat pansies for breakfast
Now I have been called an "alpha-bitch" in the past (at least once that I know of, and probably several times behind my back) but in reality I'm just a big girl. It's a chronic condition, but one that's been getting more acute with age. Now I cry at work. Regularly. For stupid reasons like getting yelled at, dumped by email during a meeting or being severely sleep-deprived. I also get sick. Like now. When that happens, I end up stranded in bed with my mother's chicken soup, feeling utterly useless. And none of my team's cheerful "relax and get well soon" emails are making me feel any less useless.
Maybe I'm not so good at the alpha game. I'm pretty sure the alpha-males never feel useless. And they never get sick. Getting sick is for pansies.
When I say male, I don't mean just physiologically having all the right bits, or being loud, brash, football-loving, beer-drinking hooligans (though sometimes they are). No, when I say male, I mean alpha-male.
As in:
Emotions are for pansies
Abuse just makes you stronger
I make all the obligatory, PC noises about work-life balance but balance is for pansies
I bring my blackberry into the delivery room
I'm on a conference call when I go into surgery
I show up to work straight from my mother's funeral
I eat pansies for breakfast
Now I have been called an "alpha-bitch" in the past (at least once that I know of, and probably several times behind my back) but in reality I'm just a big girl. It's a chronic condition, but one that's been getting more acute with age. Now I cry at work. Regularly. For stupid reasons like getting yelled at, dumped by email during a meeting or being severely sleep-deprived. I also get sick. Like now. When that happens, I end up stranded in bed with my mother's chicken soup, feeling utterly useless. And none of my team's cheerful "relax and get well soon" emails are making me feel any less useless.
Maybe I'm not so good at the alpha game. I'm pretty sure the alpha-males never feel useless. And they never get sick. Getting sick is for pansies.
Jul 5, 2009
Letters
I finally wrote a letter to my friend M today. That's post-worthy for two reasons. First, because when I say I wrote a letter, I actually mean a letter. Not a facebook message. Not an email. Not a skype-text. An actual letter with a piece of paper that I scribbled on myself, with a pen, before putting it in an envelope, licking it shut (I'd forgotten that tangy, unpleasant taste that envelopes have) and popping a stamp on it. A real 1990s experience.
The second reason for posting about my letter to M is he's the one who upped and left his law-firm life, decided to use his legal skills in the service of his country and is now at some undisclosed location in Afghanistan. This is not some big, beefy guy who enjoyed playing wargames on his Playstation and decided to try out the real thing. This guy is your typical, 30-something slightly unfit lawyer (or he was, anyway; the latest pictures seem to suggest that becoming a soldier is even more effective than shelling out for a personal trainer).
In any event, there he is, in some hot, arid place where people who don't know how incredibly funny he can be have decided they don't like him and are employing their best efforts to blow him to pieces.
Given those circumstances, I found the letter-writing a bit tricky. What do you say to someone whose daily life is now mostly filled with trying not to get killed? What exactly is the right tone? Is there an etiquette book that has a chapter on "writing war letters" that women in the 40s used as a handy reference text?
Well, M being M, and me being me, I went for funny. Hopefully that was the right call.
* * *
For fun, a few words from Emily Post on the subject of letter-writing, published in 1922:
THE ART of general letter-writing in the present day is shrinking until the letter threatens to become a telegram, a telephone message, a post-card... to-day people don’t care a bit whether they write well or ill. Mental effort is one thing that the younger generation of the “smart world” seems to consider it unreasonable to ask—and just as it is the fashion to let their spines droop until they suggest nothing so much as Tenniel’s drawing in Alice in Wonderland of the caterpillar sitting on the toad-stool—so do they let their mental faculties relax, slump and atrophy.
And to close, Ms. Post's invaluable counsel...
Of course the best advice to a young girl who is impelled to write letters to men, can be put in one word, don’t!
The second reason for posting about my letter to M is he's the one who upped and left his law-firm life, decided to use his legal skills in the service of his country and is now at some undisclosed location in Afghanistan. This is not some big, beefy guy who enjoyed playing wargames on his Playstation and decided to try out the real thing. This guy is your typical, 30-something slightly unfit lawyer (or he was, anyway; the latest pictures seem to suggest that becoming a soldier is even more effective than shelling out for a personal trainer).
In any event, there he is, in some hot, arid place where people who don't know how incredibly funny he can be have decided they don't like him and are employing their best efforts to blow him to pieces.
Given those circumstances, I found the letter-writing a bit tricky. What do you say to someone whose daily life is now mostly filled with trying not to get killed? What exactly is the right tone? Is there an etiquette book that has a chapter on "writing war letters" that women in the 40s used as a handy reference text?
Well, M being M, and me being me, I went for funny. Hopefully that was the right call.
* * *
For fun, a few words from Emily Post on the subject of letter-writing, published in 1922:
THE ART of general letter-writing in the present day is shrinking until the letter threatens to become a telegram, a telephone message, a post-card... to-day people don’t care a bit whether they write well or ill. Mental effort is one thing that the younger generation of the “smart world” seems to consider it unreasonable to ask—and just as it is the fashion to let their spines droop until they suggest nothing so much as Tenniel’s drawing in Alice in Wonderland of the caterpillar sitting on the toad-stool—so do they let their mental faculties relax, slump and atrophy.
And to close, Ms. Post's invaluable counsel...
Of course the best advice to a young girl who is impelled to write letters to men, can be put in one word, don’t!
Jul 1, 2009
Grand Place
One of the bizarre things about this job is sometimes you come to, give your eyes a good rub, and realize you're in a completely different city than you thought you were supposed to be in.
Today, that city is Brussels.
This morning, I once again got a 7am Eurostar, this time from London to the land of the Manneken Pis for a meeting. One meeting. One day. Return to the UK scheduled in time to hit a birthday party in the evening.
But over lunch, somewhere in between my leak soup and the overcooked spaghetti, plans changed and it was decided we would stay overnight. So here I am. Spending the night in Brussels before another big client meeting tomorrow. And having packed.... absolutely nothing. (Think about that one for a while... There you go... Not ideal.)
On a positive (and rather ironic) note, though, this hotel wins the prize for nicest hotel I have stayed in in the past five weeks (out of five). A particularly big hit with me are the Magritte prints in the bedroom and the Tintin figurines in the bathroom. Two Siskel and Ebert thumbs up for the Amigo.
Today, that city is Brussels.
This morning, I once again got a 7am Eurostar, this time from London to the land of the Manneken Pis for a meeting. One meeting. One day. Return to the UK scheduled in time to hit a birthday party in the evening.
But over lunch, somewhere in between my leak soup and the overcooked spaghetti, plans changed and it was decided we would stay overnight. So here I am. Spending the night in Brussels before another big client meeting tomorrow. And having packed.... absolutely nothing. (Think about that one for a while... There you go... Not ideal.)
On a positive (and rather ironic) note, though, this hotel wins the prize for nicest hotel I have stayed in in the past five weeks (out of five). A particularly big hit with me are the Magritte prints in the bedroom and the Tintin figurines in the bathroom. Two Siskel and Ebert thumbs up for the Amigo.
Jun 30, 2009
Stream of Un-Consciousness
Gaaaaarrrgghh - Damn alarm - Have to get up already? - Why's alarm so loud? - F***... really loud now, what's going on? - Hold on, that's not the alarm - That's the fire alarm - Why is the fire alarm on? - Is it already 5am? - Do I need to catch my train? - Wait, no, I'm in London already - Fire alarm's still on - Maybe I need to get up? - What time is it? Midnight? - OK, getting up now, have to go evacuate - Wait - Maybe shouldn't go downstairs in underwear and flimsy pj T-shirt thing - How about I put on the bathrobe - And hotel slippers - Why are hotel slippers always so big? They should make small hotel slippers - On second thought, might look a bit strange if I go downstairs in the bathrobe - OK, putting on sweatpants and fleece now - Keep the slippers, though - Do I need to take anything with me? - God, that alarm is loud - Don't know what I should take with me - Hey, how about the Blackberry? - OK, out the door now - That large man in a pink shirt is saying something and pointing - Ah, right, fire exit, thanks dude - Hmm, it's actually quite warm outside - Taking my fleece off - Oh wait, am only wearing flimsy pj T-shirt underneath - Keep fleece on, then - Wow, loads of people down here in bathrobes - They look a bit silly - Those other people must have come from the bar, they look really nice - I look like shit in my sweatpants and fleece - But better than those people in bathrobes - God, I'm tired - Hey, look at that, I took my Blackberry with me - How about a little facebook status update - Still really tired - Oh, the firemen are here now - Wonder if there's actually a fire - Not sure the Blackberry was the right thing to save, come to think of it - Why don't I use it to take some pictures, though, that will pass the time - OK, this isn't fun, can't we go inside now? - Really want to be in bed - Seriously - Let me back in - Now.
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