Arriving, the excitement of a new place

September 18, 2007

I hope that everyone knows the feeling of landing in a new airport and being amazed. If you had no idea that the plane was moving and you were just waiting in a tube shaped capsule for 8 hours, then stepping out of that capsule is somewhat of a shock. Well, landing in Charles de Gaulle is a shock.

Firstly, when I imagine the whole voyage via a Google Earth trip, it amazes me that I am on a whole other side of the planet. Secondly, Charles de Gaulle airport is extremely awful. If you can imagine a worse airport experience, I feel sorry for you. It is even unappreciated by the French who must deal with those horrible airport employees, taxi drivers, and bus drivers. If it's bad for the French, then imagine a foreigner who must deal with it in another language.

Tara and I took a taxi into Paris because dealing with a train while carrying these huge bags would be a hassle. I must say that the only time that Parisian taxi drivers are pleasant is when they are driving. Apart from that, they are a bunch of jackasses. They don't help put your bags in the car. They don't exactly make you feel like they want to take you somewhere, as if it wasn't in their job description. If you are going to someplace where they don't want to go, they just say no, c'est pas possible, and drive away.

Finally getting into the city limits, I thought to myself, I am going to live here. I am going to be walking in these streets, shopping in these little stores, hustling and bustling with the rest of the Parisians.

We got dropped off in this small street in the 20th arrondisement. Surveying my surroundings, I just couldn't help but thinking, this is all so French and Parisian. The doors, the windows, the pipes on the outside of the building, I couldn't imagine it being the same elsewhere.

So the plan was to go to this apartment that she had arranged by way of a friend. She could stay there while looking for an apartment. I was going to stay there for just a few hours in order to get some rest before heading out to the hostel I had planned on staying in. If the voyage didn't merit some rest, then carrying up hundreds of pounds of baggage to the fifth floor where this apartment was located did merit it.

Five floors, what a pain, but what a view. Tara and I opened the window and looked out. There were no Parisian monuments in view, but we both had the feeling, a feeling so strong we both had to just say it. "We are in Paris." "We ARE in Paris." "This is amazing."

The chimneys were everywhere. The buildings were just planted next to each other in a patchwork manner. A cat was meowing. The varying roof levels just asked for someone to make an obstacle course out of them (parkour). Then the sun broke through the clouds giving me a sense of calm which was very much in order given the past few days.

After a few hours of waiting there and just breathing in the new air, I finally decided to head out to the place where I planned to stay for the following few nights. So, down again.

Walking my bags to the nearest metro gave me a chance to be on the Parisian streets. It also gave me a chance to see some more of the Paris that is away from the tourists. Despite being on a rather small side street, there was still quite a bit of foot traffic. Curving around the bend, I saw some youths and was wondering if they might give me hard time as I'm obviously carrying two big hey-I'm-a-tourist bags. Well, they were cool and just chilling outside of their school. The street was crowded with cars and pedestrians. The sidewalk descended in elevation to the metro station. This also made it difficult to manage the bags without bumping into old women doing their shopping or old men smoking their pipes or cigarettes on the street.

The metro is fun for me. It's a game, a sport. In fact, I feel as though I've been trained in public transportation in the French system. What does that mean? It means I don't mind having physical contact with others. I use eye and body language to communicate in addition to vocally communicating. When boarding and leaving the train, don't mind your other passengers, just do what you can to get on or get off. It really doesn't have to be that difficult. It also doesn't need to be an object of complaint.

This leads me to a series of questions that a lot of French people ask me. They first ask me, "Am I enjoying France?" Then, they ask me, "Do you miss America?" Then a few questions such as, "What do you like in France, what do you dislike in France, what do you like in America, what do you dislike in America?" and finally to the concluding question of "Which is better?" These series of questions really annoy me, because no one wants to hear me answer each one in detail, I could go on for hours. So, I usually say, "Yes, no, cheese, everything is closed on Sunday, my friends and family, George Bush, and neither."