The long-awaited arrival of springtime was accompanied by another long-awaited arrival: that of one Lauren Feliz. Five summers ago (it seems like just yesterday…), Lauren and I were together in Paris on he choir tour we did through Woodson. She breezed into Paris again on Saturday in her LA finest, complete with Ugg boots (I didn’t even know what they were before she told me), slick sunglasses that don’t really block sun, and confident walk that I have missed. Our polar-opposite personalities and styles clash so obviously, it makes me smile when I think of how we are still close friends. I picked her up right in front of the Arc de Triomphe, where the bus leaves off, and thus the adventure begins.
I took her to her lovely little hostel right in the heart of the Marais quarter in Paris and not too far from me by metro. We dropped off her stuff and started walking around and exploring a little. Her resistance to the charms, beauty and grandeur of the city had not improved and she fell quickly into that romantic swoon and awe-struck excitement that I have neither seen nor felt any other city create. We walked down Rue de Rivoli and she bought a black leather scooter jacket and a scarf, making a quick transfer from LA to Parisian style. We then walked down boulevard St. Germain past all the ritzy boutiques and apartments, and then all the cheaper ones for the students at the nearby Sorbonne. It was a little cold for her SoCal blood, and she was rapturously praising her jacket and its virtues while we walked. She also kept saying how she felt like she was in a flashback or in a movie. This I point out only to prove that it’s not just me, this city does something to everyone’s head.
I dropped her back off so she could nap before dinner and then came back to get her with Patrice. We all went out for sushi and then into the St. Germain quarter again for a little bar action. I walked into the bar first and managed to get us a table, but that’s about where my leadership stopped. Lauren walked right up to the bar and started giving that bartender drink orders like she owned the place. She pointed at each of us in turn and in her ROTC voice said “what do you want” while relaying to the bartender what we said. We probably could have ordered ourselves since we were all right at the counter waiting for the table to clear, but she held that bartender’s attention like she had him by the ear and our drinks arrived pretty quickly afterwards. Her hostel has a 1am curfew for which I am secretly thankful otherwise I think I would be destroyed from tiredness every morning. Thankfully I was at home and asleep by 2.
The next morning I got up and ran part of the Paris Marathon in support of my friend Corey who ran the whole thing. I got about 10 miles then I had to head back in my direction to get Lauren and start the day. We went to Palm Sunday service at the American Cathedral of Paris, right off of Champs Elysées in a beautiful neo-gothic cathedral. The choir selections were uplifting and well-performed. They even had a piece Lauren and I had sung on the tour in Notre Dame. Since it was so sunny out I decided we should walk to the Musée d’Orsay which we did. The line was too long so we kept moving to the Musée Rodin. All the museums were free, it being the first Sunday of the month, so they were crowded but still lovely. Lauren and I walked around the gardens and through the museum and talked, admired, and laughed. It feels so good to be able to share this city with someone who can appreciate it and get as excited as I was when I first started discovering it.
After the museum we walked to the Jardin du Luxembourg which was teeming with people out enjoying the day. It happened to be Tartan Day (in honor of the Queen’s visit) so I was elated to discover Scottish and Irish clans out in force and in traditional garb playing “Scotland the Brave” and "Amazing Grace” on their bagpipes and drums. There’s something about bagpipes that I absolutely love, whether it’s their sound, the tunes that are played on them, or just the images of rolling green hills, friendly people, and Braveheart that they call to mind. Lauren was not as interested as I was but I made her stay for all the songs they played and follow their processional through the gardens with me. This is part of the give and take we've grown used to in our friendship.
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| Tartan Day in the Jardin du Luxembourg |
I returned to pick her up at around 8pm with little picnic at her hostel. We had a great time and George and Corey met up with us a little later to help us finish off the massive amount of food I made. Then we all decided to go take a walk around the Seine islands and enjoy the city lit up at night. We had a great time with only one minor incident.
This minor incident we thought was going to end up a major incident. We were sitting on a bench by the Seine looking at Notre Dame and talking, waving at the people on the Bateaux Mouches sailing by, having a great time, and then the cops pull up. They get out of the car and ask for all our identification cards. There were three of them, two men and a lady. I am laughing writing this now, but at the time I was more than a little anxious for our futures in Paris, especially the immediate future which I suspected contained incarceration. Addressing us in French, they explained that they had stopped us because they thought Corey was peeing against a wall. While this illegal action is an extremely normal occurrence, men are commonly seen relieving themselves on the sides of buildings, in metro stations, and in between cars in broad daylight, Corey does not subscribe to this practice. So they were telling him that public urination is strictly forbidden and the woman kept breaking in saying she would rather him go in the Seine, the fish don’t care. She started muttering that people pee everywhere in Paris and she doesn’t understand why. They then told us have a good night, got in their car and drove away. I was stifling a laugh from the time I heard the woman go off about public urination and it was clear that we weren’t going to get arrested, until they were a few feet past us in the car. Then I couldn’t hold it in any longer. I caught Corey’s eye and we both started laughing. I think the officers were laughing too a little but those first few seconds were absolutely terrifying for me.
After our little run-in with the law we stayed a little longer, then parted because we had work the next day, Monday. Lauren spent her day with some girls from her hostel, shopping and walking around Montmartre. She was asleep when I went to her hostel to meet her at 7:30. We ate a pick-up dinner and then ended up in the Bastille area hanging out at my favorite café talking when most of the girls in Lauren’s room at the hostel came in and we all hung out and had a great time. There was a girl from Germany who has just come to live in France, a girl from China studying in London who was spending her vacation here, and two girls from Mexico who were hilarious and told us that the Mojitos at the bar were the real deal. In short it was a lively and talkative evening. Being around so many different accents I noticed that Lauren has this thing where when she hears people speaking in an accent or in another language, she immediately responds to them in English, but with their same accent. I wasn’t sure if she heard it or not so I pointed it out to her and she started laughing because it’s true. A sample conversation:
Lauren: I would like 10 metro tickets.
Metro Guy: Yees, for Parees?
Lauren: Yees. How muuch ees eet?
Metro Guy: Ten uros.
Lauren: Okeh, heah ees twenty uros. You haf change, yees? Mehci.
The next day I enlisted Corey to show Lauren around the town while I was at work. Corey only has obligations two days per week contrary to the rest of us. I should have known better than to let her impressionable mind fall into the clutches of a sinister tour guide. The rest of the museums being closed on Tuesdays, I found out later that they ended up at the Erotica museum. I need not elaborate. Apparently I was to be the recipient of some choice items from the gift shop, but Lauren talked herself and Corey out of it, thinking that I may not react favorably.
I met up with Lauren at the Opera Garnier so we could get tickets for the ballet that night (a bit of a change of venue from earlier that day). It was the same story as last time, we got really bad seats for 6 euros and could only see a little bit of the stage but it was still pretty. We left around 11 and went to a Scottish pub right near her hostel to watch a soccer game and then we split up for the night.
The next day Corey took Lauren to the Pompidou center and they explored there for a few hours and then we tried to get tickets to La Traviata but they were completely and utterly sold out. Lauren, undaunted, took it upon herself to make her last night in Paris memorable and memorable it was. She managed to strike up a conversation with the sketchiest people in Paris between the Opera Bastille and her hostel (one metro stop, three conversations). We went to Bar Sans Nom and sat around for a good while and then we had to get back because the metro was going to close. I was only sending her one metro stop in the other direction and she refused my accompaniment multiple times so I let her go by herself. I told her she was strictly forbidden to talk to anyone on her way back. Guys in Paris take a conversation as an open invitation to follow and persist, especially when you’re very pretty and dressed to party as Lauren was. She insists that I don’t have to be worried for her, she can take out anyone who messes with her, which I believe, but I still didn’t really like the idea of her going alone. I convinced myself it was only one metro stop and told her exactly what to do to get back. I must have told her at least 20 times to not talk to anyone, and if anyone talked to her, to ignore them. Well, I left her for all of 30 seconds to go to my side of the platform to wait for the metro in the other direction and by the time I came out on the other side, she had already struck up a conversation with someone. THIRTY SECONDS and she had already done the one thing I told her NOT to do. Parents, I am beginning to understand the trials and tribulations you go through on a daily basis. And I also discovered how much of a mom I am when it comes to Lauren.
The next day I had taken off from my internship and I got to Lauren’s hostel and was pleased to find her alive, in one piece, and not with any sketchy foreigners. We already had our stuff together for Barcelona to leave that night. We walked around and through some more streets. We sat in a café and got tea, talked some more, basically just enjoyed the sunny weather and the excitement of reuniting the Twinbrook Triumverate of Power. I took Lauren back to her hostel so she could take her daily nap and then check out. I met up with her again, suitcase in hand, two blondes with about 10 words of Spanish between us ready to take on Barcelona.
To be continued…
This minor incident we thought was going to end up a major incident. We were sitting on a bench by the Seine looking at Notre Dame and talking, waving at the people on the Bateaux Mouches sailing by, having a great time, and then the cops pull up. They get out of the car and ask for all our identification cards. There were three of them, two men and a lady. I am laughing writing this now, but at the time I was more than a little anxious for our futures in Paris, especially the immediate future which I suspected contained incarceration. Addressing us in French, they explained that they had stopped us because they thought Corey was peeing against a wall. While this illegal action is an extremely normal occurrence, men are commonly seen relieving themselves on the sides of buildings, in metro stations, and in between cars in broad daylight, Corey does not subscribe to this practice. So they were telling him that public urination is strictly forbidden and the woman kept breaking in saying she would rather him go in the Seine, the fish don’t care. She started muttering that people pee everywhere in Paris and she doesn’t understand why. They then told us have a good night, got in their car and drove away. I was stifling a laugh from the time I heard the woman go off about public urination and it was clear that we weren’t going to get arrested, until they were a few feet past us in the car. Then I couldn’t hold it in any longer. I caught Corey’s eye and we both started laughing. I think the officers were laughing too a little but those first few seconds were absolutely terrifying for me.
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| The almost-convicts. |
Lauren: I would like 10 metro tickets.
Metro Guy: Yees, for Parees?
Lauren: Yees. How muuch ees eet?
Metro Guy: Ten uros.
Lauren: Okeh, heah ees twenty uros. You haf change, yees? Mehci.
The next day I enlisted Corey to show Lauren around the town while I was at work. Corey only has obligations two days per week contrary to the rest of us. I should have known better than to let her impressionable mind fall into the clutches of a sinister tour guide. The rest of the museums being closed on Tuesdays, I found out later that they ended up at the Erotica museum. I need not elaborate. Apparently I was to be the recipient of some choice items from the gift shop, but Lauren talked herself and Corey out of it, thinking that I may not react favorably.
I met up with Lauren at the Opera Garnier so we could get tickets for the ballet that night (a bit of a change of venue from earlier that day). It was the same story as last time, we got really bad seats for 6 euros and could only see a little bit of the stage but it was still pretty. We left around 11 and went to a Scottish pub right near her hostel to watch a soccer game and then we split up for the night.
The next day Corey took Lauren to the Pompidou center and they explored there for a few hours and then we tried to get tickets to La Traviata but they were completely and utterly sold out. Lauren, undaunted, took it upon herself to make her last night in Paris memorable and memorable it was. She managed to strike up a conversation with the sketchiest people in Paris between the Opera Bastille and her hostel (one metro stop, three conversations). We went to Bar Sans Nom and sat around for a good while and then we had to get back because the metro was going to close. I was only sending her one metro stop in the other direction and she refused my accompaniment multiple times so I let her go by herself. I told her she was strictly forbidden to talk to anyone on her way back. Guys in Paris take a conversation as an open invitation to follow and persist, especially when you’re very pretty and dressed to party as Lauren was. She insists that I don’t have to be worried for her, she can take out anyone who messes with her, which I believe, but I still didn’t really like the idea of her going alone. I convinced myself it was only one metro stop and told her exactly what to do to get back. I must have told her at least 20 times to not talk to anyone, and if anyone talked to her, to ignore them. Well, I left her for all of 30 seconds to go to my side of the platform to wait for the metro in the other direction and by the time I came out on the other side, she had already struck up a conversation with someone. THIRTY SECONDS and she had already done the one thing I told her NOT to do. Parents, I am beginning to understand the trials and tribulations you go through on a daily basis. And I also discovered how much of a mom I am when it comes to Lauren.
The next day I had taken off from my internship and I got to Lauren’s hostel and was pleased to find her alive, in one piece, and not with any sketchy foreigners. We already had our stuff together for Barcelona to leave that night. We walked around and through some more streets. We sat in a café and got tea, talked some more, basically just enjoyed the sunny weather and the excitement of reuniting the Twinbrook Triumverate of Power. I took Lauren back to her hostel so she could take her daily nap and then check out. I met up with her again, suitcase in hand, two blondes with about 10 words of Spanish between us ready to take on Barcelona.
To be continued…
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