I live in Parisian maids quarters, a room slightly smaller than an average dorm room with a bed 4 feet off the ground and a sink taking up half of the room. I have done some hasty measurements and after subtracting the space my bed,desk and sink take up I believe that I have roughly 9 square feet for activities. Should I leave my lacrosse bag, backpack, towel or shoes on the ground, I lose another 2 feet of floor space bringing me down to a grand total of seven square feet allowing roughly enough room to lie on the floor and make half a snow angel.
Facts like this are the kinds of thing that leave loving mothers lying awake at night . Should I have told my mother that I am living in an over sized dog crate, that cereal is a staple food group or that I have been using an old pair of boxers as a napkin I would have, without a doubt, caused my mother needless worry. That is why upon arriving in Paris I, like so many college students do each year, practiced what I like to call ” Selective Informing.”
Selective informing is what students practice each and every time their mother asks “what did you do this weekend.” Selective informing is what I did when I sent my mother pictures of my room in Paris. This is what I sent her ( to the right):
The picture to the right is the view from my window, which despite the overall size of my room is quite nice.This of course is what I e-mailed my mother when she asked for a photo of my room, not a realistic interpretation of what my room looks like but I have enjoyed keeping things vague and keeping my loving mother slightly in the dark. After all, this is not lying, just truth bending.
On the brighter side of things my 7 feet of floor space is the only thing even close to negative about my life in Paris. Ok, perhaps not completely true because I did buy a 7euro cup of coffee my first week here ( if you’re an idiot, noob things like that happen) but once you get your bearings and locate the discount superma
rkets Paris has a lot to offer. For those interested in traveling to Paris and spending any amount of time here I would like to shed just a little bit of light on supermarket hierarchy. On the more expensive end we have Monoprix, slightly below it we have Franprix and then Ed and Leaderprice at the most affordable level.Look for this friendly logo in order to maximize euro-savings. If you have any trouble finding something just ask one of the clerks in whatever broken french you have…what you’re looking for is usually in a box somewhere yet to be unpacked. “Yet to be” makes it seem like it may, at some point, actually ever make it out of the box so perhaps that wasn’t the correct phrasing. What I meant to say was ” in a box somewhere never to be unpacked.” Ah yes, it’s called leader price not “leader service” for a reason.
- French Lax reppin the 75000
Once I figured out how to save the moola I started french lacrosse fall ball. Those two things aren’t really related but they did happen in that order. Although this lacks some of the intensity that Conn. Lax does ( just a quick shout out to the Conn Lax team, Coach Cornell and Mr. Kapitulik…keep it real) it’s been nice to use lacrosse as a means to overcome a language barrier. The French team has helped me a lot with my french as well as getting acclimated to the city. Here is a picture of the most legit European Lax team around:
As If I couldn’t make this post any more disjointed I would just like to say that if anyone is a fan of Takashi Murakami his weird ass art is on display at Versailles…I suggest making a weekend out of it.I promise, for you avid blog readers( please, cool it with the fan mail, I’m only one man), that I will describe everything in vivid details with eloquent phrasing and super descriptive Hemingway-like prose. Until I find the time to do it though I hope this small sampling will leave everyone on the edge of their seat anxiously anticipating more.
May the bro’s be with you,
Rod
