France
Well, well, well! For those of you who don’t know, I’m in France and unlike other logs this one does not mark the end of my time here. Instead this log marks the beginning of a whole new phase of my trip.I’ve spent the last year (well, almost a year) gallivanting about in all these wonderful places, seeing new things, finding new places to stay, meeting new people, getting to understand a different country’s infrastructure and rules and while I’ve had enough pit stops along the way that I’m not exhausted, I think I do qualify as a weary traveler (oh how I long for a West of the Andes sandwich from old Weary). I’m two weeks short of a year and my wonderful Papermate pen has finally run out of ink; my handy, dandy notebook from Ecuador is finally full; my round-the-world ticket is set to expire and I am well sick and tired of having to find a new place to stay every night — SO! I have decided to stay where I am, to spend my remaining 3-4 months living something in between home life and traveling life.
Almost as soon as I’d officially decided what I wanted all the pieces started falling into place. After arriving in Paris (and marveling at the fact that it is as beautiful as all the stories make it seem), I headed to Lyon to check it out as a possible place to hang around for a while and was pleasantly surprised by a city built at the meeting of two rivers, with tons to do and a not-too-expensive French school and lots of students looking for apartments. My first day of looking I met a Swedish girl who will be studying Economics until Christmas and we had the very good fortune of finding the apartment of our dreams. And while there were a few significant bumps along the way and we thought the dream apartment was simply to good to be true, it finally worked out and we have moved in and made ourselves quite at home!
So, picture this, if you will: standing at a wide-open window with little lace curtains looking out over red tile roofs and chimneys (think chimney-sweep scene from Mary Poppins, but more colorful); there’s a cathedral straight ahead, a smaller kind of Gothic church further on, and a big thing up the hill that vaguely resembles the big castle at Disneyland; there’s and a river and a city off to your left, of which you mostly see more tiled roofs; there’s some ratatouille stewing on the stove behind you; a few strains from the accordion player down on the street mixes with the music from Amelie as as the sun sets and you sip your wine and wonder how it was that you got to be so very lucky. It promises to be a very good life here in Lyon.
I am officially a student again for the next three months. I have registered and paid for my classes, taken a test for the first time in many years, bought my books and await my student card. A life with some semblance of routine lies not too far ahead of me and I relish the thought, the thought of getting up at the same time everyday in the same bed and getting into the same perfectly normal shower with guaranteed hot water, the thought of buying something in the large size because it’s cheaper and I will actually have the opportunity to both store it and eat it, the thought of cooking in my own kitchen when I want to and grabbing something to eat in my own neighborhood if I don’t, the thought of walking around Old Lyon and knowing that I’m one of the people strolling on the cobblestone alleys and gazing at diners on the sidewalks who can call this little part of Lyon their own. I don’t have a phone, but I do have a mailbox. I also have keys and seven flights of old stone stairs to walk up/down every day. I have an old Italian landlady who speaks with such a thick Italian accent I can just barely understand her. I have unpacked my bag and do not plan on filling it back up again until the journey homeward in December. Maybe this all seems very undramatic to you, but to me they are all signs of a different life and a very dramatic change in my standard of living. (It does bear mentioning though that the toilette for this particular apartment seems to have been imported from India - something Martina, my Swedish roommate, and I have yet to fully accept.)
So, for the next few months, Lyon is the place to be! I have a bunch of family and might-as-well-be-family folk coming around the last two weeks of November and a few other friends also coming for a French holiday and their one chance to see what promises to be the best apartment of my life (in character, if not grandeur) and this lovely city filled with culture and fantastic food! Anyone else who’s interested drop me a line! The apartment is fairly tiny, but there’s floor space for one or two, plus there’s accommodation for all budgets in Lyon. So, I hope to be a good excuse for anyone who needs an extra nudge to head to France this fall!
NEXT STOP? Nowhere! I’m staying right here!
August 26, 2004 in Europe
