The last four days of my 2-month sojourn were in Paris. Or, rather, around Paris. The first 2 nights were in the 92; the last 2 in the 93. For the latter, you can say "quatre-vignt-treize", but the cool way to say it is "neuf trois". It's a rougher part of Paris, "la banlieue chaude", the part that had some really cool fireworks a couple years back--car burning and whatnot.
No riots while I was there. "Riot" in Froggy is "émeute"; "chaud" means dangerous; "beu" means weed.
I was staying out there in the ghetto with a friend I met in Chicago. All my French friends I met in Chicago. Or somewhere else. But few did I meet in France. And rarely without an introduction. Frédérique (Fréd), I met while doing the bike tour. But she wasn't on the tour, just standing around near Buckingham Fountain. I heard her say something in a French accent and started talking to her. I think we only hung out once: right before she left (the city, the country), we met for tea at Argo Tea. I also got to meet some other American she met; good thing she met me too or she'd think we're all crazy.
So I didn't know her all that well but still far better than I knew most of my couchsurf hosts. I certainly feel like I know her--we've been friends on Facebook for a year or more--but I still don't know much about how she functions and what makes her tick.
The first night, I met her at the train station as she got back from Annecy. If that town sounds familiar, it's because I went there with Lisa about a month earlier. Her family either lives there or owns a house; Fréd goes a couple times a summer much like I go to New Buffalo. So she was back from a weekend away, suddenly thrust into hosting duties for some dirty, couchsurfing American.
Her apartment was well outside Paris--halfway to Charles de Gaule--and more rundown than I was expecting. She is only there temporarily, has been living there for a couple of months after getting a surprise job. Soon, she hopes to find a permanent place in Paris. As such, its furnishings are mostly from the landlord, including the mattress on the floor in the kitchen/dining room where I slept. I've slept in worse places.
We didn't have much time to talk when I first arrived, but the second night, she met me at a couchsurfing event and tore me away from some new friends [later when I returned, the bar was overflowing with CSers]. We found a cute place to eat that wasn't too overpriced just north of Les Halles--close to the rue Montorgueil but not on it. [That, by the way, is a bustling ped mall with restaurants packed in like sweaty Parisians on the metro. Don't remember it being that way in 2000; now it seems a little too trendy, well-known, possibly even touristy.]
The conversation was surprisingly deep and broad--good thing: I'd been through a 1001 surface-level conversations and was craving something more substantial. We talked about relationships mostly--my favorite conversation topic. She had just gotten into a relationship after getting royally dumped a year earlier; I was just about on the way out of a relationship with Lisa, with whom I traveled to Annecy with. Fréd was in a 2-year relationship, maybe longer, and got dumped via text on Christmas. Terrible. And, as she said, it took her a year, but she got over it and opened herself up to the possibility of finding someone and then did.
At the time, I found her story of heartbreak to be more calamitous than mine, but now I'm not so sure. Getting dumped after 2 years is certainly negative, but I'm thinking more about negative reinforcement. Say old man Pavlov gave his dogs a shock 2 hours after eating; they won't necessarily associate the eating and the shock. My shock came just at the moment of falling in love--just as the dog was savoring the meet juices running down its throat. As such, I haven't been able to get much past a couple months (weeks) without having a Pavlovian reflex of panic.
When you travel, you think you're meeting people, but really you're meeting yourself.
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