Dispatch from the European front Vol. 7

[Efrim]

,ÄúHe (my manager) sat down and had a talk with me. ,ÄòYou gotta decide what you want to do. Do you want to just keep playing museums and the art festivals? Or do you want to start moving into other areas? Lou, don,Äôt you think you should think about it?,Äô So I thought about it, and I fired him.,Äù
-Lou Reed

The sun was coming up over the Eastern horizon and seeing as I was staggering drunk I wasn,Äôt seeing all that much at all. I am certain that the grounds of the Pitie-Salpetriere hospital was gorgeous under that aurora. I,Äôd like to think a bunch of pretty flowers and a well landscaped lawn would speed the recovery of anyone. This hospital had a style totally alien and unknown to the utilitarian hospitals of Illinois.

The strongest English speaker, Pierre, was trying to get my attention ,ÄúWe must go in to this building. Hopefully we will have the good receptionist, otherwise he may betray us.,Äù

This threw me off being less than sober as I was. Betray is a serious, serious word. Were these wild stories on fox news true? Would the mindless French savage simply kill me outright in the middle of this lobby? It would be an ideal place for a cover-up, slip me in the morgue and no one is the wiser. My own government would certainly be less than grieved at my loss and who even knows I,Äôm here anyways?

As I compared and contrasted my options for a funeral service in my head it slowly began to dawn on me that Pierre,Äôs English was obtained in a classroom, as such he would be very literal in his statements and demonstrate a lack of proper conversational synonyms. I felt a tug on my arm as I was instructed to wait in the glass ante-chamber while they talked to the door man who was thankfully just who they wanted him to be.

It,Äôs tough for five drunks to sneak past the room of the floor supervisor but we managed to make it. I was lucky enough to arrive during their Spring break so the halls were mostly empty and the vigilance of the floor watchdogs was greatly lessened.

The students set me up in Pierre,Äôs dorm room. It was a cramped little room but it had all the necessities. Pierre stole 3 foam cushions from the common room and I slept on those with one blanket. It was essentially sleeping on concrete...but free is free and awfully hard to argue with when you,Äôre just scraping by.

As it always does, morning came...although ,Äúmorning,Äù was around 1 pm for us.  For only a few hours of sleep and bad sleep at that I felt unusually chipper. Other members of our raiding crew were much worse off. Pierre and I walked down the hall to the showers and I proceeded to take the coldest shower of my entire life.

Pierre and I walked upstairs to the third floor common room where his friend Luc was sitting and enjoying his breakfast of white bread and chocolate spread while taking deep drags off his cigarette, which, based on the smell, was mixed with hash. Luc exuded a serious cool. He had short, wild black hair and some stubble. It takes a good measure of charisma to exuded cool while wearing a dingy bathrobe and eating white bread.  We were the first to pull ourselves out of bed from the night before so we discussed a wide range of topics, including American slang for an erection (they love the phrase ,Äúboner,Äù) and our shared admiration of Stanley Kubrick. When I got back to the states one of the first things I did was send Luc and Pierre a couple of Clockwork Orange posters.

As we ate and talked our comrades trickled in one by one. The first one up was Brigitte who was a smart, nice girl who spoke fairly good English. There was some complaining about the next girl who came up next (before she arrived, naturally) the airheaded Cecile. I hadn,Äôt noticed anything wrong with the girl because she spoke zero English but as the others translated her questions for me I came to realize all their complaints about her were very well founded.

I believe Cecile was asking me some absurd question about shoes in the United States when Jacqueline walked in with her annoyingly suave boyfriend Julien. Julien wore absurd highway patrol style sunglasses and wore a khaki colored leather jacket. His hair was slicked back with enough oil to deep fry a turkey. Jacqueline was an utter tomboy with short spiky blonde hair and a plain outfit consisting of jeans and a hoodie. They seemed an utter mismatch but I could tell even then that they were very much in love. After some more talk we decided to head out. Before we could leave we had to stop downstairs and wake up Colette from her room.

Colette,Äôs door was wildly decorated on the outside with a multitude of stickers and pictures of men and women who I can only assume were porn stars. Pierre knocked on the door and then steped back quickly as if he had just lit a fuse or felt the hum of a landmine beneath his feet. A woman with long, wild and obviously dyed red hair opened the door. She rested one hand on the top of the door and the other held a cigarette. She wore nothing but a pair of panties and a white half shirt and she was yelling what I latter learned to be something very much like  ,Äúwhat the fuck do you want?,Äù in French.

,ÄúWe,Äôre going out Colette, get dressed.,Äù
,ÄúWhy are you speaking English Pierre? Wait...who,Äôs this? An Englishman?,Äù
,ÄúAmerican. His name is Lance,ÄùShe looked me up and down for a moment like a person kicking the tires on a car.

,ÄúCould be worse.,Äù With that, she said something to Pierre in French and walked back into her room Shutting the door. Pierre turned to me and translated with his own added commentary

,ÄúCrazy Girl...she said something like all the English are homosexual. She says hopefully an American will have some wildness in them. You should take my advice and watch out for that girl.
She,Äôs good for finding something to do so we spend time with her...but I,Äôm surprised that girl is still alive.,Äù

I nodded for show because I  knew that Pierre,Äôs words had fallen on deaf ears. I didn,Äôt fly halfway around the world to hedge my bets. I was on the lam from my own typical life and nothing was going to slow me down, dammit.

Colette took over 20 minutes to get ready and when she came out all she had gained was a pair of black pants and an over shirt. She looked casually brilliant and it was impossible to tell if it was the product of actual serendipity or of methodical execution.

We walked out with a swagger in our step. We all knew were the chosen of the Gods that day. Walking through a beatific garden and then down a path next to the river on a balmy Spring afternoon in Paris...we owned the whole world and no one could convince us otherwise. It,Äôs the kind of beautiful and perfect arrogance only youth provides. We took our time getting to wherever our destination was. The language barrier did not in any way impair my sense that none of us were in any mood to break the feeling of wonder that had befallen us.

Eventually we settled at a side street caf?© and sat around a table where we all ordered cappuccino. Not even Colette felt the need to stir trouble at this point. the night would bring chaos  in large and often dangerous doses. For the time being we sat and engaged in perfectly civil conversation though our subject matter was often less than civil and we did engage in the obligatory hassling of passing tourists (oh, to be on the other side of the looking glass!).

While we were at the table Pierre asked me what Americans thought of the French. I laughed and told him he didn,Äôt want to know but he pressed the issue. I really felt ashamed, these people had taken me in after knowing me for only a few hours and now I had to explain to them why my countrymen had an inexplicable contempt for them. I told him a very gloves on version of the anti-French rhetoric I,Äôve heard but he just laughed it off.

,ÄúYeah, that,Äôs just the way it is,Äù. Pierre clenched his fist and put a sour look on his face, ,ÄúStupid Americans! How is it that you,Äôre one of them?,Äù Pierre started laughing again.

,ÄúYou know, I wonder about that myself sometimes. My country is just like my little brother. Sometimes he is exasperating, but I still love him. ,Äù

Luc looked up from his coffee. ,ÄúThat sounded nice. It would sound so much better in French though...such a pity.,Äù Luc gave me a grin and went back to looking at the cream swirl in his coffee.

We sat at that table and watched the lines of light and shadow creep down the buildings and pavement until it was dusk. We sat there for what must have been at least 4 hours. The American mind has a hard time coming to grips with such a thing. We all want our service and we want it now and we want to get right back to frittering away our lives. Sometimes the apparent waste of four hours taking slow sips from a coffee mug and talking is in all truth the best imaginable use of time. The lack of this appreciation for a slower pace has always been one of my central problems with the American temperament. We are a gaudy people with far too little appreciation for aesthetic.

That afternoon was a true indulgence of the finest order. I felt refreshed and fully recovered from my previous madness. None of this stopped me from creating more havoc that night though. My new friends and I still had a long and brutal night ahead of us.

To be continued...

*************************************************************
A note on the text

For the very few of you who care I,Äôm going to now establish a time line for my events in Europe. I started in London and due to the deep shame and degradation of events there I will probably not make a post regarding my first visit to London. From there, I went to Paris and met Douglas (Volume 2). Then it was off to Spain (Volume 5) and back again to Paris (Volume 6). After I my adventures with the medical students I met up with Julia, going with her to Amsterdam (Vol. 4, though she receives no mention) Then I went to Bruges, which has not yet been covered. Then I saw Julia dance in Brussels (volume 3). From there I went back to Paris briefly (not covered) and then to Geneva (volume 1). From there I went several other places, but you,Äôll just have to wait and see about those.

I didn,Äôt anticipate writing out my entire trip so I didn,Äôt bother to order them as they actually happened, but after the first three I realized I was really enjoying them and a few people on the board seemed to feel the same.

Anyways, after I finish the saga of my interactions with the medical students I will pick up with me leaving Geneva and from there they will be written in the order they actually occurred (unless I decide to go all Tarintino-esque on you). I if decided to write about Bruges or the first London visit or anything I didn,Äôt cover up to Geneva, I,Äôll mark it as flash-back material, though I doubt I,Äôll write about any of those events here.
*************************************************************

[Bella]

I didn,Äôt anticipate writing out my entire trip so I didn,Äôt bother to order them as they actually happened, but after the first three I realized I was really enjoying them and a few people on the board seemed to feel the same.

I would be one of those people. I love reading these dispatches.

[gnimbley]

me. one of the few.

[Efrim]

Praise from Gnimbley and Bella...

Praise from those worthy of praise themselves is always so satisfying. Thank you.

[Slarti]

i like them as well.

[Rev Thwack]

<insert more news below this line>

[Chef]

THAT'S WHAT'S WRONG WITH YA, SON!

YOU BEEN HANGING OUT WITH THE FRENCH!

YUO = CROISSANT-EATING OPIE.

[fluffy]

[Chef]

DON'T BE HATIN'!

[Efrim]

Splat!

Hated upon!

[DJRubberducky]

I hope to god that was pie.

[Malaul]

I think it was silly putty acutally

[Chef]

Splat!

Hated upon!

14TH AND MINNA, SON!  MAKE SURE YOUR DENTIST HAS HIS BEEPER ON!

ME = WALKIN' OUT WITH YOUR DATE.

YUO = CRAWLING AROUND, PICKING UP CHICKLETS!

D/N/T!

[Efrim]

Splat!

Hated upon!

14TH AND MINNA, SON!  MAKE SURE YOUR DENTIST HAS HIS BEEPER ON!

ME = WALKIN' OUT WITH YOUR DATE.

YUO = CRAWLING AROUND, PICKING UP CHICKLETS!

D/N/T!

Oh, come on now. I fight my level of skill. Taking you on would just be too vicious...I may give you a left jab and accidentally kill you. A pansy like yourself is more suited to fighting a dainty french girl like Cecile.

[Chef]

Splat!

Hated upon!

14TH AND MINNA, SON!  MAKE SURE YOUR DENTIST HAS HIS BEEPER ON!

ME = WALKIN' OUT WITH YOUR DATE.

YUO = CRAWLING AROUND, PICKING UP CHICKLETS!

D/N/T!

Oh, come on now. I fight my level of skill. Taking you on would just be too vicious...I may give you a left jab and accidentally kill you. A pansy like yourself is more suited to fighting a dainty french girl like Cecile.

I SEEN YOUR PICTURE, SON.  YOU NEED TO LAY OFF THE LENTILS, AND START EATING SOME REAL FOOD BEFORE YOU STEP.

CHEF DIESEL,
WOULD PREFER A CHALLENGE.  CIGAW?