a problem i never expected to have in another country

Leaky pipes.

The problem was discovered when a very angry, very old man came upstairs Monday griping something about "l'eau" "tombe-ing" in his "chambre." Okay, three words I can understand- water, falling, bedroom. What the angry old man doesn't understand is that I "parle un petit peu," while he continued somewhat mildly ranting. Mind you, he is of the age where he asked me three times what floor this was (troisieme) when he only had to walk up one flight of stairs, and there is a very large 3 on the lift. Anyway, I told the agency, but nothing changed yesterday except now we have 3 new girls (and 1 shower and 1 water closet).

Today at 930 I woke up to the sound of 5 girls running around an apartment, some already in heels, yelling. Then 10 minutes later I hear banging on the doors, and a girl saying "Don't open it! Call the agency!" I walk out, I open the door, and there is my friend, Mr. Happy Pants, my neighbor downstairs.

The convo went somewhat like this:

Mr. Happy Pants: L'EAU! L'EAU! MA CHAMBRE! SOMETHINGSOMETHING TOMBE! SOMETHING SOMETHING ARRETEZ!
Me: Desole! Desole. Je ne sais pas! Je parle un petite peu!
M. HP: L'EAU EN CHAMBRE! followed by lots of words I don't understand but I imagine it was "Bitch! Why didn't you fix this? I told you on Monday. Stop the water! It is falling in my room!"
Me: Je ne sais pas! Je ne sais pas! Je suis telephoner mon agence! Je parle un petit peu!
M. HP: ARRETEZ! ARRETEZ! L'EAU! SOMETHING SOMETHING THE POLICE!"

And he ran downstairs.

Then I got my manager's number and went downstairs to give it to him. On the sheet I wrote, which I thought was clever and quite clear, "Telephonez. Je ne parle pas. Il est mon manager." I repeated to him what I wrote on the sheet. "Telephonez le number." Again he started screaming at yours truly, and finally the super came downstairs. Until this moment, I had no idea who she was. Apparently "super" is a word I need to learn today. She calmly strolled in, checked out his room, and from a distance I heard "Ohh la la. Ohh la la." I think the water was really bad. I'm sure quite a few of the girls showered this morning, used the toilet, used the sink, etc.

She politely called my manager who wasn't answering unfortunately. Then a few minutes later she came up to turn off the water. Si, elle ne parle pas anglais, and she said a bunch of other stuff to me I didn't understand. I did get though that she was very sorry, that the guy was very old (and maybe alone), that sometimes we slam the door? (my guess), and that she was the "director" of the apartment. Whatever. She's rad and at least very nice. And I survived my first problem d'apartment en francais.

To be continued...

redbull, horny cats, and flatland bmx

red bull's finally legal in france!



we love the locals





chillin on the balcony watching the sunset drinking some vino



getting a trim



jessie, samia, and jenny



ewa (pronounced "eh-va")



remnants of war



this is rafa.
he introduced us to hetfeeld's.



tricks sur le quai



raph sandwich



his cat has a thing for vans



welcome back champagne



dirty raph



hell yeah! tex in the city



friday night out





so glad she's back!



for the portfolio



saturday we went to the bike shop, k-124 house, for clarissa's first lesson

scuffing



bunny hopping



alain



PIMP MY UNICYCLE



sunday brunch at the moose

surprise concerts



games of mash and drawing



the final product



some videos from the shop

alain



see why i call them ballerinas on bikes?



clarissa and raph



oh and the site for the shop is this: http://www.k-124house.fr

<3

VIDS!

i've been dancing a lot this week.



tuesday night, interpretively with niya




thursday afternoon
with clarissa while waiting for the metro




<3

kenna - out of control

a year later!




(i'm in the purple surface to air shirt.)

http://www.myspace.com/kenna
http://surface2air.com/
<3

Stories from other countries

My Italian friend, Mattia, told me about the Cheese Phantom. He is the American equivalent to the Bogey Man for kids. The Cheese Phantom lives under your bed and smells really, really bad. Sounds frightening enough to me! It also cracks me up. Of course the Italians would afraid of stinky cheese.

This reminds me of the story of the Kappa Monster in Japan. I first found out about this when I asked my booker in Osaka how you say cucumber roll. The correct word for cucumber is "kudi" and roll is "maki," but you order "kappa maki." Kappa is a monster who lives in the lake and has a hairy, flat head filled with water (I think of Nickelodeon's Arnold meets lily pad) who loves cucumbers, and somewhere along the way kudi maki became kappa maki. Check out wikipedia's entry on Kappa. It's kind of cute. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kappa_(folklore)

My Ukranian friend, Alla, just told me about the Spirit of the Home (I will call it that, but I don't know it's official name). Before you leave for a trip, everyone sits together in a moment of silence. The spirit says to you "have a nice trip!" and you say (/think), "Thanks! Please look after my home!" and then off you go.

<3

merde!

if you've ever been to paris, then you no doubt are aware of the massive amount of dog doodoo on the sidewalks. it makes me appreciate all the signs in manhattan- i mean at least curb your dog, if you aren't going to pick its mess up.

a friend said to me that in discussion with his french friend, he said this:
"why should i pick it up? it is a dog, it eats, it shits. c'est natural!"

this might also explain why men pee everywhere- parks, streets, while waiting for the metro next to the fire extinguisher.
"but i am a man! i drink, i pee, c'est natural!"

this rather large one pictured above happened to actually be on the street, fortunately, and not on the sidewalk. i am used to walking with my head down in the winter in NY- it's cold, it's possibly snowing, whatever. but here? i am tired of constantly being on the look out for someone else's pet's leftovers. although they say that if you step in it with your left foot, you're lucky.

reminds me of this clip from sex and the city (in the last two minutes):



and i'd like to note-
- i've never seen a dog inside any restaurant
- come to think of it, i've only seen maybe two dogs of that size
- smoking is illegal inside restaurants, bars, etc (much to many people's dismay because now you can smell them)
- parisians do not take their coffee to go, usually because it is un cafe (espresso)

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week 12

... was quite slow.
i spent a lot of time playing scrabulous on facebook,
so feel free to start a game with me!

um i thought this was amazing...
i played lost for 8 points.



i also spent a lot of time walking around.

at the pompidou









pantheon









i saw alla



mattia cooked us an italian dinner



... tampons?



orangina is for furries



chillin



evryone radio





and a kinda lame but quick tour of our apartment...




c'est tout!
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SNOW IN PARIS!

as a texan, i've seen snow, but as a new yorker, i've really come to appreciate it.
i mean if it's going to be cold, it might as well snow right?
rain and cold just aren't as fun.
i've been here nearly three snowless months...
until sunday night!

and as you can see, i was so stoked.




we started the night off at olga and oksana's.

the walk over pont alma to their apt.



olga and oksana



oksana, niya, and i



olga



showing us a video



group shot



pouring coke into a pepsi light can



texting



it took us five minutes to figure out the door.
doors are difficult here,
sometimes you have to push the porte button,
sometimes you have to pull a handle. it's confusing.



and thennnnn.... this!



happyyyyy





bear with a snowball



still snowing on the way home



:o)



and monday was very different.




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