The one where I explain my life in pictures again

My iPhone is kind of like my third arm. I use it for its obvious phoning and texting capabilities and then the plethora of apps, mostly dictionaries. It's actually pretty useful for a translation student that has to take three metros to get to her uni. I will gladly take all negative comments for having one because did you know? Dictionaries are effing heavy! Amazing how a tiny little device can contain enough dictionaries for me to find words in five languages and conjugate tenses with such ease! The other thing I use my phone for is taking pictures, since I can't be bothered to haul around my heavy camera and lenses. It's sad, really, because I love photography. I would love to do it as my career, but photography has had to fall to the wayside as I explore other tracks that may actually pay my bills on a regular basis. So in absence of any new updates besides work, school, writing this long-ass paper, and sleep, I present to you, Rachel's life in iPhone photos in the last month.



Took a much-needed trip to IKEA and redid my room a little so it's not so cramped. Gone is my comfortable queen-sized bed that took up all my space, replaced with a much-less-comfortable futon that folds up in two seconds. Bed cover most definitely not my choice. I bought it off a colleague recently and, well, you take what you can get for 50€. Added some more storage, a rug, random crap. A little more versatile but let's not forget: I live in a closet.

Weather finally starting to warm up. Sunsets getting pretty again. I cannot wait for summer.

Bestie Caro eating her annual pineapple birthday treat at a Korean restaurant. I ordered the spicy Korean barbecue dish even though the waiter kept insisting that it was really very hot. Since French people are big babies their version of spicy is at the same level as mint toothpaste, I was like pssssh. Bring on the spicy. What I was not anticipating was my mouth being on fire. But just to prove to the waiter that I could, in fact, take the ridiculous level of spiciness, I ate it all. My stomach was understandably upset..worth it.

This is me trying to motivate myself to do well in school so I can eventually be the proud owner of a maroon passport. Obviously since I'm writing a blog instead of doing schoolwork this practice is not working as well as expected.

Never get sick of it.

Found while walking around..Iowa represent!



Helping my friend, Duncan, find an apartment in Paris. Ahh! I am so lucky my apartment basically fell into my lap. It is a battlefield out there! He finally signed on one last week, though. I think I'll just stay here in my cozy closet for the foreseeable future.


Salon du Livre: basically a giant expo of all the publishers in France, big and small. Like a giant bookstore, but there are also author signings, readings, workshops, etc. I had a free pass thanks to my translation program. It was cool to see so many books but a bit overwhelming. Not to mention the gobs and gobs and gobs of people.

My favorite store recently got the infamous Dutch chocolate sprinkles. Say no more.

New sunglasses! On a little walk around the city on a beautiful day..



Waiting for the metro at Gare d'Austerlitz

Nothing like fun like the past subjunctive of French!

Study food. Also, a heart attack.

See the wee little Sacre Coeur behind the chimneys?

Sushi before...

Sushi after.

Eating lunch in front of the Centre Pompidou

Taken to show my brother how gas stations are in Paris. Yes, that is one pump, yes that is right in the middle of the city. Yes, owning a car will make you broke in Paris. Last time I checked gas was over $8 a gallon (it's sold in liters).

Pretty.

Nishad from London was in town, had a bite to eat.

And last but not least, my friend, Malia, aka The Great Dane, left me last month. She's just arrived in Hawaii and I know she's living the life, but it's a little more sad, a little more quiet, a little less fun around here. On her last day before going to the airport, a few of us got together to wish her a classy, Parisian goodbye.




Lunch at an abandoned bus stop..I did say we were classy.





Savner dig, kælling.

/R

A call for productivity

School started again a few weeks ago and already the end of the semester is looming over me, when I will have to turn in the most important paper of the year. That I will then have to present in front of a jury. It's called a mémoire, I'm sure I've mentioned it before, but it's essentially a mini-thesis. Around 40-50 pages, it includes a translation of around 20 pages/30,000 characters. (They use characters in France--basically, the number of letters--which easily fixes students' clever "tricks" of double spacing, increasing letting, etc. Suffice to say, I would have failed out of my undergrad degree had I not used this to my advantage in the US.) In addition to the translation, also required: 30,000 characters of commentary, in French. This is the hardest part. Not so much that it's in French, although, naturally this is a concern. However, the bigger problem is the content. Knowing how to say things eloquently, with right terminology. Like any subject, translation has all kinds of its own jargon. I read grammar books like novels, but these are terms that go beyond the normal scope of grammar jargon. I have to look for, note, commentate different methods of rendering the translation from French to English, because as I'm sure you know, it's not just about replacing words. It's a whole game of transferring meaning, which can be represented in different ways..an example I like is the change of how English speakers see things versus French ones. So, where we would say lost property (ok, in AmE, lost and found, but follow my example..), the French would say objets trouvés (found objects). Where we see it as already lost, the French see it as found. Another few that I was just reminded of on my translation workshop on Friday :
The car does 15 miles to the gallon/ La voiture consomme 20 litres aux cent (The car consumes 20 litres to a hundred)
keyhole/la trou de serrure (the lock hole)
there's a smell in the air/ a smell hangs in the air/ l'odeur flotte dans l'air (the smell floats in the air)

Anyway, I love learning about these sorts of things, but when it comes to being a diligent student and writing long-winded graduate-level papers about them..oy. I am le lazy.  It's just that I have trouble doing things in advance when there's weeks and months ahead of me..I seem to only be productive under pressure, but I know that this paper is essential! imperative! to me getting into year two of my program, and I'd really like to do well. Or at least I need to have done my best so I won't beat myself up over it if I don't get in. I must be better or I'll find my ass kicked out of the country!

Which reminds me..I got my visa renewed!

Excuse the profanity, which I try to avoid in writing..but we're dealing with French bureaucracy, man. Definitely merited. I'm not throwing a "legal again!" party until I have said visa in hand. I can't pick it up until APRIL! Argh...akdjfaesdjfkajesrhweoifwtffrancelwkejlrkwje

This semester is much more hands-on. More workshops, less theory, fewer classes in English! I am continuing my German class but am losing hope in German.. I know I'll never be fluent unless I live in a German-speaking country, and it makes me frustrated because I'm really on the cusp between intermediate and advanced; I just need more time and concentration to really do something about it.

Alright well plenty, and I mean PLENTY of translations await me. And then work. And then sleep. And then work. And then school. And then translations. And then sleep. And then school. And then work. And then translations and work and school work translations work school translations social life...

Oh no big deal, just some dinner at the Eiffel Tower

**Was meant to be posted a few weeks ago..sorry!**

Thank god it's almost over. The last few weeks have been awful. And stressful. My apartment is a proper mess and I have been eating monstrosities like chips, cookies, ramen noodles, red bulls, and coca light..apparently I have reverted to being an 18-year-old college freshman again. Except for the coke light thing, it's a real 26-year-old problem.

 I have a serious addiction. Must. Stop. French people give me weird looks when they see my recycling but all I want to say is something along the lines of "Stop giving me your judgy looks, old woman! Where's your recycling..(muttered) you polluting hag?" Instead, I walk by stone-faced with my head up because that's the nice thing to do. (I don't use transparent bags anymore to avoid this problem, what level of addiction is this?)

Back from the coke tangent. I had a week of classes right after break, followed by two weeks of finals, including two big assignments--in the same class. How rude. Good thing the professor has a lovely blond beard or I'd give him a piece of my mind! Ha. Anyway, in addition to school being beyond stressful (because I like this program about 739 time more than last year's and thus care), I somehow managed to drop my card wallet while on my bicycle. So I lost my citybike pass, my metro pass, library card, etc. All ridiculously important to me because I use them so much. (Luckily my bank cards and other important ones were in my wallet.) In the few days it took me to get these new cards, of COURSE I got controlled on the metro for not composting my ticket. I go to a uni that would be considered by some as a bit sketchy..people jump all the time. Er..not even jump. Just pass through behind someone else. So I decided to join this wagon, you know, to economize a little bit. ONE TIME, PEOPLE. And naturally I get caught. The worst part is that I actually had my passport on me that day. Just happened to have it with me, OF COURSE. So he could see the multiple visas I've had here, plus I am epically bad at pretending I don't understand French. My face always gives it away. So I couldn't be like "ohh..excusez-moi, m'seer..je ne speak pas French...I am..euh..american girl here..I have a defunct blockbuster card, is that d'accord for ID?" The man said I had a pretty smile so he "only" gave me a 50€ fine. Merci, monsieur, merci.

Anyway, last week was better, although still stressful. I was so flipping busy last week. The Great Dane turned the big 2-1, so I went out with her a few nights, including here :

Yes, you saw correctly. I ate at the Jules Verne restaurant atop the Eiffel Tower. (Okay, well on the 1st floor but atop does sound cooler, admit it. I rarely get to even utter this phrase, just let me have it.) Malia's godparents live in Paris, but they're American. The mother works at the classy private American hospital, read: they could afford to take us out. Malia, her Swedish friend that was in town visiting and I were invited. We had a delicious three-course meal, with wine, bien sûr. I can say with certainty that it is the classiest dinner I've ever had. Yet. Naturally I will dine at more exotic and less touristy places when I have the means. Give me a couple decades.





 

My cozy prison cell

I've been accumulating pictures of my small apartment for the last few months, and thought that perhaps you'd like to see my humble abode on the right bank. It's 10m², which google tells me is 107ft². I have a little storage closet down the hall, so all in all I have maybe 12m² at most. It's slightly smaller than the place I had last year, but the layout is different and I have a dormer window, so one of my walls is on a slant. Excuse my lack of architecture terms..in short, it's borderline claustrophobic.

All tidy. You're currently looking at my living room, bedroom, edge of my kitchen, chair to the desk in my "den." Notice my festive little sapin de Noël. (Courtesy of HEMA, a Dutch store in Paris that makes me want to just up and move to the NL)

My bed facing the "kitchen"

Sitting on bed, less tidy..mmm chips

Brittany by my bookcase (during her visit in November), next to the shower AND desk. It's..cozy

View out my window. Rainbow!

View out the window in the hallway. You can still see the Eiffel Tower, but she's itty bitty compared to last year's view. The colorful building in the back is Centre Georges Pompidou, blogged about  back in 2009, when I took more pictures in my abundant freetime. I kind of miss that year, but not nannying for that family!

I love the area I'm in, and the building is very nice despite my Bohemian (mostly) student-filled, paint-chipping-off-the-walls floor. The toilet is in the hallway--something I'm not a huge fan of, but god knows it wouldn't fit in here. I bitch about the seven flights of stairs, the old man next door that snores incessantly, and the constant cold drafts that in turn make the skylights rattle all night, but the truth is that I'm young, living and studying in Paris. I could be a lot worse off. It builds character, right? (And thighs, too.) I'd like to think that later in my life, I'll look back on these days and reminisce about how I had to fold up my futon every day, turn off my heater when I wanted to cook (so the fuses don't blow), and was far too used to grabbing a roll of toilet paper before making my way down the hall to the toilet shared with my numerous floormates. On second thought, maybe I won't miss the last one as much..

Bonne année!

Happy New Year to all. I got a little sad a few weeks ago, realizing that this holiday was the third in a row I'd missed. For whatever reason, I somehow thought I'd only missed two, but then I got to thinking about it, and nope..definitely three. Ah, well. Can't have everything. I would've loved to be home, but perhaps next year (..this year).

Christmas was in the midst of my crazy hours at work, so I was happy for the day off. I watched Home Alone, made a vegetable platter, and headed for the Orphan Party one of the managers at work was having. It was good to not be alone (all my friends were home!) and in good English-speaking company. Mostly Americans, but there were a few Canadians, an Ethiopian, a Frenchman (who let him in!) and maybe another nationality or two, you never know with expats who's going to show up.



We ate, drank, watched movies (yes, that's A Christmas Story), had a white elephant gift exchange (I got a head massager, awesome), played Charades, chatted, etc. Fun times for all. And so much food, as it should be! I stayed a good part of the day and into the evening, but had to work the following morning so headed back to mine to make some calls to the respective families who were still in full Christmas Day mode.

I didn't make it to the Champs-Elysées this year, but a few recent pics from my iPhone around Christmastime:


 



New Year's was pretty last-minute. Hung out with The Great Dane, aka Malia, and a French girl I work with, Flo(rence). She's actually the only French person I can really call my friend--the French are more of acquaintance type of folk; friends are a small, select group of people. She is also one of the most Americanized French people I've ever met, which probably explains our friendship, ha. I'll take what I can get! We ended up at a house party, and for the sake of my own dignity, I'll just post a picture from earlier in the evening when we weren't quite so indecent. It was a moustache and leather party, unfortunately we only found that out right before leaving, so voilà our solution!


Stay tuned for pictures of the closet I call my apartment!