On the way home (04/10/10)

Charles de Gaulle Airport.

The day slowly erases the night. I am sitting in the departure lounge of Terminal 3, the poor cousin of impressive and cosmopolitan Terminals 1 and 2. I am feeling a little worried because I was told that I cannot take my four bottles of wine through on the plane in my hand luggage. I had to put them into my suitcase. I hope that I don't arrive in Montreal to a wine-drenched suitcase, my dirty underwear and lovely gifts ruined for the sake of a cheap (but good) drink.

Impressions of Paris (03/10/10)

I was meant to be writing this from the cafe down the street called 'Irene and Bernard' but E- upon leaving the apartment this morning for her morning run locked the door behind her and now I am trapped inside. I have taken off my shoes and opened the windows to the street. I will write from the enclosed comfort of the couch while Paris life clatters by on expensive heels on the street below.

I love Paris. I love it for all of the cliches that have been repeated a thousand times before much more eloquently than I could hope to match so I will only say that I truly do love Paris. It has been seven years since I was last here.

Yesterday, we went to the local grocery chain, Carrefour, and bought wine. There were aisles upon aisles of wine. I bought a bottle of St Emilion with prize-winning stickers for 5 euros. I was truly in heaven. The yogurt aisle was varied and exotic. I bought whimsically shaped pots of coconut and chestnut flavours.

Last night, E- brought me to a bar in the heart of a park where the doors open at 6 pm and dancing finishes by midnight. My kind of place.

I am now at the cafe, E- having returned mortified that she locked me in. I was turfed from the terrasse where I get the impression only those planning to order food are allowed to sit. It was suggested I have my coffee standing at the bar but I managed to negotiate a table inside. It's a shame because it is a beautiful sunny day. Only in Paris.

Where was I? Rosa Bonheur, with sparkly lights and a tree in the middle of a garden where we wolfed down take-away pizza on a park bench before entering. Tons of people of various ages. It was so nice to go out and not feel like I was somehow impinging on the amusements of the young. The hook: for a piece of i.d. you could borrow a headset that was tuned-into one of two d.j.s who stood behind a table with their laptops. Depending on which channel you chose you got completely different music. And to those without a 'casque', the spectacle of people shuffling about rhythmically, head-bobbing and hip swaying was absolutely hysterical. So in the silence of Parisian night, people danced and danced, the only sound the scraping of foot soles on the grit of wet pavement. It created a wonderfully convivial atmosphere: strangers would share headphones with each other, dancers would gesture with their fingers to indicate what channel they were listening to ( I remember a man across the garden indicating an A with two fingers of his left hand and one finger of his right, a big grin on his face as he grooved to what turned out to be a remix of an old Whitney Houston song. Whitney Houston! Only in France.) I met a tall, curly haired Spaniard who was so full of joy, a beautiful Parisian with long blonde hair, tight jeans and high heels who cried and cried and told me "je suis malheureuse" and wanted my phone number. Of course I gave it to her. And Nicolas, the Toulousian with an accent so thick I was sure he was putting it on. Headphones in a nightclub: the great social icebreaker.

Birdoswall, Cumbria (27/09/10)

In the B&B this morning we asked the owner about the relations between the Northern English and the Scots seeing as how the border is so tangible, what with Hadrian's wall (around 100 a.d. but I could be wrong) still standing. After telling us about the savage Scots who would rape and pillage before crossing back over the border in Scotland, she told us that a local woman had been hung in the town square for marrying a Scot in the sixteenth or seventeenth century. Moving to the present, she made us to understand that the Scots were a bunch of freeloaders. It seems relations remain tense.

Impressions of London II (25/09/10)

Saturday, Hampstead Heath

Am sitting next to a pond , hills and trees across the way. Black ducks with white tipped faces and beaks churn the water gracelessly, their heads bobbing rhythmically, one can see that they are working hard just under the surface of the water. Like young teenagers, they haven't mastered the technique of making it look easy.

I love Hampstead Heath. I recall walking for what felt like hours here the first time I was in London at the age of nineteen. I especially liked the forest of trees that opened up onto vast rolling fields punctuated here and there by wide reaching and centennial trees. I remember the unexpected pleasure of coming across swimming ponds. There among the reeds and lily pads were the English, splashing about enthusiastically. It seemed to me then the height of genteel hedonism.

I am, if anything, a creature of habit. Even here in London, I have made my little rituals, which is why this morning, I went for the second day in a row (I have only been here two days) to the little Turkish grocery to get my breakfast of cheese wrapped in a flat bread. While walking down the street, breakfast in hand and feeling quite pleased with myself in the sunny, crisp morning air, I heard a man yell. I turned around to see a young man hollering at me from a car, from the back seat no less. I leaned towards him to try to understand what he was telling me but the light changed and he drove off laughing. I have no idea what he said, like I mentioned before, these accents are impossible to decipher. I am certain though, that he was not remarking on my stunning good looks nor on my intelligent taste in breakfast.

The sun has come out, casting my hand in shadow across this page. There are men fishing on this pond which is no larger than an American football field. I wonder if the city of London stocks the pond with fish each year to satisfy the cravings of urban fishermen. Behind me two women discuss the swimming conditions of the ponds. Could they still be open? It is late fall and probably no more than ten degrees. I shiver in my wind jacket and the idea of taking off even one item of clothing seems unhealthy.

I contemplate the hill across the way. I would like to climb across its grassy back before returning to the gated bourgeoisie of Camden but a pressing need to pee is tempering my enthusiasm.

Impressions of London (24/09/10)

Rain. Sun on the French side of the channel but rain and cloud when the train came out in England. It has been raining since.

I am sitting in a pub, Chandos, near Leicester Square, waiting to meet with P- and B- and their children, whom I haven't seen in over ten years. There is a pub lounge upstairs, they may be up there but I want to finish my (incredibly cheap) beer before I go up to check. They are quite possibly up there but if not, I'll have to find another place to roost when I come back down, will probably have to buy another drink as well. Still have some beer to go.

The transition from Montreal to Paris to London: All the English men in suits in the Eurostar waiting lounge, shoes that click like high heels on the their feet. The sudden complexity of English accents throws me. I keep thinking that London is full of foreigners (which it is) but often when I listen more closely I realize most are speaking English.

Where J- lives is a predominantly Turkish and Ghanaian area. The grocery store with a wall of olives to choose from and another wall with teas so exotic I am not even tempted. The woman behind the bakery counter tries unsuccessfully to teach me 'thank you' in Turkish. Esh-dashesh?

London retains an aura of soot and grime that decades of rain have not been able to erase. I feel the weight of coal here.

Beer almost finished. I hope they're up there. I'll be drunk if I have to come back down and order another beer before they arrive. Maybe I'll order a Sprite or something.

I walked most of the way here from Bethnel Green. I'd gone to the Museum of Childhood to see a photo exhibit of dolls' faces. Turns out there were only half a dozen pictures so I spent the rest of the time looking at children's toys in the museum and listening to teachers and parents reprimand their charges.

Have gone for a look upstairs. No dice. Have come back down and gotten a juice. Luckily for me, no one has taken my table near the door. No watch. Not quite sure of the time. Two thirty, maybe? Perhaps closer to three? I have nowhere else I have to be. What a great feeling.