I worried about having taken the wrong train from CDG to Paris proper. CDG is actually quite a ways outside of l'Ile de Paris, though the RER trains make at least two of "Paris' " three airports easily accessible. (The other RER-accessible train is in Orly. Beauvais is considered a Parisian airport, but it takes a two hour bus to get there.) William noticed my discomfort and tried to pep me up, but I was curt with him.
William was right to distrust the advice of the French who was, however good-intentioned, wrong about getting off at Gare du Nord. We did that only to get right back on. We rode on to Le Jardin du Luxembourg without another hitch.
Our packs are heavy. Instead of lugging around luggage (they do come from the same root), we opted for hiking packs. William bought me a beautiful green and black one from REI that proved to be handy. Our hiking packs, filled to the gills, hung from out backs, while our daypacks, also filled to overflowing, hung from our fronts. We look like American tourists from Seattle. We walk around the Jardin, a park unlike any I've ever seen before. If I were to describe it briefly, I'd note the sheer size of it, big like a football field or bigger, with fountains here, a cute cafe there, and sitting somewhere in the middle what appears to be a museum. There are paths that cut through the gardens, which aren't anything like American home gardens, much more like parks. These paths are lined with chairs, chairs everywhere, and more notable, people in them at 11:30 a.m. on a regular Thursday. Shouldn't these people be at work, these children and teens at school? High-schoolers and college freshmen (William hopes) are everywhere.
I'm tired and hungry, and more than a bit peeved. I'm ashamed of it now. I should have been elated, bubbling with beside-myself-edness. Instead, I was annoyed and sulky, pouting. To appease at least my hunger, we stake out what the park signs say are La Rafraichement et Restauration. William assures me it's just a little restaurant with open-air seating, and he's right. It's close to lunch, so--we're told--the menu is about to change. We wait for the lunch menu, but order two cafe cremes from the garcon, who is much nicer and more attentive than his lunchtime replacement. We pay our first server for the two coffees. When it's available, we order lunch: a sandwich au jambon (ham sandwich) for William, and a real crepe au jambon, aux oeufs, et a l'emmenthal (crepe with ham, eggs, and emmenthal cheese) for me. We eat and hang out like real Parisians. William's restless, and takes a walk around the grounds. I read my recently purchased edition of Harry Potter et Le Prisonnier d'Azkaban (en francais). We move a while to later to une pelouse autorisee, a lawn set aside for people to sprawl out on, unlike those labeled to prevent such. There are tons of teens hanging out on this lawn set aside for lounging between two rows of trees.
William wants me to see the Seine, so we go, passing through what could become a protest between the Jardin du Luxembourg and St. Michel-Notre Dame. The Seine is green and dirty, but the scenery is quaint. We decide then to take a bus to Pigalle instead of trying to navigate the RER. It is then that we discover just what kind of area Pigalle is. We had been warned it was the Red Light District.
We arrive at our home for the next ten weeks, Chez Ingrid Berger on Rue Andre Antoine, one and a half hours early. We remember that it's best to offer the host family/mother a gift for opening their home. I asked one of the men hanging out in front the laundromat right next to Madame's immobilier for directions to the nearest florist. Although I was really nervous, apparently I managed to make myself understood and about three blocks later, I was in a florist. I asked the florist to suggest something for a gift... for a woman. I think I may have been too vague; he recommended red roses. I asked him if that wasn't a bit "trop," and he assured me it was not. So I purchased them. Of course, it was only after I had made the purchase that it occurred to me that perhaps I had bought a gift for a young girlfriend instead of a more mature divorcee in whom I had no interest, age notwithstanding. I was, however, tickled by the awkwardness of it. By the time I get back to William, sitting on the stoop to our apartment, it's still too early for our 5 pm rendez-vous with Ingrid, so we check out Le Chao Ba right there on the corner of Andre Antoine and Clichy. They have free wifi, which will prove enormously to our favor. We order the closest thing to lemonade on the menu, 2 citron presses, which, unlike lemonade, you mix in sugar to taste. It is much more sour than we expected, but the kick is welcome. I'm sleepy after the drink, so I settle in for a nap while William tests the wifi. Little did we know that this elaborately shabby-chic pan-asian cafe-bar would become our chez-nous away from chez-nous. I wake in time to meet the Madame of the five o'clock hour, Mme Ingrid Berger.
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