"You must not mention the war, never the war, must not not NOT exacerbate tensions between Germany and Britain at this time of fiscal uncertainty in the Eurozone...and while you're at it, leave the Jews out of it too."
Thus is my preparation for mein very first trip to the Fatherland and if you think careless humour at the expense of one of the darkest hours of Europe's troubled history constitutes a dreadful lack of respect for the sensitivity of the subject you can sod right off because there's plenty more non-PC merriment where that Fawlty Towers reference came from.
Yes, no sooner am I back in Madrid than we are off on our grand Abenteuer across the Alps to a land flowing with...well if not milk and honey then plenty of beer and bratwurst! We've been talking to each other in our best German....accents (well, its all about getting into the spirit of the thing) for the last month and the stage is set for our journey to Frankfurt Christmas markets.
And true to form we are no sooner in the queue for Ryanair discussing the cut and thrust political issues of the day i.e Merkel driving the Euro train all guns blazing into the abyss when one of our party becomes an instant heroine when she utters the thoughtful phrase;
"I mean, what ever happened to not letting Germany take over the world?"
And so it begins. Incidentally, I rather believe Cameron had the same thought last week...
Take off, landing and a couple of hours of sprechensing with a German girl called Teresa later we were in Frankfurt Hahn and were in for a surprise.
Let me clarify; we have not a word of German between us. It was all we could do to stutter out Vier to the bus driver in a tragic attempt to communicate that we would like four tickets to Franfurt centre please (diabolical Michael O'Leary rubbing his hands in glee at his cunning use of satellite airports...airsmallnaturalcoves more like) Thus we were unable to understand any of his furious verbage and gesturing which occured when we hopped on the bus, found no seats, people perched on the steps down to the WC and when we turned around to say "My good man, there is no space for us weary travellers!" what came out was "Ahhhhhhhhhhh?"
"Seeet, seeeet!"
He wanted us to sit. He had a fearsome moustache. And so sit we did. In the aisle of the coach, for two hours into Frankfurt itself. It was like a wonderful hallucinogenic dream and definitely not like being transported. Most certainly not. Why, White Christmas was playing softly on the radio and the lights on the Autobahn seemed almost like the twinkling of Christmas trees. The occasional elbow in the back of the head nonwithstanding, its always nice to try new seating arrangements.
Frankfurt am Main (or Main-hattan given the striking cluster of skyscrapers which give a very New York-esque skyline) has definitely gotten into the Yuletide spirit by going mad on wee twinkling lights and an iciness that threatened to crystalise our bone marrow. Even the Christmas trees were freezing their baubels off. But that did not deter us as we tottered up to our hostel to be greeted with the first clue of exactly what sort of trip this would be.
WOS! World Of Sex! Peep shows daily! Unpronounceable German of a dirty nature!
Granted, the fact that we play Spot a Prozzie for teh lolz on any given Madrileno night should have long ago stripped us of any residual squeamishness about a sex shop next door and to be fair we were most appreciative that the mannequinns were themselves in a holiday mood dressed up like Mrs Claus after half a bottle of vodka and and a twinkle in Mr Claus' eye. But still...
The second clue came as we tottered up to our dorm room. Twas my first experience of a dorm room. I had great expectations of making friends from around the world, of like minded eurotripping individuals...of perhaps sleeping with my passport and euros secreted about my person. What I, nay, none of us were prepared for was Crazy Wolfgang.
Picture it if you will; we're all sitting on bunk beds, planning dinner when the door clicks ominously and He enters; giving the phrase two left feet new and terrible meaning. He is cloaked in weirdness and a fog of cigarette smoke and cheap beer. He appears to be as old as time itself. He raises his head, cocks it to one side and sways at us like a snake charmer.
"British?"
We make no reply. The silence that follows this query is loud yet nevertheless you can hear four young female minds panicking at once. It sounds rather like mice screaming.
"You like this?"
He thrusts a CD case at us, waving it like twas the Stone Tablets and he was Moses. We had to say yes, those plastic things have sharp edges. We were all staring at a pink cover emblazoned with a name resembling Chumbawumba wondering if we could get away with replying "British yes, and we got the damn Yanks involved the last time you people tried something like this so piss off!"
The Great and Terrible Wolfgang then decided to stagger off for a while; in which time some of us ran down and had urgent lawyerly chat with reception and the rest of us wondered about using some chalk to draw a sort of Maginot Line or at least learn to sleep with one eye open.
Relocation, relocation later we were ready to hit the town, lack of German regardless and find a recommended restaurant we had high hopes for. Now the normal setbacks occurred; indeciphirable maps, crazy men headbutting tram signs and jabbering away at us and the like but eventually we rocked up at a dark little tavern with the name "Proletariat" proudly displayed ouside.
Inside we were greeted by a man with the most beautifully done make up I've ever seen in my life. I was tempted to ask where he'd got that just-so shade of Cherry Plum. He wore black and held himself in the manner of kings. For the sake of cultural mick-taking lets call him Fritz.
Fritz let forth a stream of German. We hold our own;
"Veir" we counter proudly; indeed there are four of us, now he must lead us to a four seater table. Easy peasey ja!
I say table, I mean bench of scrubbed dark wood with trestle chairs. The tavern is lit by candle bulbs, there are exposed beams of wood, gingham curtains, eartherware jugs and a hum of chatter in German which lets us know we are in for an authentic night. And so we find that Fritz not only speaks English but can recommend us specialities. I opt for the schnitzel; in poetry speak, I'm feeling the food, not German, no good.
Schnitzel turns out to be breaded chicken and not something like jellied goose livers and it is the first time in the history of comedic writing that such a circumstance has produced disappointment. However the green sauce with it is yummy and germanic and complements the chicken so well its almost like it wants to get it into bed.
But the schnitzel is nothing, nothing (yes I Bold and Italiced) compared to the Apfelwei or apple wine. This substance is served in large stoneware jugs painted blue and goes down a treat. We are asked would we like some soda water with it. We wonder why. Fritz informs us it is to dilute the wine. We look at him as though he has sprouted another effeminately painted head. Dilute the wine? Certainly not. It is then that Fritz chuckles and informs us of an old German phrase "The liver grows with practice." It is then I glance around and note that every table has bottles of soda water surrounding one lone jug. I then stare thoughtfully at our now diminished second pitcher of apfelwei and wonder if this is one of those times when we feel sober as judges until the time comes to get up whereupon we feel dizzy, black out and wake up in French Legion uniform on a steamship to Calcutta.
Dinner comsumer, free chocolate pudding from Fritz om-nommed, bill paid we wander back into the frosty German night to make our way back to our hostel on Kaiserstrauss which we will later come to learn is the vice trade, red light, repent ye sinners centre of Frankfurt am Main.
But to get to that later you'll have to tune in next time where you will find debuachery, political protest, culture, Christmas spirit(s) and much more lurking in the city where any citizen would be proud to proclaim "Ich bin ein Frankenfurter!"
xo
Wednesday, 14 December 2011
Sunday, 4 December 2011
Franco my dear, I don't give a damn
"Shake, shake, shake señora; shake ya body line!"
Back in the USSR boy...that is to say in Banco de España Metro station where three lads, possibly from Jamaica, possibly taking the piss, are giving the steel drums the beating usually reserved for Rangers fans who, after stumbling the wrong way out the pub, drunkenly find themselves looking at a sign saying Falls Road. Well, would be if the sign weren't covered by a tricolour. There, Harry Belafonte, the Beatles and Northern Irish political homour all in one. Who says you don't get value for money?
Anyway I wouldn't mention the dynamic trio but relentless Caribbean rhythms coupled with a now rare sunshiney afternoon have induced me to just go for it and shuffle out a one-two step while going past them. They love it and Award for Most Dreadlocks gives an extra special drum roll. Fellow metro passengers suspect I may be higher than a kite.
Of course we're back in Madrid!
But all is not well in the Pridelands, Simba. The term "credit crunch" has been given a new and dreadful meaning as a series of unfortunate events conspire to leave us pondering the ultimate "get 40 credits or its strike, yer out" from Cambridge, there is the curious case of the noises in the nighttime coupled with the magically disappearing electricity bills. Roll up roll up folks, see the mysteries of Spanish banking. Watch as we transfer money to Natural Gas, marvel as you continue to recieve notices of payment due!
There's the Virgin Mary perched atop the fuse box we are afeared to take down least the "electric seetiation" gets any worse (blog soon to be available in Ulster Scots). There's the sensation of sheer defeat as we turn our radiators on and don winter coats in the capital of "sunny Spain." One enterprising chappie has scratched the "S" off the tourism board's disgustingly cheery motto leaving the slogan "Smile, you are in pain." Well done that man; its enough to make you want to take your Erasmus grant and run off to Benidorm; sun loungers, Irish bars, expats, you name it, we've got the stereotype! Ah, maybe in the interests of plausible deniability you should all forget I was drawing up this grand scheme.
But not to worry, as Jane Austen said, "Let other pens dwell on guilt and misery!" Or other keyboards and it is on that note that I must draw your attention to an astounding bit of good news and a bit of an in joke!
It all started when I wandered into that famous Starbucks, the friendliest in the world, last week. I had been overjoyed to see their Holiday menu proudly displayed on a cheery green and red background and had at last, seeing as it was now December, decided I could now treat meself to a Toffee Nut Latté.
I wandered in, shrugged off my coat and, like Houdini sauntering out of the audience after they've seen the chest he was locked in crushed under a ton of steel, the response was instantaneous...
"H'Aileen!! Pero, adonde te has escondido? Pues, no importa mujer, que hay?
Aileen! Where have you been hiding? Ah, sure it doesn't matter, what's new?
At once, I was wracked with a terrible realisation! The dear staff of Starbucks hadn't seen me in a month for when my darling relatives came over in the autumn time they brought me a laptop! A laptop to swap with my own poor excuse for an internet-recieving model! One day I'm a regular caffeine addict tapping out entries from my seat in the corner and ordering "lo normal" my usual, the next I've woken up on my bed, still fully clothed, cradling the laptop, surrounded by Stumbleupon, Facebook, Sporcle, Wiki, Imdb, Watchseries and all sorts of unbelieveable internet garbage. I had abandoned my beloved Starbucks! Of course explaining all this requires an advanced level of Spanish or at least the will to communicate so I summoned my best "sorry to have jilted you" smile and uttered;
"Que hay? Pues, parece que hay Navidad! Teneis el toffe nut latté? No lo hubiera perdido por nada!"
What's new? Christmas is here! Do you have the toffee nut latté? I wouldn't miss it for the world."
And so all was well.
Apart from that there's quite a lot to get caught up on! I realise Paris took over from those heady days of Halloween and internet explorature (because I don't trust them thar new fangled Chromes and Firefoxes) and so you missed carving pumpkins (messy fun) and introducing Cambridge Formal hall to our piso (even messier fun, damn international rules) and the realisation that if I won the Lottery I would invite the Cambridge expats of Madrid and environs to a lunch on a Wednesday, then triumphantly tell them all to get the f**k home quickly, grab a bag, I've got us flights, hotels and formal tickets WE'RE GOING TO CINDIES TONIGHT!
Then of course, miss out on all of Thursday, come up smiling on Friday morning, gather those that Erasmus made us leave behind in Cambridge then tell them to get the f**k to College quickly, grab a bag, I've got us flights, hotels and as much free entries with chupitos as possible WE'RE GOING TO SPAIN!
Of course, granted by Sunday there would be a lot of confused, still hungover people making an involuntary exchange pan-Europe with no idea where they are nor why they've woken up cuddling a policeman's helmet but sure, that'd be half the fun.
Lessee, what else...There was the switch on of Christmas lights in Sol square, presided over by not even one token celebrity but a sterling mariachi band, finally realising that "Tienes fuego" means "Do you have a light" not the literal translation of "Do you have fire?" thus stopping my reply of "M'not Prometheus mate" and the visits (plural) to the great Prado museum where I saw Goya, Picasso, Monet, Matisse, Caravaggio, Rubens and much much more and what has now become my favourite art gallery. Mind you I could count the number of art galleries I've been to on Captain Hook's remaining fingers. Reason for my fervent admiration is that I've never been so sure the best way to experience a place would be to wait til 'twas empty, then slide across the vast echoing halls of marble on stockinged feet to Shaggy's Mr Bombastic (the Mr Bean version of course). Superb stuff...
But there I leave you, for I am now watching snow sweep across the UK with an expression of glazed horror, occasionally shaking my head and muttering "No, no, no, no, no" for, though at any other time the seasonal precipitation would be welcome, I swear by all the gods I will NOT be snowed into Madrid on Christmas Day." If things should deteriorate so by the 23rd December (otherwise known as date I flee the Iberian penninsula) Ryanair cancels its flights I have already designed my hitchhiking route from Madrid to San Sebastian to Orleans to Paris to Callais to Dover to Birmingham to Holyhead to Dublin to home. And I promise, if this should happen, I will make a special live blog and keep you all updated and amused this Yuletide season.
Before all that though, there is time to worry about getting snowed into Frankfurt which is our destination this weekend and, if all goes well, my first time in Germany should make for an interesting blog.
xo
Back in the USSR boy...that is to say in Banco de España Metro station where three lads, possibly from Jamaica, possibly taking the piss, are giving the steel drums the beating usually reserved for Rangers fans who, after stumbling the wrong way out the pub, drunkenly find themselves looking at a sign saying Falls Road. Well, would be if the sign weren't covered by a tricolour. There, Harry Belafonte, the Beatles and Northern Irish political homour all in one. Who says you don't get value for money?
Anyway I wouldn't mention the dynamic trio but relentless Caribbean rhythms coupled with a now rare sunshiney afternoon have induced me to just go for it and shuffle out a one-two step while going past them. They love it and Award for Most Dreadlocks gives an extra special drum roll. Fellow metro passengers suspect I may be higher than a kite.
Of course we're back in Madrid!
But all is not well in the Pridelands, Simba. The term "credit crunch" has been given a new and dreadful meaning as a series of unfortunate events conspire to leave us pondering the ultimate "get 40 credits or its strike, yer out" from Cambridge, there is the curious case of the noises in the nighttime coupled with the magically disappearing electricity bills. Roll up roll up folks, see the mysteries of Spanish banking. Watch as we transfer money to Natural Gas, marvel as you continue to recieve notices of payment due!
There's the Virgin Mary perched atop the fuse box we are afeared to take down least the "electric seetiation" gets any worse (blog soon to be available in Ulster Scots). There's the sensation of sheer defeat as we turn our radiators on and don winter coats in the capital of "sunny Spain." One enterprising chappie has scratched the "S" off the tourism board's disgustingly cheery motto leaving the slogan "Smile, you are in pain." Well done that man; its enough to make you want to take your Erasmus grant and run off to Benidorm; sun loungers, Irish bars, expats, you name it, we've got the stereotype! Ah, maybe in the interests of plausible deniability you should all forget I was drawing up this grand scheme.
But not to worry, as Jane Austen said, "Let other pens dwell on guilt and misery!" Or other keyboards and it is on that note that I must draw your attention to an astounding bit of good news and a bit of an in joke!
It all started when I wandered into that famous Starbucks, the friendliest in the world, last week. I had been overjoyed to see their Holiday menu proudly displayed on a cheery green and red background and had at last, seeing as it was now December, decided I could now treat meself to a Toffee Nut Latté.
I wandered in, shrugged off my coat and, like Houdini sauntering out of the audience after they've seen the chest he was locked in crushed under a ton of steel, the response was instantaneous...
"H'Aileen!! Pero, adonde te has escondido? Pues, no importa mujer, que hay?
Aileen! Where have you been hiding? Ah, sure it doesn't matter, what's new?
At once, I was wracked with a terrible realisation! The dear staff of Starbucks hadn't seen me in a month for when my darling relatives came over in the autumn time they brought me a laptop! A laptop to swap with my own poor excuse for an internet-recieving model! One day I'm a regular caffeine addict tapping out entries from my seat in the corner and ordering "lo normal" my usual, the next I've woken up on my bed, still fully clothed, cradling the laptop, surrounded by Stumbleupon, Facebook, Sporcle, Wiki, Imdb, Watchseries and all sorts of unbelieveable internet garbage. I had abandoned my beloved Starbucks! Of course explaining all this requires an advanced level of Spanish or at least the will to communicate so I summoned my best "sorry to have jilted you" smile and uttered;
"Que hay? Pues, parece que hay Navidad! Teneis el toffe nut latté? No lo hubiera perdido por nada!"
What's new? Christmas is here! Do you have the toffee nut latté? I wouldn't miss it for the world."
And so all was well.
Apart from that there's quite a lot to get caught up on! I realise Paris took over from those heady days of Halloween and internet explorature (because I don't trust them thar new fangled Chromes and Firefoxes) and so you missed carving pumpkins (messy fun) and introducing Cambridge Formal hall to our piso (even messier fun, damn international rules) and the realisation that if I won the Lottery I would invite the Cambridge expats of Madrid and environs to a lunch on a Wednesday, then triumphantly tell them all to get the f**k home quickly, grab a bag, I've got us flights, hotels and formal tickets WE'RE GOING TO CINDIES TONIGHT!
Then of course, miss out on all of Thursday, come up smiling on Friday morning, gather those that Erasmus made us leave behind in Cambridge then tell them to get the f**k to College quickly, grab a bag, I've got us flights, hotels and as much free entries with chupitos as possible WE'RE GOING TO SPAIN!
Of course, granted by Sunday there would be a lot of confused, still hungover people making an involuntary exchange pan-Europe with no idea where they are nor why they've woken up cuddling a policeman's helmet but sure, that'd be half the fun.
Lessee, what else...There was the switch on of Christmas lights in Sol square, presided over by not even one token celebrity but a sterling mariachi band, finally realising that "Tienes fuego" means "Do you have a light" not the literal translation of "Do you have fire?" thus stopping my reply of "M'not Prometheus mate" and the visits (plural) to the great Prado museum where I saw Goya, Picasso, Monet, Matisse, Caravaggio, Rubens and much much more and what has now become my favourite art gallery. Mind you I could count the number of art galleries I've been to on Captain Hook's remaining fingers. Reason for my fervent admiration is that I've never been so sure the best way to experience a place would be to wait til 'twas empty, then slide across the vast echoing halls of marble on stockinged feet to Shaggy's Mr Bombastic (the Mr Bean version of course). Superb stuff...
But there I leave you, for I am now watching snow sweep across the UK with an expression of glazed horror, occasionally shaking my head and muttering "No, no, no, no, no" for, though at any other time the seasonal precipitation would be welcome, I swear by all the gods I will NOT be snowed into Madrid on Christmas Day." If things should deteriorate so by the 23rd December (otherwise known as date I flee the Iberian penninsula) Ryanair cancels its flights I have already designed my hitchhiking route from Madrid to San Sebastian to Orleans to Paris to Callais to Dover to Birmingham to Holyhead to Dublin to home. And I promise, if this should happen, I will make a special live blog and keep you all updated and amused this Yuletide season.
Before all that though, there is time to worry about getting snowed into Frankfurt which is our destination this weekend and, if all goes well, my first time in Germany should make for an interesting blog.
xo
Thursday, 24 November 2011
A Parisian Odyessy Part 3; Notre Damnit it's all so beautiful
Where last I left the constant reader we had just dragged ourselves in at six in the morning, needlessly shushing each other and visions of sugarplums...I mean beds...dancing in our heads. Apologies, that last may have been because the Starbucks at Alonso Martinez has finally brought out its Christmas menu. Yes, I am fully aware we have not yet said goodbye to November. Please. Allow me my simple pleasures in the form of a gingerbread latté in a papercup with all snowflakes on. Anyway, back to Paris.
Alarms were duly set for noon, yet verily was I up and raring to go ten minutes before it sounded. I don't know how, I was operating on six hours sleep in the past fifty-two but perhaps it was my endorphins throwing in the towel and concurring that if we were going to collapse into our club sandwich at lunchtime we may as well enjoy ourselves doing it.
The plan for the day was Montmartre and to meet another dear friend who had found herself living in Paris by various twists of fate. This delightful quartier is found lurking behind the Sacré Coeur and if Galeries Lafayette is Paris in a ballgown, Montmartre and Pigalle is Paris in a negligée. In the former you find the Moulin Rouge, prostitutes a plenty and lots of stange leather things. In the latter you find an abundance of cafés, bookshops and gnarly denizens variously busking or watching life go by. We had a coffee and a tarte au citron of such deliciousness I abandoned all hope of ever finding joy again in Montmarte surrounded by tourists laughing, Parisians smoking and falling autumn leaves. It was all desperate French.
Aprés tout it was time for us to wander back down the white stone steps at the front of the Sacré Coeur to meet my dear hosts in front of yon merry-go-round off of Amelie. This was at first a stroke of romantic genius on my part but failed to take into account the sellers of bracelets
The sellers of bracelets all have terrible grins and stalk around the bottom of the Martyr's Hill (Montmartre) and every so often will lunge at your wrists in an attempt to affix to them a frayed bracelet woven of thread. They will then charge you an exorbitantly high price for this piece of tat which you are unable to get off your wrist given the nature of the knot they have tied. Mainly its best to avoid them at all costs but I am half minded to advise the readership the best course of action is to run screaming at them as one would a flock of belligerent one-eyed Parisian pidgeons. This would be purely for my own amusement and thus very wrong of me. But funny, terribly funny to imagine...
Of course after having made our way down the steps, on my part imaginging if I would roll or bounce witha misplaced foot, we gave the aul gluteals a bit more of a stretch walking up and into the basilica itself. It was (well, presumably still is, though I haven't checked BBC news in a while) beautiful, there was a choir of blessed sisters (collective noun, a superfluity; well I suppose too much is better than nun at all!) and the songs they sang reverberated around so that you could feel them in the soles of your feet. Much nicer than Notre Dame, no hunchbacks though, juts some very nice holy brethren.
Next on our magical mystery tour as the Champs Elysees. Actually it wasn't so mysterious as 'twas my dearest wish to see it and so I dragged everyone to Paris' high street where all shops and things is. But there was Cartier and Swarovski just where a cool young man was bodypopping like there was no tomorrow; Vuitton and Guerlain where we witnessed a Michael Jackson lookalike busting a move in sparkly gloves; at one end you have the Place de la Concorde where despite its name, the guillotine gave Antoinette and Robespierre a short back and sides; and at the other the looms the colossal Arc de Triomph, commissioned by Napoleon who had a lot to compensate for. He was very underwhelming, a disappointment really. Never had any confidence with the ladies. Marie-Louise must a been a patient woman.....to think only five foot six...
Night was once again falling as we made for that glorious staple of student life; pasta in any sort of sauce available and made our plans to head to the cinema. A film all in French! I was astounded to be able to understand any of it, but even more astounded at the prices those damn Frogs will charge for a wee bag of Pick n Mix. Not amused. Even moreso when I compared it to Woolworths, remembered that great emporium had shut up shop as it were and became very melancholy over the recession. But not for long; oh never for long.
Because at last bed beckoned and eight hours sleep were paid to the sleep debt, which never seemed to matter before university, and in the morning it was sunny and clear and I was for a-wandering.
Goodbyes said, it was time to wander round the city on my own. Or at least, within a few streets of Notre Dame. Postcards purchased I was able to find a terribly nice café which outdid itself in coffee and strawberry tarts and I sat next to the window alternately scribbling missives and writing the Parisian Odyessy. I was worried they'd throw me out after an hour, but surely not. A budding Baudelaire staring thoughtfully at a little notebook is excellent for business, I'm amazed they don't hire people to give this exact effect; I'd do it in a minute, it felt like a bohemian rhapsody. And all this was topped by a cherry when a group from Ohio wandered in, guffawing loudly, sat just next to me taking off their coats, knocking my little table in the process and sending my postcards tumbling to the floor which in turn caused the serveur to rush over, not to take their order but to pick up my correspondence and say;
"Les américains, huh? Ne t'en fais pas, petite." (Americans, eh? Pay them no mind darlin.)
Granted it would have been complete idiocy to say this aloud in English. Sarkozy would probably have recieved a sharp note from Obama. But he didn't have to say it at all and after months of "I speek eeenglish, don worry" as an answer to your query said in a foreign language, it was nice to be trusted as a francophone, not a franco-phony.
So I toddled off out of Paris touristland, muttering bye-byes under my breath, and caught the Metro to Porte Maillot where my bus would leave for Beauvais. All was well, followed the signs for Sortie, climbed up the steps, glimpsed the station in the near distance and made my jolly way towards it...until I was stopped by six lanes of inner-city traffic.
Okay, thats all right, I say to myself, I shall walk down to a crossing or some such. Except there is no pavement and the grassland is punctuated by hidden hollows making walking in kitten heels a tightrope act. But verily I see someone mere yards away and assure myself there is indeed an escape.
That is until I've walked for another five minutes and come to the realisation I am in the middle of a massive fecking six lane roundabout with no way out. I've passed the fella with the backpack three times now. We have begun exchanging the flash of smile when two human beings realise that each is in the same awful situation of not knowing what the hell's going on. On the fouth sortie, we stop and shake hands.
"Er, parlez-vous francias? O espanol? Or English even?"
"My English is better than my French, Sprechen Sie Deutsch?"
"Oh, not a word of German I'm afraid. Are you, ah, lost too? I'm Aileen by the way" (well, he was an attractive German)
"Hans Gruber, yeah that about sums it up. Been on this damn roundabout for 35 goddamn minutes. No way out, you see"
"Yes, yes, I know! It's all traffic, not a pedestrian crossing in sight. Shouldn't be allowed. What do we do? What do we do?! Make a break for it? Its our only chance. Let's go!"
"No, no! Calm down mein Freund, already lost an Italian backpacker to a minute sixteen rush of madness. No...we're going to have to play this smart."
Hang on, that may have got a bit out of hand there but it would take a genius who hadn't noticed the Die Hard reference to realise it was not an impeccable narrative of true events. In the end me and a German toruist (called Michael disappointingly enough) decided to boot it across six lanes of traffic in a barely sufficient lull.
The journey home from these places is never really interesting, which is odd because you find thousands of petites moments on the way There, but Back Again was never the thrilling bit of the Bilbo's story. It was all very quiet until I got into 39 Santa Engracia, dropped my bag, wondered if I could be arsed to go make some scrambled eggs, went to switch on my bedroom light which promptly exploded and plunged the whole flat into darkness and ended any chance of hot food. And so the credits roll and the screen fades on a Parisian trilogy, until all that is left is a cinematic
Alarms were duly set for noon, yet verily was I up and raring to go ten minutes before it sounded. I don't know how, I was operating on six hours sleep in the past fifty-two but perhaps it was my endorphins throwing in the towel and concurring that if we were going to collapse into our club sandwich at lunchtime we may as well enjoy ourselves doing it.
The plan for the day was Montmartre and to meet another dear friend who had found herself living in Paris by various twists of fate. This delightful quartier is found lurking behind the Sacré Coeur and if Galeries Lafayette is Paris in a ballgown, Montmartre and Pigalle is Paris in a negligée. In the former you find the Moulin Rouge, prostitutes a plenty and lots of stange leather things. In the latter you find an abundance of cafés, bookshops and gnarly denizens variously busking or watching life go by. We had a coffee and a tarte au citron of such deliciousness I abandoned all hope of ever finding joy again in Montmarte surrounded by tourists laughing, Parisians smoking and falling autumn leaves. It was all desperate French.
Aprés tout it was time for us to wander back down the white stone steps at the front of the Sacré Coeur to meet my dear hosts in front of yon merry-go-round off of Amelie. This was at first a stroke of romantic genius on my part but failed to take into account the sellers of bracelets
The sellers of bracelets all have terrible grins and stalk around the bottom of the Martyr's Hill (Montmartre) and every so often will lunge at your wrists in an attempt to affix to them a frayed bracelet woven of thread. They will then charge you an exorbitantly high price for this piece of tat which you are unable to get off your wrist given the nature of the knot they have tied. Mainly its best to avoid them at all costs but I am half minded to advise the readership the best course of action is to run screaming at them as one would a flock of belligerent one-eyed Parisian pidgeons. This would be purely for my own amusement and thus very wrong of me. But funny, terribly funny to imagine...
Of course after having made our way down the steps, on my part imaginging if I would roll or bounce witha misplaced foot, we gave the aul gluteals a bit more of a stretch walking up and into the basilica itself. It was (well, presumably still is, though I haven't checked BBC news in a while) beautiful, there was a choir of blessed sisters (collective noun, a superfluity; well I suppose too much is better than nun at all!) and the songs they sang reverberated around so that you could feel them in the soles of your feet. Much nicer than Notre Dame, no hunchbacks though, juts some very nice holy brethren.
Next on our magical mystery tour as the Champs Elysees. Actually it wasn't so mysterious as 'twas my dearest wish to see it and so I dragged everyone to Paris' high street where all shops and things is. But there was Cartier and Swarovski just where a cool young man was bodypopping like there was no tomorrow; Vuitton and Guerlain where we witnessed a Michael Jackson lookalike busting a move in sparkly gloves; at one end you have the Place de la Concorde where despite its name, the guillotine gave Antoinette and Robespierre a short back and sides; and at the other the looms the colossal Arc de Triomph, commissioned by Napoleon who had a lot to compensate for. He was very underwhelming, a disappointment really. Never had any confidence with the ladies. Marie-Louise must a been a patient woman.....to think only five foot six...
Night was once again falling as we made for that glorious staple of student life; pasta in any sort of sauce available and made our plans to head to the cinema. A film all in French! I was astounded to be able to understand any of it, but even more astounded at the prices those damn Frogs will charge for a wee bag of Pick n Mix. Not amused. Even moreso when I compared it to Woolworths, remembered that great emporium had shut up shop as it were and became very melancholy over the recession. But not for long; oh never for long.
Because at last bed beckoned and eight hours sleep were paid to the sleep debt, which never seemed to matter before university, and in the morning it was sunny and clear and I was for a-wandering.
Goodbyes said, it was time to wander round the city on my own. Or at least, within a few streets of Notre Dame. Postcards purchased I was able to find a terribly nice café which outdid itself in coffee and strawberry tarts and I sat next to the window alternately scribbling missives and writing the Parisian Odyessy. I was worried they'd throw me out after an hour, but surely not. A budding Baudelaire staring thoughtfully at a little notebook is excellent for business, I'm amazed they don't hire people to give this exact effect; I'd do it in a minute, it felt like a bohemian rhapsody. And all this was topped by a cherry when a group from Ohio wandered in, guffawing loudly, sat just next to me taking off their coats, knocking my little table in the process and sending my postcards tumbling to the floor which in turn caused the serveur to rush over, not to take their order but to pick up my correspondence and say;
"Les américains, huh? Ne t'en fais pas, petite." (Americans, eh? Pay them no mind darlin.)
Granted it would have been complete idiocy to say this aloud in English. Sarkozy would probably have recieved a sharp note from Obama. But he didn't have to say it at all and after months of "I speek eeenglish, don worry" as an answer to your query said in a foreign language, it was nice to be trusted as a francophone, not a franco-phony.
So I toddled off out of Paris touristland, muttering bye-byes under my breath, and caught the Metro to Porte Maillot where my bus would leave for Beauvais. All was well, followed the signs for Sortie, climbed up the steps, glimpsed the station in the near distance and made my jolly way towards it...until I was stopped by six lanes of inner-city traffic.
Okay, thats all right, I say to myself, I shall walk down to a crossing or some such. Except there is no pavement and the grassland is punctuated by hidden hollows making walking in kitten heels a tightrope act. But verily I see someone mere yards away and assure myself there is indeed an escape.
That is until I've walked for another five minutes and come to the realisation I am in the middle of a massive fecking six lane roundabout with no way out. I've passed the fella with the backpack three times now. We have begun exchanging the flash of smile when two human beings realise that each is in the same awful situation of not knowing what the hell's going on. On the fouth sortie, we stop and shake hands.
"Er, parlez-vous francias? O espanol? Or English even?"
"My English is better than my French, Sprechen Sie Deutsch?"
"Oh, not a word of German I'm afraid. Are you, ah, lost too? I'm Aileen by the way" (well, he was an attractive German)
"Hans Gruber, yeah that about sums it up. Been on this damn roundabout for 35 goddamn minutes. No way out, you see"
"Yes, yes, I know! It's all traffic, not a pedestrian crossing in sight. Shouldn't be allowed. What do we do? What do we do?! Make a break for it? Its our only chance. Let's go!"
"No, no! Calm down mein Freund, already lost an Italian backpacker to a minute sixteen rush of madness. No...we're going to have to play this smart."
Hang on, that may have got a bit out of hand there but it would take a genius who hadn't noticed the Die Hard reference to realise it was not an impeccable narrative of true events. In the end me and a German toruist (called Michael disappointingly enough) decided to boot it across six lanes of traffic in a barely sufficient lull.
The journey home from these places is never really interesting, which is odd because you find thousands of petites moments on the way There, but Back Again was never the thrilling bit of the Bilbo's story. It was all very quiet until I got into 39 Santa Engracia, dropped my bag, wondered if I could be arsed to go make some scrambled eggs, went to switch on my bedroom light which promptly exploded and plunged the whole flat into darkness and ended any chance of hot food. And so the credits roll and the screen fades on a Parisian trilogy, until all that is left is a cinematic
Fin
Thursday, 17 November 2011
A Parisian Odyessy Part 2; Sightseeing; just an Eiffel of everything really
About halfway through the 19th century, Napoléon III got out of bed one morning and decided he wanted a wee bit of modernisation. Now, being an Emperor this involved less hunting out the Dulux colour charts for the kitchen and more summoning Baron Haussmann to discuss restructuring his capital city. This is the reason for the wonderful boulevards which lounge spectacularly through Paris and open the City of Lights to the sky. There, eddication by the powers!
160 years later, an Irish tourist is making full use of the wide open spaces to gawp out the windows of the airport shuttle and resist the urge to take snapshots or nudge the snoozing Spaniard beside me to tell him "I'm on my holidays" and if he's just going to loll against the glass, can I have the window seat?
My stay in Paris was made possible by wonderfully accomodating friends, because at my time of life you are wary of booking a hostel least you not be kidnapped and sold to a Bedouin cheiftain. It would happen to the blonde Scandinavians just out of high school and that would just upset me. Besides, hostel owners don't provide you with the most delicious baguette (freshly baked) and cheese (possibly Camembert) you've ever tasted. Really the only eloquent way to sufficiently describe the succulence of the combination is om nom nom nom nom nom nom nom.....
Autumn in Paris is by far the best way to experience the season. The trees laugh at the universe's suggestion "Now, we were thinking brown for lack of chorophyll" and get their bling on, with gold and red and maroon and chestnut and well they just go all out really. It was very cold and clear and there were contrails making a tic-tac-toe game out of the blue sky. The Christmas decorations were up, the streets were thronged and we were at The Galeries Lafayette because I was in Paris and feeling expensive.
Well I felt expensive right up until we walked in and luxury took one look at us and asked if we would be paying by card or cash and more cash?
It was exquisite; All the attendees were dressed in black , hands clasped behind them, and they ever so bemusedly arched their eyebrows every ten seconds. There was Chanel and Dior and Hermés and Bvlgari and Gaultier and yes I am fully aware that on beholding I would not appear to be able to pronounce much less know these names but one of my shameful secrets I can now exclusively reveal is that I have yet to miss an episode of Sex and the City and know my Yves Saint Laurent from my Ralph Lauren. There's an extra "t" in the former there yousee...
So, assuming my best "Mah faaaaather owns Bah-clays" expression (as though everything amuses you but if it bothers you a large man will appear and snap its fingers like a Kitkat; others have informed me I look like a stunned goldfish) and we went to see Paris from atop the Galeries. And is was exquisite. I felt like I was cheating on Madrid who was at home washing the dishes.
And so we drank in the beauty of our surroundings until twas nearly lunchtime. Then there was a beautiful moment. It comes when two or more human beings are thinking the same thing at the same time and is so magical we often call it love. Unless of course it's that horrible moment when both are thinking "I'll give it five more minutes and then if he/she doesn't Facebook chat me I'm burning all my things and moving to a nunnery/monastery." It began with "Ah, there's a MacDonalds just down here..." and the smiles on the faces of your kinsmen let you know we are one in purpose. The purpose being a MacFlurry and desperately wanting to order a Happy Meal because its got all you want to eat and it has a toy!
Feeling disgustingly americanised yet not because sweet lord ah-mighty what do they put in that special French fries sauce? we saunter to Notre Dame past a town hall that could play a Disney castle convincingly. The Catherdral was beautiful but one still cannot work out where the flying f**k the famous Rose Window was.
We gazed upwards at a stained glass window, afternoon sun streaming in, the predominant colour a soft rose. It was built in a perfect circle and the faces of the saints were picked out in loving detail. We "Ahhhh'ed" in appreciation. And turned to walk on...
...and came face to face with a window which looked exactly the same. This caused raised eyebrows, squinting round to see if anyone had noticed and once again settling into a suitable expression of wonder...
...until we set up off a flight of stair and found another window, exactly the £$%&ing same as the two before. So I attempted my most respectful "here lads, sod this for a game of soldiers" and snuck on earphones to accompany the sighseeing with the soundtrack to The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Who needs a guidebook?
Ah, the light had faded and my feet were very nearly walked off me but it was time to head out on the razzle! Which involved of course bringing the fine Spanish cultural pillar of botellon to France. I dot E, buying du vin and drinking it in front of the Eiffel Tower which was lit up like a bride on her wedding day/night, delete as appropriate to your sensibilities.
This was magical, but more so was our daddle to le Marais, where one can find art galleries, museums, gay bars and a lot of Chinese people. If all that together is your thing. We got kicked out of the line for a hip happening gay bar daddy-o, as a matter of fact. Despite my protestations of "You like men, we like men!! Can't we work upon this mutual interest?" and "Well how do you know we're not lesbians?" Granted if I'd reversed the order this approach may have worked better.
Nevertheless we ended up in a lovely bar called Enchantuer a wee way down the road. And this is where, in al the bars in all the Marais, I met a homesick Spaniard.
We had been talking in French to a group of party goers and switched to English for some reason or other when this boyo (rather attractive boyo, mind you) made a sound like a punctured porcupine and said "Non, non, pas en anglais. C'est trop d'un effort en francais quand meme, s'il vous plait." No, no not in French, it's too much of an effort as it is, please."
This arouses my, ah, curiousity and I ask "Quelle langue préférez-vous?" What language would you prefer?
"L'espagnole." He quasi(modo)-sighs. As to the effect of my next words, I never ever seen a man smile so genuinely, in such a dark bar, without any mention of say, whipped cream or handcuffs. Made me frankly ashamed of my mind.
"Pues, hombre, sí quieres hablar en espanol no te falta más que pedir."
Well son, if you want to speak in Spanish all you have to do is ask."
So we talked about Madrid, what was happening in Spain, if I liked it, if I preferred French or Spanish, I began to wonder if we would get around to whether I'd met his granny and if she was alive and well. And at the end of all this he gave me a rose.
While this was heartachingly romantic; everyone gave me a rose... Spaniard, dear new friend who wished not to accept his from a creepy Frenchman and the bartender who gave me a rose and two cheek pecks after we sang Over the Rainbow together, the Israel UnpronounceableSurname version. Had we had another hour I could have had a bouquet.
And so Part 2 draws to a close, as we wander home over the Seine, through the Ile Saint Louis and in the predawn glow I chuck a rose into the Seine and wonder where it will wash up, perhaps far away, once it has been swept out into the English Channel on the shore at Dover. This is far too flipping romantic, the damn flower will get ground to pieces in the locks at the Oise, but hey, I'm feeling romantic.
And so my friends, don't forget to miss the thrilling conclusion to this triumvirate spectaulaire! Witness the Sacré Couer, Montmartre, the Champs Elysees possibly as you've never seen them before or wish to again! And last but by no means least, me, trusted on my own to roam around Paris and find my way back to not-so-sunny Spain! It promises to have you on the edge of your seat, on the arm of the sofa, clutching the screen in amazement then getting bored and wandering off for a snack...
Á toute a l'heure xo
160 years later, an Irish tourist is making full use of the wide open spaces to gawp out the windows of the airport shuttle and resist the urge to take snapshots or nudge the snoozing Spaniard beside me to tell him "I'm on my holidays" and if he's just going to loll against the glass, can I have the window seat?
My stay in Paris was made possible by wonderfully accomodating friends, because at my time of life you are wary of booking a hostel least you not be kidnapped and sold to a Bedouin cheiftain. It would happen to the blonde Scandinavians just out of high school and that would just upset me. Besides, hostel owners don't provide you with the most delicious baguette (freshly baked) and cheese (possibly Camembert) you've ever tasted. Really the only eloquent way to sufficiently describe the succulence of the combination is om nom nom nom nom nom nom nom.....
Autumn in Paris is by far the best way to experience the season. The trees laugh at the universe's suggestion "Now, we were thinking brown for lack of chorophyll" and get their bling on, with gold and red and maroon and chestnut and well they just go all out really. It was very cold and clear and there were contrails making a tic-tac-toe game out of the blue sky. The Christmas decorations were up, the streets were thronged and we were at The Galeries Lafayette because I was in Paris and feeling expensive.
Well I felt expensive right up until we walked in and luxury took one look at us and asked if we would be paying by card or cash and more cash?
It was exquisite; All the attendees were dressed in black , hands clasped behind them, and they ever so bemusedly arched their eyebrows every ten seconds. There was Chanel and Dior and Hermés and Bvlgari and Gaultier and yes I am fully aware that on beholding I would not appear to be able to pronounce much less know these names but one of my shameful secrets I can now exclusively reveal is that I have yet to miss an episode of Sex and the City and know my Yves Saint Laurent from my Ralph Lauren. There's an extra "t" in the former there yousee...
So, assuming my best "Mah faaaaather owns Bah-clays" expression (as though everything amuses you but if it bothers you a large man will appear and snap its fingers like a Kitkat; others have informed me I look like a stunned goldfish) and we went to see Paris from atop the Galeries. And is was exquisite. I felt like I was cheating on Madrid who was at home washing the dishes.
And so we drank in the beauty of our surroundings until twas nearly lunchtime. Then there was a beautiful moment. It comes when two or more human beings are thinking the same thing at the same time and is so magical we often call it love. Unless of course it's that horrible moment when both are thinking "I'll give it five more minutes and then if he/she doesn't Facebook chat me I'm burning all my things and moving to a nunnery/monastery." It began with "Ah, there's a MacDonalds just down here..." and the smiles on the faces of your kinsmen let you know we are one in purpose. The purpose being a MacFlurry and desperately wanting to order a Happy Meal because its got all you want to eat and it has a toy!
Feeling disgustingly americanised yet not because sweet lord ah-mighty what do they put in that special French fries sauce? we saunter to Notre Dame past a town hall that could play a Disney castle convincingly. The Catherdral was beautiful but one still cannot work out where the flying f**k the famous Rose Window was.
We gazed upwards at a stained glass window, afternoon sun streaming in, the predominant colour a soft rose. It was built in a perfect circle and the faces of the saints were picked out in loving detail. We "Ahhhh'ed" in appreciation. And turned to walk on...
...and came face to face with a window which looked exactly the same. This caused raised eyebrows, squinting round to see if anyone had noticed and once again settling into a suitable expression of wonder...
...until we set up off a flight of stair and found another window, exactly the £$%&ing same as the two before. So I attempted my most respectful "here lads, sod this for a game of soldiers" and snuck on earphones to accompany the sighseeing with the soundtrack to The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Who needs a guidebook?
Ah, the light had faded and my feet were very nearly walked off me but it was time to head out on the razzle! Which involved of course bringing the fine Spanish cultural pillar of botellon to France. I dot E, buying du vin and drinking it in front of the Eiffel Tower which was lit up like a bride on her wedding day/night, delete as appropriate to your sensibilities.
This was magical, but more so was our daddle to le Marais, where one can find art galleries, museums, gay bars and a lot of Chinese people. If all that together is your thing. We got kicked out of the line for a hip happening gay bar daddy-o, as a matter of fact. Despite my protestations of "You like men, we like men!! Can't we work upon this mutual interest?" and "Well how do you know we're not lesbians?" Granted if I'd reversed the order this approach may have worked better.
Nevertheless we ended up in a lovely bar called Enchantuer a wee way down the road. And this is where, in al the bars in all the Marais, I met a homesick Spaniard.
We had been talking in French to a group of party goers and switched to English for some reason or other when this boyo (rather attractive boyo, mind you) made a sound like a punctured porcupine and said "Non, non, pas en anglais. C'est trop d'un effort en francais quand meme, s'il vous plait." No, no not in French, it's too much of an effort as it is, please."
This arouses my, ah, curiousity and I ask "Quelle langue préférez-vous?" What language would you prefer?
"L'espagnole." He quasi(modo)-sighs. As to the effect of my next words, I never ever seen a man smile so genuinely, in such a dark bar, without any mention of say, whipped cream or handcuffs. Made me frankly ashamed of my mind.
"Pues, hombre, sí quieres hablar en espanol no te falta más que pedir."
Well son, if you want to speak in Spanish all you have to do is ask."
So we talked about Madrid, what was happening in Spain, if I liked it, if I preferred French or Spanish, I began to wonder if we would get around to whether I'd met his granny and if she was alive and well. And at the end of all this he gave me a rose.
While this was heartachingly romantic; everyone gave me a rose... Spaniard, dear new friend who wished not to accept his from a creepy Frenchman and the bartender who gave me a rose and two cheek pecks after we sang Over the Rainbow together, the Israel UnpronounceableSurname version. Had we had another hour I could have had a bouquet.
And so Part 2 draws to a close, as we wander home over the Seine, through the Ile Saint Louis and in the predawn glow I chuck a rose into the Seine and wonder where it will wash up, perhaps far away, once it has been swept out into the English Channel on the shore at Dover. This is far too flipping romantic, the damn flower will get ground to pieces in the locks at the Oise, but hey, I'm feeling romantic.
And so my friends, don't forget to miss the thrilling conclusion to this triumvirate spectaulaire! Witness the Sacré Couer, Montmartre, the Champs Elysees possibly as you've never seen them before or wish to again! And last but by no means least, me, trusted on my own to roam around Paris and find my way back to not-so-sunny Spain! It promises to have you on the edge of your seat, on the arm of the sofa, clutching the screen in amazement then getting bored and wandering off for a snack...
Á toute a l'heure xo
Wednesday, 16 November 2011
A Parisian Odyessy Part 1; Getting there by hook or by crook
"Oh, we're all going on a...reasonably priced city break...with no more worries for a...day or two!"
I am taking dreadful liberties with Cliff Richard as I run round our flat preparing to leave for gay Paris (note to self; check if this description is still allowable under SOS Homophobie guidelines. Author would not wish to cause unintentional offence...not when intentional offence is so much more fun.)
The flat is empty, as the others have wandered off to Marrakech. That's the way it goes on a year abroad, we go where the wind takes us, and if we happen to leave one of our number alone so she feels it acceptable, nay, necessary to re-enact Tom Cruise's dance scene from Risky Business then so be it.
Pizza consumed, dance scene complete, it was now time to catch the Metro at one in the morning. No sleep was on the cards for the weekend. This is a sentiment that would come to be regretted/regretten but that mattered not because, like so many things, that was a problem for tomorrow's Aileen. And I am not that unhappy wretch yet.
I arrived at Alonso Martinez and toddled down the stairs nodding amicably at the little old cleaner who looks like Manuel from Faulty Towers. I generally nod or speak to everyone, which makes me very unsuited for village life back home especially during those times when civil blood makes civil hands unclean over "what her Karen said about our John that time at your Bernadette's wedding, so don't give them the satisfaction of speaking to them."
This is where gentle musing descends into "ohshitohshitohshit" as I realise my plan of catching a train at quarter past to catch a train at twentyfive past to tie in neatly with when the Metro stops at half one works in world built around my plans and forgets about the fifteen minute gap between arrivals. I panic and make a snap decision...nothing for it but shelling out for a taxi to Plaza de Cibeles and the bus.
"Oye, oye mi hija! Que vas a otro sitio? Que pasa?"
This is Manuel; and he has asked "My daughter, are you going somewhere else? What's wrong?"
I do not wish to be rude and explain the predicament with "Tren...retraso...aeropuerto...no puedo"
He replies; "Sí, si nena! No te preocupas, que vas a llegar Que corres como el diablo, no esperas, corre!"
"Yes, yes pet. Don't worry, you'll make it. Just run like f**k, don't wait, run!"
And so with his cries echoing behind me I do exactly this...run like blazes and arrive at the metro to the airport just as the buzzer signalling the Closing Of The Doors sounds. It was rather Disney. I genuinely believed this was impossible, but continued anyway on the advice of an old man and so the day was saved and I got my ass to the plane on time. A short Disney film to be sure but Morgan Freeman if you're tuning in there's a casting opening for Manuel in the movie adaptation of A Cautionary Tale...call me...
The Crook in the title can be no other than Michael O'Leary who abuses me dreadfully on occasion but yet I always go back to dear Ryanair sooner or later. On this particular occasion it was his cheery insistence that Beavais is a hop, skip and a jump away from Par-eeee. No, no, no, dearest Michael, that was a description of your landing.
It was because the pilot was from Dublin and was possessed a a beautiful lazy southern lilt that these next words washed over us almost unnoticed;
"Ah, right now ladies and gentlemen, we're going to be attempting to land in Beauvais in the next five minutes or so. If we are, for any reason, unsuccessful in this attempt we'll...ah..get back to you shortly with more information."
None of the Spaniards caught the mere suggestion in the remark, that getting back to us might just mean buying us a drink in the Afterlife bar and discussing how big those flames were back there. Nasty suspicions rose in my mind and caused me to look out the window...
...whereupon I saw nothing. This was not necessarily comforting as seeing nothing meant that two feet from the window a dense, clinging fog obscured everything from view. I instantly reassured myself that flying these days is all done by lasers and infra-red and such and the pilot is only really there for the look of the thing.
This opinion was quickly revised as the tarmac suddenly loomed out of the mist and the pilot took evasive action which was to swoop back up into the sky. Good plan that man. When in doubt, retain altitude. No one has ever successfully collided with the sky.
Eventually land we had to and I can only presume that Ryanair will now be refitting chair covers and tutting over nail marks. I enjoy a bit of life or death action as much as the next lady but I would prefer next time for wings not to graze the runway, if Michael doesn't mind.
La France, la belle France. Nous sommes arrivés. The extra ninety minutes in a bus would mean nothing...for, as we shall see in the next thrilling installment, it pales in comparison to baguettes, Hermés, Chanel, Haussman's doing with Paisian architecture what Colonel Sanders does to chicken, Notre Dame, the Eiffel Tower and much much more debauchery...
Apologies for a blogging trilogy, the first of which dealt with planes, trains and automobiles. I love travelling in ways that begin to seem slightly deviant if you squint.
Á toute a l'heure xo
I am taking dreadful liberties with Cliff Richard as I run round our flat preparing to leave for gay Paris (note to self; check if this description is still allowable under SOS Homophobie guidelines. Author would not wish to cause unintentional offence...not when intentional offence is so much more fun.)
The flat is empty, as the others have wandered off to Marrakech. That's the way it goes on a year abroad, we go where the wind takes us, and if we happen to leave one of our number alone so she feels it acceptable, nay, necessary to re-enact Tom Cruise's dance scene from Risky Business then so be it.
Pizza consumed, dance scene complete, it was now time to catch the Metro at one in the morning. No sleep was on the cards for the weekend. This is a sentiment that would come to be regretted/regretten but that mattered not because, like so many things, that was a problem for tomorrow's Aileen. And I am not that unhappy wretch yet.
I arrived at Alonso Martinez and toddled down the stairs nodding amicably at the little old cleaner who looks like Manuel from Faulty Towers. I generally nod or speak to everyone, which makes me very unsuited for village life back home especially during those times when civil blood makes civil hands unclean over "what her Karen said about our John that time at your Bernadette's wedding, so don't give them the satisfaction of speaking to them."
This is where gentle musing descends into "ohshitohshitohshit" as I realise my plan of catching a train at quarter past to catch a train at twentyfive past to tie in neatly with when the Metro stops at half one works in world built around my plans and forgets about the fifteen minute gap between arrivals. I panic and make a snap decision...nothing for it but shelling out for a taxi to Plaza de Cibeles and the bus.
"Oye, oye mi hija! Que vas a otro sitio? Que pasa?"
This is Manuel; and he has asked "My daughter, are you going somewhere else? What's wrong?"
I do not wish to be rude and explain the predicament with "Tren...retraso...aeropuerto...no puedo"
He replies; "Sí, si nena! No te preocupas, que vas a llegar Que corres como el diablo, no esperas, corre!"
"Yes, yes pet. Don't worry, you'll make it. Just run like f**k, don't wait, run!"
And so with his cries echoing behind me I do exactly this...run like blazes and arrive at the metro to the airport just as the buzzer signalling the Closing Of The Doors sounds. It was rather Disney. I genuinely believed this was impossible, but continued anyway on the advice of an old man and so the day was saved and I got my ass to the plane on time. A short Disney film to be sure but Morgan Freeman if you're tuning in there's a casting opening for Manuel in the movie adaptation of A Cautionary Tale...call me...
The Crook in the title can be no other than Michael O'Leary who abuses me dreadfully on occasion but yet I always go back to dear Ryanair sooner or later. On this particular occasion it was his cheery insistence that Beavais is a hop, skip and a jump away from Par-eeee. No, no, no, dearest Michael, that was a description of your landing.
It was because the pilot was from Dublin and was possessed a a beautiful lazy southern lilt that these next words washed over us almost unnoticed;
"Ah, right now ladies and gentlemen, we're going to be attempting to land in Beauvais in the next five minutes or so. If we are, for any reason, unsuccessful in this attempt we'll...ah..get back to you shortly with more information."
None of the Spaniards caught the mere suggestion in the remark, that getting back to us might just mean buying us a drink in the Afterlife bar and discussing how big those flames were back there. Nasty suspicions rose in my mind and caused me to look out the window...
...whereupon I saw nothing. This was not necessarily comforting as seeing nothing meant that two feet from the window a dense, clinging fog obscured everything from view. I instantly reassured myself that flying these days is all done by lasers and infra-red and such and the pilot is only really there for the look of the thing.
This opinion was quickly revised as the tarmac suddenly loomed out of the mist and the pilot took evasive action which was to swoop back up into the sky. Good plan that man. When in doubt, retain altitude. No one has ever successfully collided with the sky.
Eventually land we had to and I can only presume that Ryanair will now be refitting chair covers and tutting over nail marks. I enjoy a bit of life or death action as much as the next lady but I would prefer next time for wings not to graze the runway, if Michael doesn't mind.
La France, la belle France. Nous sommes arrivés. The extra ninety minutes in a bus would mean nothing...for, as we shall see in the next thrilling installment, it pales in comparison to baguettes, Hermés, Chanel, Haussman's doing with Paisian architecture what Colonel Sanders does to chicken, Notre Dame, the Eiffel Tower and much much more debauchery...
Apologies for a blogging trilogy, the first of which dealt with planes, trains and automobiles. I love travelling in ways that begin to seem slightly deviant if you squint.
Á toute a l'heure xo
Sunday, 6 November 2011
Portrait of the Artist as a Drunk Woman
Now I understand many of you won't have asked for this; indeed many won't have had any idea this was a distinct possibilty given the impeccable narrative thus far but the "artist" has thought it is high time the readership comes to terms with the inevitable coupling of free mojitos and reasonably priced pina coladas...a Victor Mildrew-esque rant against prices in Madrid's cocktail bars and the inaugral drunken blog. Hang on I've read over that sentence and it lacks oodle foodle tapas whay-hey!!!!! There, that should set the tone... Anywho...
Last week, Madrid woke up one morning and decided it was autumn. Tuesday you're prancing around in Tshirts laughing at Spaniards in their winter coats; Wednesday you've woken up to grey skies and golden leaves skittering around everywhere on a gale that just blew into town (ahaha, weather related humour.)
The problem with this dashed weather is that it leaves one unable to walk out the door without serious thought to the consequences...that is mere days ago I could wander down to Dia to purchase several bottles of wine and brandy for a fiesta, in my flip flops...a feat that lead to Que tienes fiesta este noche, no? (Are you having a party tonight?) Since my Spanish wasn't equipped to deal with my normal response of "Yes, Hercule Poirot, we are having a bit of a shingdig as it happens, how did you ever work it out?" I come out with "No, no, its all for me!" in a joke that not so much flops as leaps suicidally off the Empire State building...apparently I now AM capable of downing two rosés, two bottles of brandy and some decorative cinnamon sticks on my own thank you so very much Día's checkout finest...don't tell my mother, I probably could if dared...
Despire the perpetual drizzle the artist did manage to make it out this very night it the spirit of science and enthusiastic research (I can now freely find free mojitos, shots and sangria anywhere in the city at any hour of day...I believe that ability alone should be enough to earn me a place in Heaven...) The bars were lively, the restaurants packed, the tapas flowing and the fine tradition amoung Spanish men of verging on sexual harrassment alive and well...thus it may be time to indulge in a little renditon of Madrileno nightlife...
It begins with Día, that holy place where a carton of wine costs 55c and a bottle €1. This is to be drunk at leisure..savoured as it were, with a little music in the background. I have a penchant for Sinatra followed by Jay Z; some find this a little like tuna and chocolate, I leave it up to your gentle judgement.
Now I say the next is heading out...this is a Northern Irishism which means killing the sound, groping for coats and jackets and striding purposefully into the night hellbent on causing some mayhem... or finding the nearest MacDonalds...all previous intention seems to fade away on Gran Vía when you see the Golden Arches and remember you can play the "Spot a Prozzie!" game. Record stands at 25 in one night.
After that you can take it two ways...you can wander in and out of bars, freebies in each, until you inexplicably end up at the Fontana de Oro, the "Golden Fountain" Irish pub which seems to attract aimless party-goers like a black hole attracts matter and in which you should never EVER dance with Columbian men. I'm only telling you for your own good, they're no Fred Astaire...
Or you may gravitate towards one of Madrids many clubs; open til six thirty, guaranteed to offer music to make you move til the wee small hours of the morning. Also damn fine measures in the mixers...
I apologise for the concentration on the tipsy wonders of Spains capital...hey, it's what you do to keep the punters amused...but also of greater merit is the food in the tucked away eateries dotting the fine city. Three courses, wine and complementary bread for €10 and everything tastes like a stereotypical Goodfellas mob boss cooking for his nephew. You know, like;
"Tony, whassamatta you? You look thin! Here, sit down, I get you something to eat...what you mean you don't want nothing? You tastes this. I swear is like the angel Gabriel hisself, he make the pasta. You crazy, you know that...you eatta this sauce, you go to your maker happy..."
And so forth...I can't promise they'll say exactly that but I'll surely have a go at Marlon Brando's Sicilian accent.
Now, first blogging under the influence complete I have to admit its not that shabby...mainly because I have been tracing every sentence with one wobbling finger and conducting my disjointed train of thought with a cup of Tetley's, occasionally the tea will make a spirited leap for the freedom but I have thus far managed to contain the bugger; which has made me absurdly pleased with myself.
Toodle pip chappies and as I promised you a "One Foot in the Grave" type rant you should now imagine me and you; linked arm in arm as we wander home through the leaf strewn, breezy Madrilenan night; wending our way past treelined streets and late night tabernas, waving a "No, gracias" to promoters handing out club flyers. And as we stroll under delicate balconies and sculpted stone a Norn Irish voice echoes into the night;
"€10 for a pina colada? €10!! I don't believe it! I could have flown to Cuba for a rum based cocktail and felt better about the damn waste of money...unbelieveable, next they'll be telling me a ham sandwich costs enoughto bail out the Greek banks..."
xo
Last week, Madrid woke up one morning and decided it was autumn. Tuesday you're prancing around in Tshirts laughing at Spaniards in their winter coats; Wednesday you've woken up to grey skies and golden leaves skittering around everywhere on a gale that just blew into town (ahaha, weather related humour.)
The problem with this dashed weather is that it leaves one unable to walk out the door without serious thought to the consequences...that is mere days ago I could wander down to Dia to purchase several bottles of wine and brandy for a fiesta, in my flip flops...a feat that lead to Que tienes fiesta este noche, no? (Are you having a party tonight?) Since my Spanish wasn't equipped to deal with my normal response of "Yes, Hercule Poirot, we are having a bit of a shingdig as it happens, how did you ever work it out?" I come out with "No, no, its all for me!" in a joke that not so much flops as leaps suicidally off the Empire State building...apparently I now AM capable of downing two rosés, two bottles of brandy and some decorative cinnamon sticks on my own thank you so very much Día's checkout finest...don't tell my mother, I probably could if dared...
Despire the perpetual drizzle the artist did manage to make it out this very night it the spirit of science and enthusiastic research (I can now freely find free mojitos, shots and sangria anywhere in the city at any hour of day...I believe that ability alone should be enough to earn me a place in Heaven...) The bars were lively, the restaurants packed, the tapas flowing and the fine tradition amoung Spanish men of verging on sexual harrassment alive and well...thus it may be time to indulge in a little renditon of Madrileno nightlife...
It begins with Día, that holy place where a carton of wine costs 55c and a bottle €1. This is to be drunk at leisure..savoured as it were, with a little music in the background. I have a penchant for Sinatra followed by Jay Z; some find this a little like tuna and chocolate, I leave it up to your gentle judgement.
Now I say the next is heading out...this is a Northern Irishism which means killing the sound, groping for coats and jackets and striding purposefully into the night hellbent on causing some mayhem... or finding the nearest MacDonalds...all previous intention seems to fade away on Gran Vía when you see the Golden Arches and remember you can play the "Spot a Prozzie!" game. Record stands at 25 in one night.
After that you can take it two ways...you can wander in and out of bars, freebies in each, until you inexplicably end up at the Fontana de Oro, the "Golden Fountain" Irish pub which seems to attract aimless party-goers like a black hole attracts matter and in which you should never EVER dance with Columbian men. I'm only telling you for your own good, they're no Fred Astaire...
Or you may gravitate towards one of Madrids many clubs; open til six thirty, guaranteed to offer music to make you move til the wee small hours of the morning. Also damn fine measures in the mixers...
I apologise for the concentration on the tipsy wonders of Spains capital...hey, it's what you do to keep the punters amused...but also of greater merit is the food in the tucked away eateries dotting the fine city. Three courses, wine and complementary bread for €10 and everything tastes like a stereotypical Goodfellas mob boss cooking for his nephew. You know, like;
"Tony, whassamatta you? You look thin! Here, sit down, I get you something to eat...what you mean you don't want nothing? You tastes this. I swear is like the angel Gabriel hisself, he make the pasta. You crazy, you know that...you eatta this sauce, you go to your maker happy..."
And so forth...I can't promise they'll say exactly that but I'll surely have a go at Marlon Brando's Sicilian accent.
Now, first blogging under the influence complete I have to admit its not that shabby...mainly because I have been tracing every sentence with one wobbling finger and conducting my disjointed train of thought with a cup of Tetley's, occasionally the tea will make a spirited leap for the freedom but I have thus far managed to contain the bugger; which has made me absurdly pleased with myself.
Toodle pip chappies and as I promised you a "One Foot in the Grave" type rant you should now imagine me and you; linked arm in arm as we wander home through the leaf strewn, breezy Madrilenan night; wending our way past treelined streets and late night tabernas, waving a "No, gracias" to promoters handing out club flyers. And as we stroll under delicate balconies and sculpted stone a Norn Irish voice echoes into the night;
"€10 for a pina colada? €10!! I don't believe it! I could have flown to Cuba for a rum based cocktail and felt better about the damn waste of money...unbelieveable, next they'll be telling me a ham sandwich costs enoughto bail out the Greek banks..."
xo
Wednesday, 19 October 2011
Of all the gin joints in all the Iberian penisula...
I had briefly considered naming this piece "Aileen in Blunderland" but feel a little Casablanca may in turn lend a little Tinseltown to what has conspired to be a very trying week. If I were Mrs Bennett I would be reclining on a four poster clutching a lace handkerchief to my brow and crying out for someone to fetch the smelling salts to restore my poor nerves. That's how it went down.
What a terribly awkward week. I'm in Starbucks again trying to look artsy and not at all like I had to Google the correct spelling of "hankerchief." Even now as I try to remember what I wanted to write I must shudder in remembered social embarrassment. Here's why;
Primero, my assigned uni sort-of-college-mother figure. A dear sweet girl who I ran into on the way out of the UAM cafeteria; but herein lies the rub Hamlet. You can't just spring Spanish speakers onto me. I need time to mentally prepare. It would be like asking Rocky to take on Apollo Creed when the guy's just stepped out of the shower. The man isn't in the zone! He needs some Eye of the Tiger, he needs protein shakes...he needs to run up the steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and cry out for joy! And so do I! No, what I need is some time to translate "A pleasure to meet you" without accidentally using the noun "placer" which is more for the Belle du Jour sort of pleasure and would just end up horribly embarrassing everyone.
So I froze, open mouthed like a lazy goldfish, and could not come up with a suitable answer to Que tal? which is GCSE Spanish at its best. And because I took my own ridiculous advice "Say anything, nothing could make you look more of an idiot than you already do" and came out with "No sé que decir" (I don't knwo what to say) I'm afraid my poor Spanish guardian is now under the impression I'm more likely to ask for a lollipop than advice on the up and coming issues in mercantile law.
As if the UAM day wasn't spicy enough I have added the game Hide and Don't Seek to the fun. Now I know that a good 80% of you play this game too. Maybe you've never heard of it, maybe you don't realise you do it but don't lie to yourselves when I describe it. Join me in coming clean, holding one hand up to Heaven and say loud and proud "I too have made a complete tit of myself in front of a perfect stranger on a night out and now cannot look them in the eye least I die of shame..."
That's a bit long; we'll cut it down to something we can put on a T-shirt...
Anyway, the perfect stranger is not important. What is important is that they may have witnessed an angry monologue about Spanish internet providers, accompanied by spirited use of a mojito to punctuate amoung other things and now I have to use a mirror to look around Law Fac corridors.
Thus it was that on exiting a classroom I espied the stanger to the starboard side and kept right on walking...
...right on walking into a caretakers closet.
What could I do? They were waiting for another class. The danger would be over in mere moments. All I had to do was sit tight at base camp and hope no one came to use the mop and bucket. Which of course Juan the Janitor did.
"Usted se encuentra perdida?" He asks. Are you lost? (Polite verb form and everything, what a gentleman)
"No, de todas formas no," I reply.
He looks concerned, And so am I because we have just come to the same conclusion at the same time via mental arithmetic. If I'm not lost I must have a reason to be hanging out in his store room, and I'm not letting this get extremely, horribly "Are you trying to seduce me Miss Devlin-y" out of hand.
"Ah ha, ta luego señor..."
Escape number two and somewhere up there Harry Houdini is wondering whether this could have been incorporated into his performances.
Next there was Philosophy of Law; Jurisprudence to we legal folk and usually I, if not kick ass, then serioudly prod bottom in this arena. First lecture, who comes up but Dworkin. Can´t pronounce that if you try to roll the r my foolhardy Latinos. They all look terrifed. Our teacher smiles
"¿Quereis que lo escribo?" she asks knwoingly.
No I don´t need you to write it. I´m all up in this bitch, as I once heard Samuel L Jackson and rather liked the sound of. I am ON the spelling of Richard Dworkins name.
Except the we had to "colocaros en filas para que no podeis copiar" get into alternating rows so you can't copy
Had she seen through my ingenius scheme of sitting behind a Spaniard with a laptop so narry a word was missed? Nope; we had a test. On an article I had not read for the very legitimate reason of having no fecking clue it existeed. And it was multiple choice. And one of the questions was "Who wrote Critics?" Oh the holy mortifying shame of it all.
The last straw that broke the camels back...or summat like that...was a friendly run in with the neighbours. I'm lying, of course, we may have inadvertently held the lift door open while getting up to speed with gossip. A simple mistake, but one that made our vecino climb four flights of stairs. We didn't realise this. I didn't realise this. Thus it came as a shock which made the San Francisco quake of '06 seem like a child's hiccup when she screamed;
"Que cerrais la jodida peurta!" Close the f**king door and then, on opening her door across the hall proceeded to inform her room mate that;
"Estas putas que viven aqui no saben ni siquiera cerrar una puerta! Coño, putas!"
This translates rather charmingly as "Those whores that live across the way don't even know how to close a door! F**king whores!"
If ever a moment called for my best Kenneth Williams style; "MADAM!" that was it. I believe the Carry On reference may have been wasted though.
Other than that, well I don't think I can top that. Now if you'll excuse me I must once again recline on my four poster surrounded by Cadbury's that I may have purchased purely to cheer self up. Best case scenario, glorious chocolate induced food coma. Worst? Well I could take the putas suggestion seriously and set up a brothel. The classy kind. Maybe set up a contract, none of this pay-as-you-come-and-go nonsense. No chintz nor red velvet. Blonde or dark wood? Some tasteful nude prints? Or famous movie sex scene stills!! Yes, this could wor...
I apologise, must leave to ponder an ...ah... unrelated matter. Opinions/advice on entrepeneurship in the sex industry are, as always, very welcome
xo
What a terribly awkward week. I'm in Starbucks again trying to look artsy and not at all like I had to Google the correct spelling of "hankerchief." Even now as I try to remember what I wanted to write I must shudder in remembered social embarrassment. Here's why;
Primero, my assigned uni sort-of-college-mother figure. A dear sweet girl who I ran into on the way out of the UAM cafeteria; but herein lies the rub Hamlet. You can't just spring Spanish speakers onto me. I need time to mentally prepare. It would be like asking Rocky to take on Apollo Creed when the guy's just stepped out of the shower. The man isn't in the zone! He needs some Eye of the Tiger, he needs protein shakes...he needs to run up the steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and cry out for joy! And so do I! No, what I need is some time to translate "A pleasure to meet you" without accidentally using the noun "placer" which is more for the Belle du Jour sort of pleasure and would just end up horribly embarrassing everyone.
So I froze, open mouthed like a lazy goldfish, and could not come up with a suitable answer to Que tal? which is GCSE Spanish at its best. And because I took my own ridiculous advice "Say anything, nothing could make you look more of an idiot than you already do" and came out with "No sé que decir" (I don't knwo what to say) I'm afraid my poor Spanish guardian is now under the impression I'm more likely to ask for a lollipop than advice on the up and coming issues in mercantile law.
As if the UAM day wasn't spicy enough I have added the game Hide and Don't Seek to the fun. Now I know that a good 80% of you play this game too. Maybe you've never heard of it, maybe you don't realise you do it but don't lie to yourselves when I describe it. Join me in coming clean, holding one hand up to Heaven and say loud and proud "I too have made a complete tit of myself in front of a perfect stranger on a night out and now cannot look them in the eye least I die of shame..."
That's a bit long; we'll cut it down to something we can put on a T-shirt...
Anyway, the perfect stranger is not important. What is important is that they may have witnessed an angry monologue about Spanish internet providers, accompanied by spirited use of a mojito to punctuate amoung other things and now I have to use a mirror to look around Law Fac corridors.
Thus it was that on exiting a classroom I espied the stanger to the starboard side and kept right on walking...
...right on walking into a caretakers closet.
What could I do? They were waiting for another class. The danger would be over in mere moments. All I had to do was sit tight at base camp and hope no one came to use the mop and bucket. Which of course Juan the Janitor did.
"Usted se encuentra perdida?" He asks. Are you lost? (Polite verb form and everything, what a gentleman)
"No, de todas formas no," I reply.
He looks concerned, And so am I because we have just come to the same conclusion at the same time via mental arithmetic. If I'm not lost I must have a reason to be hanging out in his store room, and I'm not letting this get extremely, horribly "Are you trying to seduce me Miss Devlin-y" out of hand.
"Ah ha, ta luego señor..."
Escape number two and somewhere up there Harry Houdini is wondering whether this could have been incorporated into his performances.
Next there was Philosophy of Law; Jurisprudence to we legal folk and usually I, if not kick ass, then serioudly prod bottom in this arena. First lecture, who comes up but Dworkin. Can´t pronounce that if you try to roll the r my foolhardy Latinos. They all look terrifed. Our teacher smiles
"¿Quereis que lo escribo?" she asks knwoingly.
No I don´t need you to write it. I´m all up in this bitch, as I once heard Samuel L Jackson and rather liked the sound of. I am ON the spelling of Richard Dworkins name.
Except the we had to "colocaros en filas para que no podeis copiar" get into alternating rows so you can't copy
Had she seen through my ingenius scheme of sitting behind a Spaniard with a laptop so narry a word was missed? Nope; we had a test. On an article I had not read for the very legitimate reason of having no fecking clue it existeed. And it was multiple choice. And one of the questions was "Who wrote Critics?" Oh the holy mortifying shame of it all.
The last straw that broke the camels back...or summat like that...was a friendly run in with the neighbours. I'm lying, of course, we may have inadvertently held the lift door open while getting up to speed with gossip. A simple mistake, but one that made our vecino climb four flights of stairs. We didn't realise this. I didn't realise this. Thus it came as a shock which made the San Francisco quake of '06 seem like a child's hiccup when she screamed;
"Que cerrais la jodida peurta!" Close the f**king door and then, on opening her door across the hall proceeded to inform her room mate that;
"Estas putas que viven aqui no saben ni siquiera cerrar una puerta! Coño, putas!"
This translates rather charmingly as "Those whores that live across the way don't even know how to close a door! F**king whores!"
If ever a moment called for my best Kenneth Williams style; "MADAM!" that was it. I believe the Carry On reference may have been wasted though.
Other than that, well I don't think I can top that. Now if you'll excuse me I must once again recline on my four poster surrounded by Cadbury's that I may have purchased purely to cheer self up. Best case scenario, glorious chocolate induced food coma. Worst? Well I could take the putas suggestion seriously and set up a brothel. The classy kind. Maybe set up a contract, none of this pay-as-you-come-and-go nonsense. No chintz nor red velvet. Blonde or dark wood? Some tasteful nude prints? Or famous movie sex scene stills!! Yes, this could wor...
I apologise, must leave to ponder an ...ah... unrelated matter. Opinions/advice on entrepeneurship in the sex industry are, as always, very welcome
xo
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