Mademoiselle, vous êtes très charmante...

Apparently, vanity got the better of me today, as I sallied forth in a short jean skirt and off the shoulder black top to face the 50something degree weather. Apparently, I forgot that I have a cough AND still-damp hair smelling of hair styling unguents...or perhaps I didn't forget, but overrode common sense with my Narcissistic tendencies...

In any case, I suppose I didn't look half bad, as per this incident:

Scene: Monoprix, the Safeway (or Shaw's, for you East Coasters) of Paris. I am leaning over the freezer, picking out frozen vegetables for my fried rice (rather, my mother's. but hopefully i'll make it mine soon). Ears are plugged with the delicate white plastic buds of my ipod nano.

Man: Excusez-moi mademoiselle, mais est-ce que je pourrais faire votre connaissance?
(roughly: excuse me miss, can we meet each other? well more like can we introduce ourselves)

Me: Ehh..., c'est comme vous voulez....

(as you wish)

Note: From past experience, I should know to say, sorry, I need to go. Or, I have a boyfriend. Nope, still not smart enough to do that. Or perhaps too soft hearted, he didn't seem too sketchy.

Man: etc etc etc asks about my background, where I'm from, where I live.

All the while, I'm alternately looking at him and glancing at the vegetables, unable to drop the rejecting words or say, "go away"

Man: Est-ce que vous avez un numero pour que on puisse se voir autour d'un verre?

(Do you have a number so we can meet up for a drink?)

Kate: (lying very very badly) Er, j'ai pas un portable...

(I don't have a cellphone...)

Man: Un addresse d'email, donc?

(How about an email address?)

Kate: Je suis très occupée, j’ai beaucoup de devoirs…et mon copain va me rendre visite la semaine prochaine.

(I'm really busy, I have a lot of homework, and my friend (male) is going to visit me next week)


Perfect time to pretend my "copain" is actually my "petit ami" (boyfriend). Nope, not clever/quick/hard hearted enough to do that non plus...


Man: Mademoiselle, je vous trouve si charmante...etc etc etc

(Miss, I find you very charming)

Me: Ummm, merci...mais il faut que je m'en aille....

(Thanks...but I have to go...)


And I run away, forgetting my frozen vegetables. How am I going to cook my fried rice? I suppose it's a dinner of baguette and rillettes for me tonight. Yum.

Oh Kate, when will you learn to say no??? Or pretend you have a boyfriend? I'm terrible at lying. Sigh. Although if I could lie, I'd say I was lesbian. Just a little white lie, non?

or maybe I like this. You know, it's quite possible. French men have this frank forthrightness, it can be unnerving sometimes, but very refreshing from the puerile Harvard mentality--enough with the shrinking violets, bring on the aggressive sunflowers, right? Or perhaps a compromise.....


In other words, I read the best Crimson article ever, an editorial by a freshman, which conveys my sentiments exactly. Entitled "What's a Woman to do?" I highly urge both men and women to peruse it at http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=513134


Motherhood is perhaps one of the most glorious positions I could ever have. It is a choice that I made many years ago, a conscious, educated, informed choice. Contrary to feminist accusations, I have not been oppressed by the patriarchial concepts of female subjugation into believing this. To the contrary, my parents, and especially my father, pressured me in the opposite direction. To first be an overachieving businesswoman, to climb the professional ladder first, to be in a position of power. I do not feel as though American society today pressures women into being housewives...there is a greater pressure for women to be super-beings--to be mothers and professionals. It's not to say it cannot be done. I'm sure there are women who make great mothers and great corporate powerhouses. But I know I cannot.

But for me, there was never a doubt what was more important to me, what was my choice above all else. For me, my family, my children will always come first. And feminists ought not, as Lucy pointed out, deny me this most basic, fundamental right of motherhood. I am not a feminist, but I always thought that feminism was about choice. Because freedom of choice has always for me equalled freedom. I have had, with regards to my family and social context, never been denied a choice in this matter. I saw the different scenarios, the possible forking paths to walk upon. And for me, the choice of motherhood is the most glorious, beautiful, indeed noble, of all accomplishments. And being a wonderful mother, that means more to me, beyond doubt, than being a CEO of Company X. . If feminists laud women who chose their career, why cannot they respect women who chose motherhood? It is once again, the freedom, the power of choice that empowers us more than the actual decision that we take. If I do not begrudge or envy women for choosing their career, why cannot I be accorded dignity for choosing motherhood?

To clarify, this is not to say that my only goal in life is to be a mother. Only that motherhood is a choice I would gladly and easily make in the future.

AH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

*dramatic gesture*

This morning was the worst morning of my time in Paris, and dramatic as I tend to be, I am not exaggerating this time.

I got up at 8 am today to write emails...and discovered that I was unofficially dumped by my girlfriend on facebook, for probably the 3rd time.

Went to the Sorbonne to pick up a packet from my history professor's office. Spent 20 minutes running up and down stairs, in vain. Where is G647???? Does it even exist???

Ran 10 minutes to Centre Michelet for my art history TD. Only to find M. Laugee was not there. Of the 2 other students waiting outside the empty Salle Fermigier, no one knew what was going on. I asked the secretariat, who eyed me languidly and said, "I have no information on M. Laugee, sorry." This, after my CM prof. M. Goetz did not show up for the Tuesday evening class, to which the Secretariat also said, "I have no idea where he is." The 2 French students looked at me with pitying eyes, "It must be difficult for you foreign students, welcome to France." Difficult, what an understatement.

So I walked back to the Sorbonne to try to find M. Crouzet's office. After about 40 minutes of dashing up and down stairs again (in my new heels nonetheless!!! I suppose they're well broken-in now), and asking two Secretariats (History secretariat: His office is Escalier G, 1.5 floor, first room to left. Me: What's the number? Secretariat: I dunno, it's just there.), I finally found the confounded room. No, it was NOT the first room on the left. And sadder, I was actually within 2 feet of the room at one point earlier in my travails, and didn't even realize it. I must have looked a fright, sniffling nose and sweaty brow to my professor. I was so frazzled I didn't even say "au revoir" to him after I took the packet. Sigh.

At least I'm well exercised for the day.

The point of my complaint is: I will be so incredibly grateful for Harvard's organized, well-structured classes and classrooms and pleasant mannered secretaries when I come back.

I still love this place though.

A List

Profuse, profound apologies for not updating, and nod to Shang for reminding me of my blogging duties :)

What have I been doing these last few weeks? Besides coloring a rouge-like shade of red after one sip of wine, besides becoming entangled in yarn-like twists of would-be homo sapiens interactions, besides burning two pots of jasmine rice, besides losing my Chinese, English, already rudimentary Spanish and somehow regressing in my spoken French...and not to mention acquiring abominable black caresses of pollution that my painfully white coats betray so blithely only 1 day after the dry cleaners...

My adoration, an adoration of folly for Paris, somewhat akin to irrational, fatalistic love of the Chevalier for his beloved in Manon Lescaut (which I am reading and heartily recommend), is as strong as ever, but mingled with a slight pain. While I speak French with a passable accent, while I do not dress conspiciously in the prototypically "American" way (at least to the minds of many French, where American dress = sweats, sweats...and sweats)...I realize every time I hear a native French speaker, every time I see a chic Parisienne, that I am very far away from even stepping into the suburbs of what in my eyes is the Mount Olympus of the civilized world. Don't reproach me for my ignorance of all that is not lovely here, I know it well. O Pascal, ce que vous dites, c'est vrai: «Le coeur a ses raisons que la raison ne connaît point.»

But yes, the list. Of French literature. To read. So long. I wish I had started earlier. Being thesis-free (don't hit me, please), my thesis replacement will be a frenzied burrowing into the long, illuminated, diamond-studded passageway of French literature.


Currently reading: Manon Lescaut de l'Abbé Prévost


Currently needing to finish: Les Liaisons Dangereuses de Choderlos de Laclos


Random things that have happened to me recently:

1) Being accosted by a Chinese couple near the Arc de Triomphe trying to trick me into buying a Louis Vuitton bag for them so they can make fakes in China.
2) Almost getting into a heated argument with the aforesaid couple by accusing them of trying to make a fool out of me, and telling them I knew exactly what hanky-panky they were up to. Thanks to my mother, who got rid of them before I could say anything more damaging.
3) Eating the most sublime mini gâteau Saint-Honoré à la rose with a broken plastic spoon on the Champs -Elysees (after which aforementioned incident occurred)
4) Seeing an old man on a bus near Versailles winking at my mother
5) Developing a crush on dead white men *see note below
6) Staring unabashedly at comely young strangers in the subway and being caught by my vigilant mother
7) Sniffing 100 perfumes at Sephora in the quest for my second perfect scent (almost there, narrowed down to about 10)
8) Conversing with an old Christian missionary outside Notre Dame, who claimed that Jewish people are doomed to hell because they don't believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God.
9) Being catcalled at by some high schoolers while walking through the Jardin de Luxembourg
10) Realizing that I have made a very good and true French friend : )

*note: I have a penchant for dead white men...at the Louvre on Monday, I saw the classic portrait of Louis XV and thought, well, I certainly wouldn't have minded being Madame de Pompadour or la Comtesse du Barry (well, the latter had him during the wrinkly corrupt years, so mayhaps not). At Versailles, I swooned over portraits of several dead white princes and dukes in various habiliments of royal glory. But really, Louis XV was terribly handsome...more so than Louis XIV I should think.

felicia is right

...when she pointed out to me that I must be "enjoying myself", marked by the absence of posts.

I've had two visitors from the far away capitalist empire of the United States (Only half joking about this one) in the last week and a half, dear Mirla and equally dear-in-a-different-fashion Harr.

Mirla's being here actually encouraged me to step out more often...I had categorically refused to set foot near the Eiffel Tower (incidentally a 15-20 minute stroll from my apartment) until she cajoled me.

I have a bit too much too say and am too tired to say it, so I won't. Yes, I am being unreasonable. But have I ever been a reasonable person?

A little update: I will be staying here in Paris for the summer, working for the Let's Go Paris guide. Happiness : )

I am not always the most eloquent of beings, and always experienced difficulty in expressing my philosophy on the fate. But this summarizes it snugly:
"As human beings, are we free to live out our lives according to our own desires, in accordance with our will, or are we merely powerless pawns in the hand of destiny? These are potent questions that in some way or another confront us all, sometimes in the most unexpected of ways. In a sense, I do believe that our fate is pre-determined. Yet paradoxically, I do not believe that this absolves us of our responsibility to try to alter it for the greater good, nor do I believe that fate has the final word. We might even say we are co-authors with fate of our destiny."

-Chen Kaige

This I believe.

Life is a set of opposing forces, opposing actions, opposing ideas, that form the sometimes gentle, oft savage waves which shape the pebbles of life. I have come to see myself, the world, as a set of paradoxes...and I realized that all my life I have obstinately struggled to define myself between competing forces, when I should have been reveling in the natural state of paradox that exists within me.















No, I have not consumed any alcohol in the picture. Yes, I am very proud of my poitrine, which appears actually existent in the picture.





















Obligatory Eiffel Tower picture. I let Mirla bully me into it. : D
















At a bar. No Tina, you stalker, I am not really corrupting Mirla.
















I love the effect of the light in this picture...it's so blue and pink creating a delicate slightly stereotypically French bistro feeling. Pink + blue = pretty