All Around the World

Le Canard Stéréotypé Française, a stereotypical French Duck.
See the Eiffel Tower in the center of the background? 

How lovely it is to be awoken by the sun, especially when the view out my window is of a glorious summer morning in Paris. Most windows are perpendicular to the ground, thus increasing the opportunities for people-watching, and for viewing spectacular skylines and Eiffel Towers. The window in my room is focused on other things: tilting towards the sky, due to the slanted ceiling, my window welcomes the sunbeams which illuminate my little room. Lying on my bed, I can watch the never-ending stream of clouds as they drift over Paris.

As I acclimate to the Parisian speed of life, it’s hard to believe that I left Los Angeles twelve days ago; stranger still is the fact that only two weeks have gone by since I waved goodbye to my New Zealand friends. 

My entry visa into France!
(On the right, you can see my student visa for New Zealand. It's still valid until the end of August...)

The itinerary of my past two weeks shows a veritable whirlwind tour of the world: I left Dunedin on June 23, arrived in LA on the same day (I’m still confused about how that’s possible), departed LA two days later, met my dad and sisters for dinner during a 45 minute layover in Philadelphia, arrived in Paris on the morning of June 26, met the couple whose apartment I’m staying in this summer, dashed off to one of Paris’ main train stations, caught a high-speed train to Taizé, France, where I spent a week at a monastery, and finally returned to Paris on July 3.

Truly an international crowd. I was definitely in the minority as a native English-speaker,
but I was amazed to find that almost everyone spoke English to some degree, most very well.

The week in Taizé was exactly what my internal clock needed to recover from the five time zones I’d lived in on three continents, all in the span of four days. Luckily, I had predicted that I would need such a respite during this transition time, and had blocked out a week just for this purpose. Now I will attempt to explain what Taizé is, though I already know that my description cannot do it justice. Perhaps this is because I can’t articulate exactly how the thrice-daily prayer affected me, or maybe I am still in awe of the thousands of young people who surrounded me, all speaking in unfamiliar languages. Taizé could be the definition of ecumenism. Not once during the entire week, which I spent working in the kitchen, walking in the stereotypically picturesque French countryside, attending talks by the brothers, and talking with new friends at Bible studies and over meals, did anyone mention what “sort” of Christian they were. Baptists, Catholics, Presbyterians, Orthodox, Anglican—those words are effectively meaningless at Taizé, a place which celebrates the global community of Christians and focuses on similarities rather than differences. It’s amazing how much can be learned about the world during a retreat from the world.

Watching the sunrise at Taize, 5:30am 

Though the Train de Grande Vitesse, or “the TGV” as everyone calls it, transported me from Taizé to Paris in under two hours, these places are worlds apart in every respect (except for freshly baked baguettes, which are practically omnipresent, and omni-delicious, throughout the country.) From the balcony of the apartment, I have a clear view of the Boulevard Peripherique, which looks a bit like the Pasadena Freeway crossing over the Arroyo Seco. It is always busy, but there are only three lanes in each direction instead of four or five, or however many there are. The cars are smaller, and more people ride motorcycles and scooters than back home in LA. The public transit system is like a dream, but then again Paris is a very densely populated city, so it’s practical to have free, public bicycle stations every few hundred meters.

The apartment I'm staying in is above a cafe, and has a balcony with a view.
I couldn't have asked for a better situation, and with lovelier hosts!

But enough about the merits of Paris city planning; let’s talk about the real deal, the reason I’m here in the first place. Though I don’t consider myself to be one hundred percent fluent yet, I’ve successfully lined up some appointments with some bee experts. On Wednesday, I had my first phone call, all in French—what a feeling of success! Today I’ve got another one. Phone calls are the hardest task when speaking in a new-ish language, because of the complete lack of gesticulations and facial cues, and the presence of background cell phone noise. But I did it nonetheless, and managed to set up an appointment next week with the secretary of the National Beekeeping Union. I’ve just confirmed two more meetings with beekeepers, dates to be announced. I’m particularly excited about meeting the pastor who keeps beehives on the roof of his church: the honey is sold as a fundraiser.

The evening sun as seen from the rooftop cafe at Printemps, a fantastic department store in central Paris.

I’ve got so much more to say, but I’ll just have to tantalize you with this picture, in which you see my post-shopping afternoon snack. We had champagne, and my hostess Liz introduced me to the delectable, multicolored French version of macaroons, all on the rooftop patio of a department store, with a fantastic 360-degree view of the early evening sunset over Paris. 

My daily afternoon snack.
(Yeah right!)