Daily Life with Poetry

This photo was taken on a Metro train somewhere beneath Paris. I took it because in the front of the car on the right hand side we had a standard subway advertisement. However on the left hand side we see a white panel with a blue field. Sadly my phone did not have to resolution to capture the words, which were a poem describing a person's need for poetry like a daily vitamin.

Here is another poem, this time on the platform. I took this photo for Eric, but it illustrates my point here today.

Je suis un enfant de partout

un enfant de Paris, de Cotonou,

un enfant des montagnes

des plis rouges d’un pagne.

Je suis un enfant des nids de moineaux,

de Mulhouse, de Baltimore,

des petits bateaux de la baie de Rio

et pire encore

je suis un enfant de quelque part

né de l’amour entre la chance

et le hasard.

Un enfant avec un nom,

un prénom,

mais un enfant qu’on appelle Terrien

parce que, sans moi,

cette planète n’est rien.

I have different photos to show the incredible flowers in public places, but I think these things - public poetry, flowered towns - are the real genius of French urban dwelling. We have good baguettes in America now, but we haven't yet made as much of an effort to add art in our lives. I wish we'd do more of it.

We didn't pay no stinkin' taxes!

I've tried to get Eric enrolled in the crèche (daycare) but unlike America you can't just roll up and sign up. I gave up a while ago and just decided to focus on nannies because it was just too complicated to even get on the waiting list.

First you have to have a lease that is an original, not a print out. Well, if you completed your lease internationally it's tough to have any original. This is 2012 people.

Then you have to have an electricity bill. Those things are solid gold over here. I don't really know why they love them so much.

Then you need pay stubs. OK, I can sorta understand that one, though in America we'd say that you only need to provide them if you're looking to get a subsidized spot.

There are a bunch of random other things I've forgotten but the one we were laughing about tonight was their requirement of your last tax statement. Ours was, of course, filed in the USA. They don't want that one, so what they want us to do is go to the Trésorie and get a statement that because we were not living in France last year we didn't pay taxes in France last year. Daddy was suggesting that we could get a bunch of other statements too, just for the fun of it. We were also not living in Chile, Sweden, Latvia, and Kenya last year. We could just make ourselves a new hobby of collecting statements from foreign governments which assert that because we had nothing to do with them during the calendar year we paid no taxes there.

THAT would make a dossier that would impress even the crèche lady!

The Power of a Brand

So "Big-E Smalls" has been sick a lot lately (I know it's normal but I'm not used to it yet). Anyway, over here for fever they give paracetamol. It's funny but because my mother gave me Children's Tylenol when I was sick now even the packaging is now comforting to me. Over here they give some kind of suspect "paracetamol" stuff, and I swallowed hard and allowed them to dose my precious baby with their mystery syrup. I wanted to know how it is different and the answer is NOT AT ALL! As the wikipedia page cites:

The words acetaminophen (used in the United States, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Iran) and paracetamol (used elsewhere) both come from a chemical name for the compound: para-acetylaminophenol and para-acetylaminophenol.

 One less thing to worry about!

Staying In Touch Long Distance

One of the big challenges about being over here is feeling isolated - I can have wonderful times and wonderful French friends, but my history is living 6 hours behind me and without that I do feel lonely. It's hard to be relevant when one is so far away... As a means of keeping in touch two of my sisters and I have decided to have a little recipe club. Each of us chooses a culinary "theme" she's interested in exploring and contributes it to the pool (need not be an ingredient, could be a technique or anything). Then we all spend the month working on and trying out recipes that have something to do with that theme. Hopefully we'll email about them, discuss them, send photos, whatever. Honestly, hopefully we'll just continue to be important parts of each other's lives...

So this month is the début and the project doesn't even have a name but the contributed themes in no particular order are: parsnips, leafy greens like chard, and lentils.

Best-loved recipe contributions and suggestions for what to call this virtual cooking club are most welcomed!

Getting Our Bearings

We haven't written much because we're still just getting our bearings. Saturday Eric and I went to sleep at 6PM and slept straight through to 8AM! We awoke feeling like new people, but new people who still need a lot more sleep...

We finally have a bank account. Daddy went back to the bank with a real electric company statement saying we live at our address and have an account with them but since we just arrived they have not yet sent us a bill for the electricity we're just beginning to use. The electric company assured us that this was the legal equivalent of a bill. The bank said that isn't good enough, so in anger Daddy left and went next door to the luxury bank. We will pay 8 Euro a month to have an account but at least we'll have an account. He was sorry because he wanted to patronize the bank that sponsors the Tour de France but they just made it too hard on us.

Eric now has a nanny. She comes to the house, to make life easier for him, and they are getting to know each other this week. It's wonderful watching him watch her speak French, it's as if you see the wheels turning in his head. He's having a hard time adjusting to the time, the place, and the language, so I'm glad we're not adding another new place to all of this. Learning about childcare in France has been interesting. She will be declared, and that costs more (6 weeks paid vacation each year!) but we get 40-50% (reports differ) of her salary back as cash, and the rest is tax deductible. There is no need to plan ahead and create a flexible spending account or anything like that. It's just there for the asking.

On Monday we went to an expat playgroup I found through Message Paris. This is specifically a group for babies his age in our neighborhood. They defined parallel play, but all the same I felt that Eric was relieved to know that there were other English-speaking babies his age right down the street. We'll make a point of going every chance we get. They also helped me orient to the various opportunities here. It seems the most popular venue for outings with babies it the Aquarium, just across from the Eiffel Tower at Trocadéro.

Eric is practicing his French

OK, I am posting this photo because I know this entry isn't all that interesting. I hope to have a more exciting update soon!