Sojourns in France

There is a theme about Paris that I’m starting to pick up on, and that is pretty much that no matter when people are living there, they always wish that Paris was the same as it was in the past, and I don’t think I ever really understood this seemingly universal disillusionment before this week, especially studying Bauldelaire. During the course of his life, Paris underwent a very wide variety of social, political, and architectural changes that Bauldelaire general considers in his poetry to be worse than what came before it. He speaks especially of the constant construction sounds disrupting things that used to be stable, and new plaster buildings covering up the stone monuments of ages past. I think I originally read this as a phase of construction that had started at one point and was eventually completed to transform Paris into the city in which I live today. However, upon touring areas of Bauldelaire’s Paris with this new lens, I realized that this construction culture is a way o...

Though there have still been many new discoveries around Paris, there is beginning to be a lot more routine as well. After several trips to the Latin quarter, I practically consider the Panthéon my second home in Paris. The first couple of trips in the area felt strongly focused on the architecture of the area, which is admittedly impressive. However, through subsequent visits I became much more enraptured discovering more about the people who lived there. One of the most significant of these for me personally was the residence of Ernest Hemingway when he was living in Paris. Although the location is extremely unassuming, I felt like I was completing a pilgrimage in paying homage to my fellow American. Hemingway feels like such a kindred spirit to me, as a young American searching Paris for a creative awakening. Another discovery that was super cool to me was that the final resting place of Sainte Geneviève, the patron saint of Paris, is inside a church the the area that I had already...

Whenever I think about the fact that I am currently in France, the word that comes to mind in unreal. In such a surreal way, everything is so different here, from the bread to the architecture, to the French language itself. My first week in France has been a strange balance of trying to be an ultra-cheesy tourist (sorry not sorry for making the Eiffel Tower my profile pic) and trying to carry out a student life in the city. Having already checked off most of the essential Paris digs already, I'm finding myself falling in love with some of the more underground (Metro mastery in progress) aspects of Paris. One of the big things that I have been learning about France is that it is crazy diverse. My trip to the south of France was, quite honestly, a lot closer to my expectations of Italy, featuring a colosseum style arena and old churches on every corner. Paris, while full of all of the things you traditionally think about France, also has some sharp contrasts, such as the cutting ...