The Frazzled Waiter

Forceful gales of wind blew dust that scratched our exposed legs as we walked along the coastline.  An open-air tent toppled over on the beach and rolled away until a trio of sunbathers rescued the shelter.  The sea was a royal blue speckled with glittering crystals of sunlight.  As the thunderous waves crashed upon the pebble shore, the water turned translucent and, once settled, blue again.  This is the Cote d’Azur——the Blue Coast.  The name is not the most creative, but the label is appropriate.

My small group escaped the powerful gusts by heading into the Old Town of Nice, France.  In the central vein, shopkeepers sold expensive local produce while amateur artists hawked their water colors.  All the cafés offered over-priced dishes that forced us to find sustenance in the backstreets.  After turning down a few spots, we came across a cheap selection of salads and sandwiches. 

A casually-dressed waiter addressed me in rapid French of which I understood very little. 

Je regarde le menu, I said, “I’m looking at the menu.” 

The waiter’s hair was thinning even though he looked quite young.  He cleared the table with one hand and wiped the surface with a paper towel in the other hand.  While cleaning, he spoke too quickly again, so I asked if he could speak more slowly.  He didn’t appear to do much slowly, which explains his thinning hair.

He switched to a form of rushed, broken English and arranged the tables inside the cramped café to accommodate the whole group.  I ordered a four cheese panini because it was the Frenchiest dish I could find other than a salad nicoise, but I doubted a salad would fill me up. 

Bridget ordered a large salad, and I discovered it may have done the job due to its enormity.  There were heaps of thinly-sliced ham stacked onto a bushel of lettuce and a few kilos of tomatoes. 

I couldn’t identify the individual cheeses on my sandwich, but they were all lined up in a particular order, which was repeated on each half of the panini.  If the cheeses were a poem, their rhyme scheme would be:  A, B, C, D, A, B, C, D.  I first bit into this greenish bleu cheese and was slightly revolted when I realized I would encounter this cheese once more after I consumed its neighbors. 

The waiter zoomed around the café with efficient movements.  From where I sat at the bar, I could see the small galley kitchen in front of me.  A young French girl hand-washed dishes in a small sink and distributed menus to newcomers.  A woman handled take-out orders from customers standing on the sidewalk behind a glass case of samples.  She also manned both the cash register and the panini grill. 

My seven friends and I sat inside at the bar and at high-tables near the wall.  There were more tables and chairs on the outside patio, and customers were piling in during the lunch rush.  Having worked in the restaurant industry, I could recognize talent when a man or woman was overwhelmed with tasks.  These people were in the weeds, but they handled the onslaught with synchronized teamwork that was beautiful to watch. 

The waiter poured crepe mixture onto a hot griddle and flattened the batter with a thin wooden mallet.  He scraped the bottom upward with a spatula and flipped the crepe.  As he waited for it to cook, he delivered two dishes and two glasses of wine to a couple sitting on the patio.  He quickly returned to the kitchen to add dollops of Nutella to the crepe.  He folded it, plated it, delivered it, and retrieved dirty dishes. 

His pace was so frantic that he banged his leg off a table and limped off the pain outside the restaurant.  After recovering, he weaved his way through menu-browsers while yelling, Attention! Attention! Excusez! Excusez!  His demeanor was quite blunt, which differed vastly from the deferential and subservient display of American waiters.

When the waiter announced my friends’ meals in the French names they did not recognize, they did not respond, so he yelled the names in English.  “Wake up!” he said as he spread butter onto a sugary crepe.  Many diners would consider this outburst to be rude, but I appreciated his honesty and his curtness.  I know what it’s like to deal with the ignorant public when you’ve got a million things to do.  He merely said what was on his mind, and I respect him for that.  However, the language barrier helped to lessen the tension in his words.    

Back home in the States, I could lose my job if I talked to a customer like that, and I’m never treated this way at restaurants where I’m often pampered with inauthentic, corporate-created dialogue.  This brush with the hectic, impolite French waiter was a refreshing spectacle.  Being properly scoffed at by locals is a crucial component of being cast astray in foreign territory. 

After sluggishly chewing through each stripe of cheese, I paid the bill and conversed with the cashier in French.  I apologized for eating so slowly, but she waved this off and told me I should take as much time as I would like.  I explained to her that I worked at a restaurant back home.    

“You all work so fast,” I said.  “It’s incredible.”

She thanked me and handed me the change, and I made no attempt to grab the money and delivered this awkward phrase, “I have no need.”  I didn’t know how to say Keep the change.  For less than ten euros, I got a sandwich that was 75% delicious, and a performance to rival the cabaret.    

Barcelona's Street Performers

Spain is not a place that adheres to deadlines.  This nonchalant attitude toward time lends the land its charm, and this whenever-feeling is pervasive throughout the culture, especially in the tapas bars.  The concept of tapas is to eat little dishes, and you can order each course whenever the mood strikes. 

Ryan and I took our seats at the bar and examined the pictures of food on the paper menu.  A Catalan woman with bright red lipstick and a spunky demeanor handed us a multilingual menu that corresponded with the pictures to their word-equivalents. 

Ryan is an electrical engineer from Vancouver, and he is traveling with his two sisters and his cousin.  They were the first group I met during the rendezvous at the London hotel.  Out of all the men on the tour, I enjoy his company the most.  A very receptive and humble listener, he is full of quiet insight.  He loves his job and looks forward to returning home.

“Most people travel to escape from their jobs,” he told me earlier that day as we strolled down La Rambla, “But I actually enjoy what I do, so I don’t mind going back to work.”

He buys and sells power from electric dams and coal-power centers.  Basically, he’s the middle man between those who generate electricity and the companies who provide power to homes and businesses.  Kilowatts are exchanged like stock on Wall Street.  The price of energy goes down at night because most lights are turned off.  You sell during the evening when day-laborers return home to watch TV.  I didn’t realize there was so much activity behind my electric bill until I ordered tapas with the man who worked behind the scenes. 

Quiero un café con leche, Ryan ordered. 

After conferring with him over the meaning of this phrase, I parroted his words.  He ordered shrimp, and I chose fried calamari.  The seafood is cheap because we are right on the Mediterranean Sea.  The waitress spoke a little English to us.

“OK, for now,” she said, indicating I could order something else in the future whenever it suited me. 

The tapas meal was a mid-day snack to energize our bodies after walking around Barcelona all day.  After visiting La Sagrada Familia, a magnificent work-in-progress began by the famous architect Gaudi, Ryan and I roamed southward down Barcelona’s most frequented avenue, La Rambla.  The street was lined with souvenir shops and only a few beggars.  We reached an arch on our right that heralded Barcelona’s bustling food market.  Fruit vendors, butchers, and take-out cooks crammed their shops together.  You couldn’t walk down the lanes without brushing against strangers.

We ordered one euro fruit juices.  The signs in Spanish and Catalan were largely indecipherable to me, but pictures indicated the main ingredients.  As I sipped my passion fruit drink, we wandered around the labyrinth filled with Spanish spices, mixed nuts, and giant fish pulled out of the harbor. 

We chose an organic Spanish restaurant, and I ordered a spicy taco sprinkled with cayenne pepper.  The dish lived up to its name.  For ten euros, I got a filling meal that also included paella (a rice and pepper dish), neon red rice, neon green rice, and a mixed salad with some unnamed yellow sauce.

As there was nowhere to sit, we ate standing up inside the market at a narrow counter on which we perched our lunches.  Browsers bumped into my backpack.  Since I am unable to eat quickly, the claustrophobic confines increased the challenge of consuming my meal in a timely fashion.  When I ate a light breakfast in a coffee-shop across the street from the Rockefeller Center in New York City, I yearned for a ten-foot bubble in which to sit by myself. 

For some reason, however, I was not uncomfortable rubbing shoulders with fellow diners in Barcelona.  The streets were busy——not as busy as the Big Apple’s——but the busy-ness lacked that impersonal urgency and instead possessed a warm and welcoming energy.  The chaos was beautiful rather than intimidating. 

The meal was satisfying, and the whole experience at the market was unexpectedly delightful.  I didn’t take many photos or visit any major landmarks, unless you count the statue of Christopher Columbus who is pointing in the wrong direction of the New World. 

There was no Eiffel Tower or Buckingham Palace crowded with tourists.  All the pleasure in Barcelona could be found in the streets. 

Visiting the Spanish city was like spending a pleasant day at a public pool while everyone else was at work.  I could stretch out and immerse myself into this refreshing habitat and soak up the novelties the environment had to offer.  Paris is more akin to an overcrowded amusement park filled with obnoxious vendors.  I prefer not to swim in over-populated pools with strangers whose hygienic practices I distrust.

For the evening’s entertainment, we watched Flamenco dancers perform.  Our Spanish host told us there are three instruments in this traditional dance:  the wooden clappers, the guitar, and the hands clapping together.  Three women wearing clunky shoes tapped their heels against the stage and slowly twirled their cupped hands snake-like to the rhythm of the Spanish guitar.  The women stomped on the ground so hard I could feel tremors under my rumbling feet.  The dancers’ faces were intense and confrontational.  For one song, the women flapped home-made fans like they were bird wings beating against the wind.  They spun in blurring motions, and their movements seemed improvised and even mildly uncoordinated. 

When the song ended, this female dancer headed toward the dressing room to change.  To get there, she had to maneuver between the tables where the audience was sitting.  I turned around, opposite of the stage, and saw the dancer poke her head out of the dressing room.  She mouthed something to a bald man on stage who was clapping his hands and maintaining the beat.  He nodded to the dancer and gestured toward the woman seated next to him.  The woman stood up and started dancing to a new beat that changed abruptly. 

Witnessing this subtle, wordless interaction between the performers, I deduced that not all went according to plan, so they improvised.  This moment summed up my experience of Barcelona where the buses may run late but the streets are filled with the unexpected.   

Us vs. Them

A civil war was brewing, and the camp began to divide.  There are those who like to party into the night, and there are those who don’t.  These are two extremes; not all of us dwell on either pole.  Although we may lean toward a particular side, our association with that group does not define one’s personality in its totality.  We were mature enough to realize this, but still we disdained the other’s behavior and deemed ourselves morally superior. 

As a wandering troupe of vagabonds, we were removed from the many burdens of a solitary existence.  The longer you stay in a place, the faults of the land become easier to spot.  We never stayed in a city long enough to truly bicker about issues such as outrageous gas prices or congested traffic.  We left each destination before the beauty could fade and the negativity could infiltrate our moving utopia.  The only constant throughout our trip was the people.   

                                  

During the evening at the Barcelona campsite, we devoured burritos that Elaine, our cook, had prepared for us.  Some of us sipped on sangrias and sat at picnic tables.  Clearly-defined cliques were solidifying at this point, and the evidence became visible. 

A quiet bunch discussed the sketches of Laura, a Kiwi with English roots and a talent for drawing dragons and mice.  Aaron told us about the planets he could see through his telescope.  One of us glared at the rowdy group behind us and muttered something along the lines of:  “They’re a bit obnoxious.”

A few Contiki campers stacked beer cans atop one another to build a Heineken castle.  The empty cans outnumbered the people.  The girls at the next table were shouting the lyrics to a pop song overplayed on the radio.

“They never have anything interesting to say,” someone at our table said. 

“I love this,” I said.  “This was advertised as a perfect vacation where everyone is happy all the time, but I crave negativity.  It reminds me of home.”

“I don’t usually like to be a bitch,” this person said, “But they are really pissing me off.”

“This is a mindless love song,” Aaron said.  “This is why I never listen to the radio.” 

My distance from my friends and my routine at home has allowed me to see how much I enjoy bonding over shared enemies.  Complaining, I realized, is somewhat of a hobby. I try not to indulge too often, but the over-enthused pep-rally atmosphere of the trip was beginning to make me cringe.  I had been forced to smile in too many pictures.  Not to say I was unhappy; the vacation was fun, but I’ve never been enthusiastic about multiple group photos.  I didn’t know everyone too well at that point, and this lack of intimacy made me feel slightly estranged. The others were distant figures I needed to examine more closely.

When I studied horror films in college, we learned about the concept of the “Other.”  Frankenstein’s monster is a classic example.  He is ostracized because of his unusual appearance.  If everybody else in town looked like the monster, then he’d have no problem fitting in, but he was the outcast.  Figures like the monster make me wonder if humans possess an instinctual drive to pit themselves against an eternal enemy. 

Could anyone walk through life without differentiating himself from others and attaching himself to groups of like-minded individuals?  Diversifying ourselves is beneficial to the survival of our race because it limits competition for resources by spreading out the population.  But when we split up into clans, animosity between factions is inevitable.  For example, as long as there is baseball, certain fans will always hate the Yankees.

Back at the campsite, the nerds, bibliophiles, and culture vultures were dismissing the others as stupid, drunken bimbos and tools.  What inspired these verbal attacks?  Maybe we were jealous because the others possessed qualities we lacked, or qualities we fear may surface in us.  Maybe we were all wallflowers who wanted to dance but were afraid to look silly, so we covered up our jealousy with complaints and judgments.

Earlier that day, I sat next to Murray on the bus.  His arms are covered in tattoos.  He likes to party hard and frequently, and my social habits are the exact opposite.  If I were to see this guy at a hostel, I would assume we didn’t have much in common, so I wouldn’t bother getting to know him.

A friend of mine told me I have a problem of judging others too quickly, so I decided to work at this by asking Murray some questions.  He was kicked out of high school before he could graduate, and he’s worked all of his life since he was thirteen.  He operates heavy machinery at a factory and makes good money.  He is only twenty-three years old, yet he has nearly paid off his house.  At the time, I, too, was twenty-three.  My job as a waiter in an above-average restaurant was not sufficient enough to pay off my enormous debt in student loans. 

“People think I might be stupid because I never went to unni, but most kids that went to unni only know books,” Murray said to me on the bus.  “But they don’t know practical things.”

When we camped in Pamplona, a strong gust of wind uprooted the cook tent and three burners of the stove were damaged.  Murray tinkered with the stove for only a few minutes, and he fixed it.  Before this trip, I would’ve assumed anybody who didn’t graduate high school was unintelligent.  I have a college degree, but I can’t fix a broken stove.  Clearly, I needed to reevaluate my definition of intelligence. 

Before we left London, an Australian guy talked to a bunch of us about his Contiki trip that ended as ours started.  He warned us that we will all get sick, and he gave us some advice. 

“I know it sounds corny, but don’t judge a book by its cover,” he began.  “I saw these big burly guys with big muscles and all that.  And I thought, ‘These guys are douche bags, you know?’ But then I actually sat down and talked to them, and they were actually really nice guys.  I told them what I initially thought about them, but I felt really bad because these guys were awesome.”

The Australian’s words stuck with me, and I vowed not to repeat his mistake.  Despite our group’s division, I did not view the others with contempt.  If they wanted to get drunk every night, that was all right with me.  I may have no interest in getting smashed, but my preferences are not laws to be upheld.  I’m learning not to sneer at those whose behaviors differ vastly from mine.  That is simply not my lifestyle, not my path.  Anyone else who wishes to walk that path is free to do so, but the path does not define all those who tread upon it. 

What We Talk about When We Talk about Anything

We headed to a country where I couldn’t understand the writing on the billboards.  We crossed the border into Spain and drove through the tunnels that burrowed under the Pyrenees Mountains.  I was excited to travel to a place where I had very little knowledge of the language.  When I was in fourth grade, my elementary school offered paltry bi-weekly lessons that included numbers and colors.  Aside from that, my only knowledge of Spanish resulted from working with Mexican dishwashers who would frequently ask ¿Quantas mesas? near the end of each shift.

Since I was only visiting Spain for a few days, I expected very little of myself.  I tried to pick up a few words, but mostly I savored the liberation of walking around in the dark, hardly understanding a word of Spanish buzzing around me.  This caliber of disengagement from the public was a novelty I haven’t experienced since I was an illiterate child dependent upon my mother.  Without a guardian to supervise me on this trip, I regressed to a stage where it is acceptable to make hand gestures and point to things I want. 

If I don’t want to participate, I don’t have to because I have an excuse:  I can’t string a sentence together except to ask Where is the bathroom?  If a homeless man pleads for my help in some unintelligible speech all I must say is No hablo español and be on my way.  I can ignore the hawkers advertising their useless wares.  I can be left totally alone, lost in my surroundings.  There is nothing I recognize——not the streets or the mumbled conversations of passersby.

I was in Pamplona, where Spaniards and tourists flee from frightened bulls charging through the streets.  The event takes place every year from July 7^th through the 14^th, so I was a few weeks early.  Sadly, there were no bulls, and there was hardly any people either. 

We arrived around three in the afternoon when most of the business owners were taking their siesta. None of the shops were open. Gates were down and locked. I couldn't read the signs that indicated when they'd reopen because there were no numbers.

Eventually, I stumbled into the bull ring, which was closed.  When I reached the Plaza del Toros, I heard noises, evidence that we were nearing the Pamplonians’ hiding place.  Tourists gazed at the far-off mountains and the red-roofed houses as they stood atop the hill that offered a panoramic view of the town below. 

As I turned the corner, I saw masses of people sitting on cobble-stone roads in between shops that lined the pedestrian-only streets.  I entered a shop and selected a magnet of a Spaniard running from a black bull that seemed irritated and hell-bent on gouging him.  The sticker marked the price of three euros, so I counted out my coins before making the transaction.  I placed the magnet on the counter in front of the shopkeeper.

The shopkeeper’s black hair had a few gray strands.  Wrinkles formed crow’s feet by the corners of her eyes.  She greeted me in Spanish.

 

Hola, I responded, and immediately the shopkeeper knew I wasn’t from around here.  She spoke rapidly and pointed to the magnet.  I didn’t comprehend a word, but when I saw her coworker search through a drawer behind the register I guessed that the display magnets were not for sale.  The shopkeeper had to pluck one from her supply. 

She pointed to the €3.00 inscribed in green on the monitor, and I handed her the coins.  We exchanged gracias’s and then either she told me to have nice day or to get the hell out of her store.  I assume the former, but I have no way of knowing for certain. 

My essentially wordless exchange with the cashier made me ponder the nature of communication with all of my tour-mates on Contiki.  At home, I socialize only when I want to.  Usually I’ll see a friend once a week.  We share a meal, see a movie, or maybe go for a run in the city.  During these outings, we exchange our thoughts, our memories, and our dreams.  And then we separate for a while until new ideas overtake us.  I return home to read new books and watch movies I haven’t seen before.  When I meet up with my friend again, I report what I’ve learned and how my mindset has evolved since our last outing.  This cycle of joining and separation keeps the friendship alive and refreshing. 

During the camping tour, however, we are constantly in each other’s company for an entire month.  For the most part, we see the same sites, walk the same routes, and eat the same meals.  A discussion of our surroundings would be worthwhile to exchange differing viewpoints, but we were still getting to know each other.  We mostly spoke of the food we liked and complained about the gypsies. 

Since my life is mostly solitary at home, I was uncomfortable being around people all of the time.  I grew annoyed by the endless repetitive announcements of menial tasks such as the need to do laundry.  I hate discussing trivial matters such as how urgently one needs to trim one’s fingernails.  These utterances require no response and barely deserve an acknowledgement.  A head nod would suffice, but really these needs should never be announced.  There are simple, understood truths about life that don’t need to be articulated.  They are perpetual tasks destined to be checked off again and again. 

While at home, I tried getting into the practice of speaking only when necessary.  If words served an immediate purpose, like if I needed someone to help me move furniture, then speaking was direct and purely functional.  But when words are used to entertain, different rules apply.

You can say as little or as much as you want, and your crowd can elect to listen or ignore certain parts of your speech.  If there is no goal but to transmit worthwhile ideas, then the speaker must cater to his audience.  When we speak, we are all performers, being appraised by our listeners, and I believe we should choose our words carefully to avoid wasting people’s time pleading to be heard, inflating our egos, and barraging innocent victims with monologues better suited for diary entries.  We should seek to engage with our audience——to educate, to challenge, and then to inquire. 

I dread phone calls because these kinds of conversations are becoming a lost art.  I have relatives who call me to spew unremarkable gossip, and then I have relatives who need to be prodded and practically strangled to utter a sound.  This is merely part of being in a family, so I play my role and offer my ear. 

I prefer to live my life as though I were a character speaking dialogue in a script.  What would this character say, and how would the reader view him?  Would they be interested in his words and contemplate his ideas?  Or would they skim over his useless utterances?  After spending time with another person, I often review the conversation in my head after I’ve gone home.  I take note of worthy questions I asked and then focus on areas where I could improve.  I try to be witty, or at least original, so I kick myself for using generic phrases when the conversation moves faster than my thoughts can produce a proper response.

Sometimes it’s easier to say nothing at all.  Complete disengagement is effortless in Spain as I don’t know the language.  I don’t have to listen to anyone, or conjure up a response.  I can retreat into myself and bottle my thoughts.  Naturally we are social animals, so our thoughts are bound to burst out of us.  Some words are melodious.  The rest is just noise.    

 

The Man Who Didn't Speak English

The receptionist at the Bordeaux campsite didn’t speak any English.  My Australian and Canadian friends tried to buy some ice at the head office, but the French man didn’t understand.  Murray, a tatted-up Aussie with a penchant for partying, sought my aid.

“Can you ask the guy if we can put our drinks in his fridge?” he asked.

I switched my brain to French and searched for the appropriate words all the while muttering to my calculations to myself.  I was nervous to have an audience watch as I struggled with the foreign language. I had been an excellent student in high school and could comfortably chat en français with my Togolese friends who didn’t mind my incorrectly conjugated verbs and my stories that were usually told in the present tense even if they happened yesterday. 

For some reason, when I spoke French with strangers I suddenly lost my confidence and made simple mistakes.  Diction in any language often depends on confidence, and regaining my confidence was only a matter of practice.  The more words that rolled off my tongue, the crisper they sounded.  Switching the conversation to a foreign language is like driving through a tunnel with the radio on.  You lose the words you can recognize, and then you hear static as you near the tunnel’s exit.  Once you’re on the other side, the words are clear again.

The Aussies and Canadians led me to a bespectacled, white-haired man in a small, wooden office.  We greeted each other in French.  First I asked him if he had any ice.  I was careful to use the polite “you” form because he is my elder. He had no ice, so I started my next question, which I had rehearsed in my mind a few times before meeting the old man. 

“May my friends put their drinks in your...” My voice trailed off as I searched for the correct pronunciation of refrigerator.  The French equivalent “réfrigérateur” looks like the English word and the syllables are divided in the same manner, but the inflections are radically divergent.  If you weren’t entirely sure how to pronounce refrigerator in English and you mumbled your way through it, the result would sound like the French translation.  In both languages, the word is incredibly too long, which is why we both shorten it to fridge.

Ah, le frigu? the man suggested.

Oui, I affirmed.

D’accord. “Okay,” he said.  I motioned to my friends that he would allow them. 

Quand est-ce qu’ils reviennent pour leur boissons? the old man asked me. 

I turned to my friends and asked them: “When are you coming back for your drinks?”

“After dinner,” they replied, and I translated.

The old man turned his wrist and checked the time.  Je pars a six heures mais je reviens a huit heures.

“He said he’ll be gone at six and come back at eight,” I said, and I couldn’t believe I was actually transmitting correct information.  I envisioned myself asking the old man to repeat himself over and over again, and then when I translated half of the material I’d make something up for the words I didn’t recognize.  But I didn’t have to lie about my imperfections because I actually understood each word the old man said.

Everyone agreed the time was suitable.  My friends ambled back to camp, but I stayed behind to speak with the old man. 

“You were in Paris?” he asked in French.

“Yes.  We were there for only two days, but I wish I could stay for a long time.  But when the bus goes, I must go.” 

Although my phrasing was often child-like, my language was proper and efficient because my vocabulary could only stretch so far.  If I had the same conversation in English, I would’ve described the nature of my trip in fuller detail, but some of my sentences would’ve been redundant.  My limited word bank was teaching me to be economical with my speech.     

“Now you will go to Spain?” the old man asked.

“Yes. To Pamplona.  Where there are the...” I was trying to say the running of the bulls, but I didn’t know the word for bull. 

“...where the male cows run,” I offered as consolation.  “I don’t know the word for male cow.  What is the word?”  I pantomimed horns.

“Ah!” the old man exclaimed.  “Le matador.”  He thought I was describing the bull fighters, but it was close enough to me.  I resolved to look up the correct translation later and continue with the conversation rather than stumble over a small detail and risk losing the old man’s attention. 

At that moment, Liz, a psychiatric nurse from New Zealand, approached the old man behind the counter and asked if there was any toilet paper.  The toilets were without this essential, as the French bathrooms contained bidets instead.  I was unfamiliar with the equipment and did not desire a demonstration.

“Do you have any toilet paper?” I asked the old man in French.

“Not in the bathrooms,” he responded. 

“There is none in the bathrooms?” I asked redundantly, not because I misunderstood, but I wanted to practice negation. 

“Is there a market——” I began.

Magasin.  “Store,” he corrected.

 

“——that sells toilet paper near here?”

Non, he said, but then he searched in the cupboards and found a roll. 

He handed me the roll, which I gave to Liz, and we thanked him. 

“My friends don’t speak French, but I can translate for you,” I said.

“You speak very good French,” he said, and I celebrated quietly in my head.  As the old man was locking up the office, we said goodbye, and I sauntered off back to camp, where I met Murray. 

“You saved the whole camp, man,” he said.  “We’d be lost without you.”

I was overwhelmed with a sense of empowerment during my brief role as translator.  When I spoke with the old man in his native language, I felt in control in this foreign place.  To have a firm grip around those who feel confused because they can’t speak or read the local language, this is a steroid for the ego.  The pleasure is intoxicating, but there is also the danger of thinking too highly of oneself, a peril I wanted to avoid especially around new friends.

I never imagined my four years of high school French classes would culminate in a conversation regarding toilet paper and refrigeration, but at least I could put all that practice into use, rather than storing information for hypothetical situations or embarrassing monologues.  I was sad to be leaving France just as my confidence and my vocabulary was growing.  I was rapidly learning new words as my fellow campers asked me to read labels on bottles of lotion, hand cream, and shampoo. 

There is a refreshing quality to reading a foreign language imprinted on common household products that awakens the child in me.  When I was a kid, I was developing habits of the way I spoke.  Both my accent and the words I chose contributed to my forming identity, which was gradually solidifying into a body less bendable.  When my behavior became more rigid, I ignored things I knew I wouldn’t absorb into my personality, and I gravitated toward my preferences. 

But in France, everything was new to me, even the shampoo bottles I rarely stopped to read at home in the States.  My environment offered unlimited possibilities to build a new identity——a separate self who uttered strange-sounding syllables.  In French, my IQ was probably on par with a fifth-grader’s, but, like a young child with little awareness of social pressures, I didn’t care what people thought of me.  I had no fear of failure because a mistake was inevitable, and progress was easily made because there was so much I didn’t know.  I wanted to fully immerse myself into a foreign land devoid of English, so I could watch my personality disappear and witness a new form emerge.

          

The Empire of the Dead

When I first walked around Paris, I told myself I was going to walk above ground rather than take the metro.  I wanted to see the Eiffel Tower and stroll through the café-riddled streets where vendors sold pain au chocolat.  I wanted to spend every minute possible soaking up my surroundings.  Even if I were on some uninteresting street at least it would be an uninteresting Parisian street. 

If I took the metro, I’d simply be underground, staring at outdated advertisements for movies that have already been released.  I could be riding through the dark tunnels of any city equipped with a subway.  However, I soon discovered that what lurks beneath the avenues can give a city some character. 

My tent-mate Aaron convinced me to see the catacombs.  He had thoroughly researched activities in each city and saved these plans on a Microsoft document on his miniature laptop.  I read a few travel books by Bill Bryson to get a sense of the places I would be visiting, but I didn’t peruse Lonely Planet guides for ideas how to spend my time.  Instead, I planned on wandering around each city to see what I would bump into.

But when I happened to befriend a man with the necessary preparations, a navigational knack, and an ambitious pace, I decided to abandon my plan in favor of his.  Aaron is one of the oldest travelers on the tour which only allows people from ages 18 to 35.  He is a thirty-year-old engineer who is very devoted to his career, and his viewpoint of the world is rational and scientific.  I can talk to this man about a variety of subjects so long as they are factual.  I sense that he wishes he could be more emotive, more sociable, but I admire his lone-wolf lifestyle.  He has his own prerogative and doesn’t let others distract him from accomplishing his goals.  The down-side of his strict autonomy is that he doesn’t really ask me many questions.  He does most of the talking. 

Bridget and Ash, sisters from rural New Zealand, tagged along as well.  They are an extremely cheerful duo, and I was very pleased they decided to join us.  They have very humble and optimistic outlooks, which was very refreshing, because I never felt like we had to impress each other like people so often do when they form friendships.  Conversations came naturally, and even during silences I felt comfortable saying nothing. 

Since Aaron researched the route, he took the realms and guided us to the metro.  I decided to seize every opportunity to practice my French, so I asked many strangers for directions even when I was fairly confident I was going the right way.  Double-checking was just another way of reinforcing vocabulary.  Even when I could see the signs for the metro, I asked two police officers to point me in the right direction.

I imagined my American self disappearing the more I spoke in a foreign tongue which wasn’t foreign here.  I wondered if the strangers I asked for directions would ponder where I came from.  At best, I hoped they assumed I was from a far-flung corner of France where they speak very long and proper sentences with funny accents.  I came from the land where people phrased questions like this:  “Is it that you can tell me where is the metro?”

After following superfluous directions from numerous pedestrians, we reached the entrance of the catacombs and stood in line for roughly thirty minutes.  In the queue, we met a Brazilian who was studying English in London.  During his time off, he decided to visit Paris.  His English was fluent, but his conjugation and expressions were often silly.  He was extremely talkative and child-like.  He kept repeating that there was a monster lurking underneath the concrete.  In retrospect, he probably loved the way the words rolled off his tongue, and he spoke often, perhaps to keep practicing with English speakers.  Essentially, I was doing the same thing with strangers, but I wasn’t following anybody around to improve my language skills.  I quickly bothered people and then left them alone. 

We descended into the catacombs via a circular, vertiginous staircase that seemed to last several minutes.  Before I reached the bottom, my head was spinning in such a manner I haven’t felt since discovering the euphoria of twirling quickly on my kitchen floor like a pirouetting ice skater.  Finally there was gravel under my feet and a dimly lit corridor lay ahead. I could hear the faint sound of trickling water.  If I weren’t surrounded by a group of people, I would be slightly afraid.  The low-ceiling path was not a straight shot.  This dark hallway was more akin to a cave than the organized streets above.

Aside from a few rock sculptures of buildings, there wasn’t much to see at first, until we reached the ossuary where all the skeletons are stored.  Before entering, I read the inscription on the arch above the doorway:  “Here lies the empire of the dead.” 

Massive piles of bones were stacked on top of one another.  Intermittently, skulls protruded from the tibia-walls.  Some craniums were cracked.  Several teeth were missing.  The air, or lack thereof, was frigid, and the walls were full of passages about mortality:  “Think in the morning, you won’t live to see the evening.  Think in the night, you won’t live to see the morning.”  These quotes were both macabre and inspirational. 

Considering that most of these underground crypt-mates have been dead for over two hundred years, the catacombs are both fascinating and eerie.  The corpses were dug up from their graves and deposited into the catacombs because various cemeteries were removed to make room for new constructions.  The dead were forced to lie with new neighbors.  Their tibias and fibulas are all mixed together like a morbid salad of bones. 

Above my head is a metropolis teeming with life, yet I’m wandering through an uncatalogued library of displaced and anonymous skeletons.  As the day waned, I rejoined the land of the living with a rejuvenated appreciation for my properly functioning organs and vocal chords.  Without them, I could not pester another Parisian for directions to my next destination where my working bones would take me.    

Barenaked Ladies

The lights in the auditorium were dim.  Upon circular tables sat buckets housing champagne.  The club was small, but that meant the action was never far away no matter where you sat.  The room grew dark until the spotlight landed on a skimpily-clad female singing “Paris, je t’aime.”  Fully-dressed men twirled around the dancing ladies.  Everyone lip-synced except for the ringleader, a French woman with a boyishly short haircut and a pleasing bilingual voice.  

Before heading to the Parisian cabaret, I was forewarned that the female performers dance topless, and this advertisement alone was sufficient to persuade many male members of my group, including myself, to see the show.  I expected the nudity from the waist up, but I was surprised to discover how the sexual aspects were not emphasized.  This wasn’t some pornography parlor where raunchy men congregate to ogle some stranger’s breasts and get their fix.

I remember the discomfort and the weird sensation of studying pornos in my film seminar during my senior year of college.  There were about twelve students stuffed inside a cramped room where my professor played a variety of pornos.  In one of the films, a hotel concierge seduced customers and did the dirty behind the reception desk.  In another, a Disney-esque character walked around with an erection as big as his leg.  The cartoon inserted himself into a hole of a fence.  On the other side was a horse with no standards as to what he would put into his mouth.  These films were funny due to their absurdity, but others were more graphic. 

During the screenings, I looked around the room to see how everyone else was reacting to the sexual content.  It was awkward to witness such a private act while being part of an audience, but we were protected from a lot of discomfort since we were watching the porno with a studious eye.  This was a film theory class about movies not shown at commercial theaters, and we studied the purpose of films.  Why are people watching this film?  What’s the relation between viewers? 

My classmates and I were associates rather than friends.  Our discussions never grew very intimate.  We often refrained from attacking each other’s beliefs and instead opted for safer comments that maintained the conversation but often lacked passion.  Sexuality tends to be repressed in professional environments, and for this reason most of us wouldn’t reveal our true thoughts about the pornos we saw in class.  We couldn’t talk about sex, even though it dictated our motivations.  The thought of sex influenced our outfits and where we chose to sit in class.  I had a crush on one of my classmates, but I was slow to reveal this to her.  Why couldn’t we say what’s on our minds?       

There are certain images we hold inside our minds that we would not want to project.  Pornography’s strength lies within its secrecy.  A man can act in a distasteful manner without damaging his public image.  Even if you are watching a normal, non-graphic movie, the viewer experiences scoptophilia, pleasure derived from looking.  When you watch a movie, the characters onscreen can’t see you, but you can see them. You’re allowed total access to private matters, and you don’t even have to hide. 

 
When you replace the screen with real people who can meet your stare, how does this affect the viewer?  I contemplated this as I sat with my new friends and we watched topless dancers bounce lightly on their toes.  Despite the fact these women were clearly on display, they did not merely present themselves as objects to be stared at and mentally consumed.  As the women stretched their legs above their heads, you weren’t supposed to think strip-club thoughts.  Instead, you were to marvel at the various forms and achievements of the human body. 

The Can-Can girls flapped their skirts and willingly exposed their undies.  They were playfully aware their bodies were sexualized, but they used this power to their advantage.  There was no shame in their actions, and there was no shame in watching.  The performers were beautiful creatures who knew that if they showed some skin the audience would gaze at their perfect bodies with adoring eyes.  None of us was afraid of our instincts.                        

The Mona Lisa Cult

There are many women in Paris worth staring at, and they are easy to find.  Like most people, I entered the Louvre with the intention of laying eyes on a woman I’ve heard about since my world history class in junior high school.  The museum was humid from all the body heat radiating off the numerous visitors.  I removed my jacket and followed the signs pointing toward the Mona Lisa.  The signs weren’t completely necessary; I followed the throng of people marching toward that famous lady. 

I was not curious to see the painting.  The image of Da Vinci’s masterpiece has been indelibly printed in my mind.  I was more excited to witness the mob of photographers jostling for a better position.  I imagined them as hunters aiming their rifles at an innocent creature.  They’d squeeze the trigger and show off their trophy at home. 

The Mona Lisa has no next-door neighbors, for she hangs on a wall in the middle of the room.  A wooden, semi-circle railing keeps the thieves and vandals at bay, and a glass case protects her from foul play, like McMissile milkshakes thrown from afar.  A dense cloud of spectators huddle around the painting.  Some fight their way up to the front, whereas the meek raise their cameras above their heads and hope to capture that smile recognized around the world.  Youngsters take selfies with Mona to make Facebook friends jealous. 

I didn’t take a picture of the Mona Lisa for several reasons.  I suspect I shall never forget that face.  Not only do I already know what the painting looks like, but so do my friends and family.  Even my father, who says redneck phrases like “Yinz want anything from Sheetzes?” is familiar with La Joconde.  Showing my folks back home a snapshot would be a redundant confirmation. 

Instead, I took a picture of the people taking pictures of the Mona Lisa.  I wondered why so many of these people flocked to see this.  Surely, the millions of visitors weren’t all art buffs.  Not everyone in this room understands the meaning of chiaroscuro, and most probably could not tell the difference between a Monet and a Manet.  I doubted my knowledge as well, so what was I doing here?  Why are we all crowding around this old painting in this stuffy room? 

Certain museum-goers undoubtedly could extrapolate the reasons why La Joconde is a timeless artwork, but that doesn’t account for half of the world being there all at once.  Like the city she lives in, the Mona Lisa has become a household name known around the world thanks to our history books and Dan Brown thrillers.  Snapping selfies with Mona means you’ve been somewhere worth bragging about, but this behavior also suggests something potentially repugnant.

Rather than creating our own art, we snap photos of the works of dead artists.  We merely replicate the genius of others and use these pictures as backgrounds for our iPhones.  But maybe I’m being too harsh about this. 

We could be keeping Da Vinci’s painting alive by combining ancient brushstrokes with social media.  Our interaction with art has changed with the influx of convenient cameras tucked inside our smartphones.  Tourists may be unable to steal the Mona Lisa, but they can walk out of the museum with a miniature masterpiece stored in their photo albums.  The glass case and the wooden railing offer futile protection because the physical form is becoming irrelevant except to purists and art thieves.  While the Mona Lisa hangs inside the Louvre, she is displayed on digital walls and inside memories. Da Vinci has already achieved the ultimate goal of art.  He is immortal, and so is his painting.