les petites choses

1. My morning commute to school takes about 45 minutes. A 15 minute tram ride, a cup of latte from the train station market, followed by a 20 minute train ride.

2. The walk to the tram stop smells like fish every morning. Fish and dog waste. You learn to walk fast and avoid inhaling through your nose.

3. The river has risen about three feet since I first arrived. The day they opened up the dam, some men from an animal rescue service were freeing a swan who got its neck stuck on the bank of the river. They were pushing the bird into a cage as I walked by.

4. My roommate and I discovered the best place to get coffee at the train station. Coffee by machine is much cheaper than over-the-counter coffee. And there's this second machine in the corner of the market that fills your cup to the brim. The rest only go about two-thirds to the top.

5. My roommate puts on lipstick before she video conferences with her boyfriend every night. This makes me think sheepishly back to yesterday morning, when I stumbled out of bed and rushed down to the student lounge to conference call Chris. Who happened to have four other people hanging around that day. It was a party. And I arrived with bed hair.

6. There's this one ice cream stand about three stops away that serves gruyere and meringue ice cream. It tastes like...joy.... On that note, so does the quatre fromages pizza from the Italian restaurant down the street. As well as this avocado, mozarella, and prosciutto salad served at the same place. And that dry, white wine that I had for dinner earlier tonight. Okay. So the food and drink here are pretty spectacular. I just have to stop complaining about the prices long enough to taste it.

7. I drink water straight from the tap. It tastes better than bottled water back at home.

8. I try to speak French everywhere I go, but nobody is fooled. I'm still the American. Conversations proceed as follows:

"Bonjour!"
"Bonjour...Je vais prendre du jus de pamplemousse, s'il vous plaît."
"That'll be four francs." Damn. The minute I open my mouth, I'm labeled a foreigner.

In Cambridge, a barista once told me that I sounded English when I responded, "That would be nice, thank you." I was so flattered. Although, come to think of it, if he had to tell me I sounded English, then I wasn't exactly fitting in...

9. My dorm room came with exactly one trash bag and one roll of toilet paper for the entire month. For garbage, we've made do with shopping bags. As for toilet paper, we split a pack of toilet paper with the boys next door, but we just ran out. I started nicking toilet paper from establishments. Just ripping off a handful here and there. Yesterday, I progressed to the more advanced stuff: I took an entire roll that was just sitting there, tempting me, in the campus bathroom. I also...took some packets of salt and pepper from a gas station restaurant in Germany. For cooking my eggs. Mm. At what point do you cross the line from frugal living over to petty theft?

10. I still haven't found the running path. Instead, I've been getting my exercise via a whole new routine: window-shopping. On cobblestone paths. Sometimes in heels. It's a real calves-toner. And everything is so...pretty.... It's a pity about the prices.

I never thought I'd say this, but I can't wait to go to Paris this weekend and find some really good deals!