Alumni Magazine Article

This was an article I wrote that was originally going to be in the Galloway alumni magazine, but that the publishers have since nixed for being too long (I had a 200 word limit and exceeded this by roughly 1300 words).
It may still be published next April, but in the meantime, I figure this is a good place to put it as a way to wrap up the year. Some of the ideas are rehashed from old blog entries, some not.
I wrote the majority of it on a 7-hour train ride from Biarritz to Arles. Enjoy:

I have been asked to write an article about the past year I have spent living and studying in France. This proposition has sparked a deluge of ideas in my head. Where do I even start? Do I discuss the workings of the French academic system (or lack thereof)? Or my mentally disturbed neighbor who, convinced I was fiddling with the pipes and changing the water pressure, never missed an opportunity to call me a “thug” and inform me that she and her polices forces were watching me? Or perhaps my successful efforts to sneak into a VIP room by posing as a member of the Italian elite?

I will start by saying that this entire exhausting adventure has been the result of a junior study-abroad year. That year, I took piano lessons at L’Ecole Normale de Musique, a prestigious and somewhat dysfunctional conservatory founded by Alfred Cortot, a renowned French pianist and Nazi collaborator, although the school usually highlights the former achievement over the latter. At the end of that year, my teacher, surprised that I was returning so soon to the US, invited me to come back for further studies after I graduated from Carnegie Mellon.

Come graduation, I realized I had two options: move back to Paris, or start manning the pasta buffet at Lettuce Souprise You. It was a difficult choice, but I soon found myself filling out visa forms and making endless trips to the French embassy.

May you live out your entire life, Dear Reader, without having to deal with the French embassy. They rejected my application so many times on technicalities (e.g., the photocopy of my diploma was “too large”), that I finally cracked and uttered an unprintable expletive. Just to amuse themselves, it seems, they sent my visa a day late, causing me to miss my original flight.

I arrived in Paris on September 13^th, my 23^rd birthday, two weeks before school started, with no apartment and few friends to my name. I spent my days and nights in a hostel in the less than salubrious parts of Montmartre, dealing with bedbugs and hostile Macedonians, and obsessively checking housing websites.

It would be too lengthy a narrative to recount my entire year, so I will do what many before me have done and make this a list of tips and advice for students wanting to survive France and the French. Having this list at the beginning of my stay may have saved me a few misunderstandings and humiliations.

1. Rule Number One: You are always entitled to free bread at a meal. Never, ever forget to ask for your free bread. Like soft drinks in America, you can get free refills, although this privilege can be abused.

2. Rule Number One (part two): Do not place your bread on your plate. This may seem frivolous, but the bread always goes on the table, next to the plate.

3. Rule Number One (part three): Do NOT place your bread on your plate. Trust me, you will look like a total chump.

4. Come breakfast time at the bakery each morning, you will likely find yourself eyeing the pastries, trying to decide which one offers the best bang for your buck. It took months of experimentation, but the answer is the chausson aux pommes. This doughy pocket filled with stewed apples will fill you up much quicker than a croissant or pain au chocolat, for no extra charge.

5. We can discuss education now. When studying in a French university, you may be surprised at the lack of classes, tests, quizzes, homework, or pretty much anything that would help you to learn or gauge your progress. In many universities, such as my music school, the entire year hinges on one 15-45 minute exam for each class.

Furthermore, at my school, there is only one class a week for each subject, and the classes serve little, if any, purpose.

My theory class consisted of an elderly man riffing on lofty metaphors for chords and keys for two and a half hours. I was often the last to arrive (half an hour late) and the first to leave (half an hour early). I passed the exam with flying colors.

My sightreading class was taught by a French woman with more than a hint of spirits on her breath, who would place random sheet music before us and whack our hands at each wrong note. She would also laugh hysterically every time I said the word “okay.” I am not sure why. I passed the exam with minimal class attendance.

This lack of meaningful classes gave me an unprecedented amount of free time. I frantically tried to fill this time for most of the year. I practiced several hours a day. I took on a bar job, from which I was promptly fired after breaking several pitchers and missing a shift. I attended screenings of “West Side Story” by myself.

By the end, something began to slow down inside of me, and I began spending hours a day drinking coffee and eating interminable lunches. In other words, in spite of my best efforts, I became French.

6. It is impossible to have too many passport pictures in France. You will need one to accomplish almost any task, whether that be creating a student university card or taking a shower. N.B. Smiling is usually forbidden in passport photos, and even the slightest expression of joy or curling of the lips will invalidate them.

7. For piano students such as myself, keep in mind that finding an instrument to practice on in Paris is a Herculean task which will likely involve steep fees and humiliating compromises. I spent most of my working hours in a rented studio that the owner would physically lock me into for hours at a time. The necessity of this was not clear. I was forced to squeeze myself through the studio’s lone window on more than one occasion.

8. Despite constant claims to the contrary, Parisians are actually perfectly decent people. That is, if you are willing to concede that everything works better in France.

My former host-mom, a champion of homeopathy, quipped that France didn’t use the rubbish they use in American medicine (i.e. medical science). One of the heads of my school expressed his belief that the level of music education is much weaker in America. This, Dear Reader, is what we call a scorned Julliard applicant.

To be fair, there are many things that do work better in France. They get the benefits of unpasteurized cheese, for example. The French language also contains an astonishing variety of words to describe body parts—I would guess at least three times the number of obscene similes that one would find in English. They also offer free health care, if you can keep up with the steady stream of letters telling you to mail three more passport pictures.

9. Be extremely careful when introducing French friends to American cuisine. I invited a friend out to an American-style diner in an effort to introduce him to my culture. He ate a stack of blueberry pancakes and promptly vomited.

I offered another one of my friends a bag of gas station-variety beef jerky from America. She promptly vomited.

This is not a weakness on their part, but simply an effort to adapt to ingredients that are not meant for human consumption.

10. If you had a French waiter in a restaurant, would you mercilessly mock his accent and his culture? Probably not, but the French will do it to you. Just laugh along with them, and wait until you get home to burst into tears.

11. There is a very pretty neighborhood in Paris called the Marais. Be aware that the bars in this area often cater to certain sexual orientations, as I have awkwardly learned more than once.

12. If you want to one-up the guy at the café counter drinking boring old coffee next to you, order “une noisette.” This will land you a nifty dash of cream in your coffee. The guy next to you will concede defeat.

13. Romantic relationships are terrifying, but worth touching on. If you kiss a member of the opposite sex, you have likely made a terrible mistake. Try explaining to him/her the purely American idea that, even though you kissed, you would like to wait a week or two before purchasing an apartment and choosing a baby name (N.B. Jean-Luc is a very popular name, and Madeleine is considered old-fashioned). Attempting to slow things down a bit will get you an escargot fork in the eye.

14. Parisian apartment parties have very specific rules. Everyone gathers around a table in a cramped room. The host will serve frozen pizza and quiche as the guests down cheap wine and begin to throw things. Be sure to throw something at somebody by the end of the night—preferably peanuts or something sticky. Otherwise people will start to wonder about you.

15. An important word to learn in French is “Courage!” You will hear this multiple times a day. This is roughly the equivalent of “Come on! Keep your chin up!” and is useful for encouraging people without actually taking any action to correct their problems. For example, a conversation with a landlord:

“Excuse me, I think a pipe burst. My bathroom is beginning to flood.”

“Courage!”

“Could you call a plumber?”
“Courage!”

16. For an endless source of entertainment, ask French people to pronounce words such as “hearth,” “squirrel,” “law,” and “photosynthesis.” Laugh increasingly louder each time they try.
    

It is currently unclear if I will spend next year here or not. I have mixed feelings about my school, and more alarmingly, I am not convinced that staying here will earn me any kind of useful diploma.

However, whenever disturbing thoughts about my future and goals begin to intrude, I sit down in the nearest café, take a deep breath, and spend the next four hours eating mussels. I remember that I am missing the point of life in this country. Who needs productivity or so-called “diplomas?” Is that any substitute for unending vacations, coffee breaks, and long weekends?

I wash the mussels down with a glass of Chablis and feel my ambition succumb to the heat and alcohol. I chuckle loudly to myself, causing my fellow diners to turn their heads. Staring into my wine glass, I let one word escape my lips:

“Courage!”

End of Exams

Alas, I have finished all of my exams, and my original predictions may have been astonishingly wrong.
I learned today that I passed the year in solfege. This means a lot to me, as I am awful at solfege, and put minimal effort into the class. Of course, since I started in the 3rd level, and dropped the 2nd level after a few months, that only means that I'm back to where I started. A triumph, if ever there was one.
I also learned that I passed analysis. This means a lot to me as well, since I went to 20% of the classes, at best.

I wrote a few weeks ago that nobody, in the history of music conservatories, has ever failed a music history exam. Although the results come in a week, I'm predicting I may be the first.
Our music history exam worked like the lottery from hell. We would draw a little slip of paper with a subject on it, and then have to discuss the subject for about fifteen minutes in front of a jury.
I drew "symphonic poems." Oh shite.
I remembered Liszt. Liszt was a Hungarian dude with large hands who did a number of things, but also wrote some symphonic poems, one of which is called "Les Preludes."
This was more or less the extent of my speech. The jury gazed at me blankly. Could I name some other composers who wrote symphonic poems?
"Uhh, Schumann. Yeah, Schumann. And Schubert."
No, Schubert did not.
"Uhh, no, you're right, he didn't. Schumann, yeah, he totally did. The names sound similar...you know?"
Silence.
After giving me an absurd amount of hints, they finally got me to pronounce the name "Strauss."
"Right! He wrote 'Death and Transfiguration!'"
Could I name any of his other symphonic poems?
Silence.
End of exam.
That's too bad. This comes only a day after an atrocious sightreading exam.
But hey, who needs sightreading when I've got my good friend Jim Beam by my side?

This marks the end of my exams, except for my huge piano jury on the 23rd. Classes are now over. I can't tell the difference.

Raté

Let's take a look at the bets I placed on my exams a few weeks ago:

ANALYSIS: FAIL
SIGHTREADING: FAIL
SOLFEGE: PASS
CHAMBER MUSIC: PASS
MUSIC HISTORY: PASS

I learned ten minutes ago that I failed my chamber music exam, along with my jovial, female Japanese partner.
That's a sharp left turn--if I could have bet on passing a single one of my exams, it would've been chamber music.
Alas, we played our Mozart sonata for two pianos yesterday, and it was as if some malicious spirit was in the air--there were wrong notes and slips galore (for both of us), and at one point, my hand actually froze and played nothing when I was supposed to play a scale. But still. Failing? That's kind of embarassing, especially since we've been rehearsing that same damn piece, every class, since October (although it probably reached its peak back in December).

This also confirms what I sort of suspected--having a jury at the end of a *semester* makes sense, as opposed to my school's retarded system of having one at the end of every year. This will leave students to practice the same stuff for way too long and get mighty sick of it, and it's just dumb to have a whole year's worth of work hinge on one ten-minute event.

It's a bit of a discouragement, but at the same time, my school works in such a complicated (and bad) fashion, that no one has been able to explain to me why I needed to pass this exam to get a diploma.

I guess it's back to practicing for the second part of my solo piano jury, even if I'm growing slightly apathetic about the results.
On a more positive note, I'm sure I rocked my analysis exam, which (according to my predictions) I originally chalked up as a failure. The music history exam consisted of one completely open-ended question--it was a quote from Lizst, talking about how the inventions of new forms can express new emotions. We were then instructed to write anything we wanted, using this quote as a springboard. I wrote about how the invention of YouPorn has revolutionized the medium of pornography and created a much-needed sense of community in the genre of amateur hardcore.
At least I probably could have, and I may have gotten away with it.

Alright, back to YouPorn. I mean, practicing.

Booyah

I passed.
Along with 31 fellow pianists (out of 46 competitors), I was deemed worthy enough to participate in the second part of the exam on June 24th.
So apparently 2/3 passed instead of the supposed half...that leaves a lot of worthy competitors for the next part, but I am nonetheless content with these developments.
This comes after I spent the entire weekend looking up graduate programs for Master degrees in literature (I don't even know where I get these ideas).

Anyway, I'm off to practice and likely drink tonight.

More importantly, Lucky, objectively the best cat ever, turned 18 yesterday.















In cat years, that makes her 126. What a true champion amongst the animal kingdom.

Quoi?

There was a question on my solfege exam this morning asking what the marking "mp" means in music.

Wow.

All I can say is that if you've been playing an instrument for fifteen years and can't answer that question, you're in serious trouble. Like, "throw your oboe into a massive firepit and jump in after it" kind of trouble.
And if you've playing an instrument for more than a week and can't answer that question, you're still in trouble.

Along with a few more astonishing questions, the "theory" part of the exam involved writing a short (five measures) melody.
Maybe I was missing something important--I scratched mine out in a few minutes and was the first to turn in my exam.
Of course, this is France. While the rest of the students kept finishing their tests, the teacher (also the head of the school) actually picked up mine, looked through it, and made facial gestures. These ranged from nods to furrowed brows to outright laughter at certain points. Was it necessary to do this in front of the class? I suppose so.

I'll learn the results of my jury tomorrow. Will report back later.

More importantly, my internet dating site finally landed me a date with a francaise named Drumcaype (note: to protect the girl, I scrambled the letters of her name and added a few more). Although she looks like an adorable blonde in her photo, I won't bat an eyelash if a grizzled, 48-year old Korean farmer shows up to the cafe. Such are the risks we take with internet dating.
I guess it would still be fun with an old Korean guy though--we could go bobbing for apples and giggle alot, and maybe do a round of cosmic bowling. Then he could show me his home country. Keep an open mind, right?

Choeur

We had our final choir performance last night.
Some of you may be surprised to learn that I was even singing in a choir at a little music school at Saint Germain des Pres, but the explanation is simple. Singing in the choir technically makes me a "student" at the school, and being a "student" gives me access to their lovely practice rooms.
The choirmaster (also the head of the school) long ago figured out my scheme and now won't even make eye contact with me when we cross in the halls.
The choir has been an overwhelmingly low priority for me--one week I skipped three out of four rehearsals, and I didn't even buy the sheet music until last week.
I guess I also missed the news that this would be a formal concert--I could have sworn that the choirmaster said it would be "informel" and that we wouldn't need to dress up, but maybe he was saying it would be "infortune" (wretched). Although that'd be a pretty negative comment for a choirmaster.

Anyway, I showed up to the church last night to find the women in black dresses and the men in tuxedos. I was wearing jeans, Pumas, and a dusty sweater with a bunch of cheese crumbs stuck to it. Oops.
A kind woman in the choir called her husband to bring me a nice pair of pants. Unfortunately, he brought another pair of jeans--a few hues darker and about four sizes tighter, but still jeans.
I expected to get some very French comments, and I did. Example:

*During* the concert, between songs, while the large crowd is applauding, the woman next to me murmurs:

"You were supposed to wear a white shirt."
"I know, I'm sorry. I didn't know."
"In France, we dress up for concerts. They dress up for concerts everywhere."
"I know, I'm sorry."
"I mean, you play piano concerts right? Don't you wear white shirts for that?"
"Yes. I'm sorry."
"We wear white shirts to concerts here."
"I'm sorry."
"It's like that everywhere."
"I'm sorry."

Another example:

A guy in the dressing room passes me and looks at my Pumas.

"Looks like you forgot your bowtie, huh?"
"I'm sorry."

This could go on endlessly. Needless to say, it was a fitting end for my stint with the choir.
Even better, there's actually video footage from last night. I'm the guy about ten seconds in who's wearing a sweater. I'm hard to miss.

Foutu

My first piano juries got changed to Friday. As in, the day after the day after tomorrow. They used to be on the 29th. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!!!!!

This wouldn't really be a problem if I didn't have to play that damn Chopin "Black Keys" etude. I don't know what my deal is with this piece--I've played harder stuff, and it's something that a lot of 15-year old pianists can handle. But for some reason, the gears just get stuck on this one. Or, more accurately, my hands get stuck, thus making it sound like shite.

In general, my morale concerning my school has been steadily decreasing for the past six months or so, to the point that I found myself browsing university websites today for master's programs in foreign language education--what I imagine I'll fall into if/when this piano thing falls through.
I guess I'm somewhat happy I'm getting it over with though. If I fail, I probably won't bother taking the other exams, which will at least save me a bit of stress.

I've been thinking about metaphors for how I've felt throughout this school year, and especially now that it's winding to an end. I've come up with a couple accurate ones:

1. That feeling when you start a book and put it aside for a long time. Then when you pick it up again, you have to reread everything to remember what happened. It's a kind of annoying feeling that you're wasting your time, and you're often tempted to just put it aside and pick up a new book.

2. When a chica is clearly not interested in you, and you make some huge, last-ditch effort to snag her, reasoning that if you're going to fail, you should at least fail in a last blaze of glory.

I guess I'm regressing into "complaining" again. Maybe I should go practice instead.
Please light a candle for me and my jury. Preferably one of those gingerbread scented ones.

Ellen

I had a dream last night that I was on the NYtimes website looking at the Top 10 most emailed articles.
The tenth most emailed article was about the death of Ellen Degeneres--she had apparently been struggling for years with health problems and prescription medication addictions.
I then woke up this morning to find that gays can now marry in California. My subconscious is up to something, but I'm not really sure what.
If someone could make sure Ms. Degeneres is okay, I would feel better.

On another note, I used to think that eating sugar cubes when I ran out of food qualified as hitting "rock bottom." But I then decided to take a swim in the most soiled of waters by joining a French online dating site called "Meetic."
This is the first and hopefully last time I resort to online dating, although I'll admit that I'm kind of enjoying it so far. After deciding that the usernames "GigglyAdam" and "AdamDaThroatSlasha" wouldn't translate well, I settled on the horrendous "AdamRicain."
"Ricain" is a pejorative term for Americans in French--it's basically the equivalent of a German giving himself the username "RolfTheKraut."
I am clearly playing the "adorable foreigner" card here in a way that makes me nauseous. You have to write little blurbs about yourself--mine begins with "Hello!" (written in English) and ends with "please don't make fun of my anglophone accent :-) "
You then click and fill out little forms talking about your hobbies--there's specific buttons to click for "role playing games" and "figurine collection," albeit none for "playing bingo without a shirt on."
You then look at pictures of people and "flash" them, which is a cute way of saying you're interested. I must be somehow targeting a certain demographic, since I've only gotten five flashes so far, and almost exclusively from Korean women in their 40s (this is actually not an exaggeration).
Anyway, again, here's hoping for a bit of luck in these exciting times.

La fin s'approche...

...and there you have it. An entire season has apparently passed without me updating this thing.
On the other hand, I had nothing legitimate to write about until last night, when I finally accomplished a lifelong goal: I snuck into the VIP room of a swanky club by impersonating somebody else.
A group of posh Italians were in said VIP room for a birthday party. A French friend who was with me gave me a useful tip: whenever there's a large group of Italians, there's surely a "Giorgio" somewhere in there. Thus the strategy when I approached the bouncer:

Bouncer: Yes?
Me: (with exaggerated, fake Italian accent and rolled "r"s) Yes, I'm a friend of Giorgio.
Bouncer: Giorgio? Giorgio who?
Me: Giorgio, uh...Lugano. Mr. Lugano.

I read a book in fifth grade in which one of the characters was a teacher named Mr. Lugano. Why this was the first thing to emerge from my subconscious, I will never know.

Bouncer: Giorgio Lugano?
Me: Yes, he's in here somewhere.
Bouncer: Okay, go ahead.

Sweet. It was everything I could have dreamed of: free vodka and leathery Italian women dancing on tables as the intoxicated crowd hooted "Bene! Bene!". I drunkenly kept whispering the phrase "cool as a cucumber" to myself, although in retrospect, I have no idea what the hell that meant.
In conclusion, I felt special for the first time since 1998, when I won a pair of movie tickets in our school raffle. I lost them within a week.

Apparently my exams are approaching alarmingly quickly. I'd like to do what some people do before sports games and place bets on which exams I will pass:

ANALYSIS: FAIL. The French harmony system is both different from, and inferior to, the system that everyone else uses. We never learned it, and the teacher never really bothered to teach it to us.

SIGHTREADING: FAIL. There's something about improvising cadences in different keys on the final exam. Our teacher has never been sober enough to go over this with us. I'm buying the textbook next week, but I'll have to do some heroic cramming to learn everything in two weeks.

SOLFEGE: PASS. That's a pretty optimistic prediction, but I'm really not any lousier than the other students in my class. And they can't fail all of us! Right?

CHAMBER MUSIC: PASS. I own Debussy's "Petite Suite" and the Brahms waltzes. If the jury thinks otherwise, I'll burn the building down.

MUSIC HISTORY: PASS. Has anyone, as long as music conservatories have been around, ever failed a music history exam?

Then, there's the exams I care about. The piano juries.
This works in two phases. On the 29th, I play a Chopin etude, a prelude and fugue, and some dumb contemporary piece. Half of the students will then meet their demise.
The half that rest will play the rest of their program at the end of June. Half of those students will then meet their demise.

This depends solely on my nerves. My nervousness flairs up sporadically and can be the difference between a shimmering rendition of "Jeux d'Eau" (see Atlanta 2007) or a shite rendition of "Jeux d'Eau" (see Italy 2007). Thus my predictions:

If I do not get nervous: PASS
If I do get nervous: UNKNOWN
If I take a huge whiff of ether and down a bottle of poppers before playing: FAIL


Here's hoping for a bit of luck in these exciting times.

Wow!

I really haven't updated this thing in a month? I will get on that immediately...in a day or two.

I have learned one significant thing in the past month, and it is this:

Easter tradition in the Czech Republic dictates that men fashion sticks out of willow and then chase girls through a field while whipping them.
If a girl does not get whipped, she will become infertile.

Note to women:
Although I'm not a religious man, I will be celebrating Easter this year. On the metro. My collection of willow whips will surpass all reasonable boundaries.

Tu ne peux pas me virer!

I just got the work schedules for the next two weeks at the Frog (the pub I work in). I just glanced through them a couple times.
Something seemed a bit out of place. I couldn't quite put my finger on it. New font? Different managers?
Oh wait. They accidentally spelled "jeudi" as "jerdi."
Oh, and last week I was on the schedules. This week I'm not. That's kind of strange too.
Did I really get fired just when I finished my seemingly interminable training? I've been a model worker so far. My mojito has become an artform. I can balance two baked potatoes, a slice of cake, and a cheeseburger on my arms. I cleaned out their garbage room at 4AM when another staff member directly disobeyed the order. They had just finished renovations in the area--the garbage room was full of huge wooden slats, sacks of plaster and chemicals, and an alleged family of rats, but I did it anyway. I don't steal tips off the table that are meant to be shared with the entire staff, unlike half of the waiters.
This no doubt stems from an incident that occurred Saturday night, when I stirred a customer's drink with my johnson.
Just kidding. That might actually be an interesting story.
I was apparently scheduled to work Saturday night, but missed this on the schedule. Without fail, I have always worked Fridays and Sundays, but was scheduled for an extra day last week. I must have grazed over it and made an honest mistake. I had already scheduled a quasi-date Saturday night and had made complicated plans.
They called asking me where the deuce I was. I was already on the way out the door to meet a girl who would hopefully like gin and church bingo games as much as myself. It would require the Jaws of Life to pry me away from the evening and put me in the Frog until 1AM. I'm a good man, I promise, but I needed an excuse this time.
"I have a piano class."
"On a Saturday night?"
"Uhh yeah. Well, a lesson. I absolutely cannot miss it."
"Ok. I will note that."
Click.

Although the manager informed me on Sunday that it was "not cool," we seemed to smooth everything out and agree that an honest, one-time mistake had been made.
Although I won't know until tomorrow, I don't think things are smooth anymore.
My piano teacher told me to quit this job today, since staying out until 6AM in order to close the bar was making my Schumann sound awful. So maybe this is all a blessing in disguise.

Yes, maybe I should've run into work on Saturday, but I still think it's a bit silly to fire me over one missed day. To be determined. But I have a feeling this one isn't going to end well.
So just in case, here is my acrimonious kiss-off to the Frog. I'm amazed I got fired before I quit, like 1/3 of the barstaff does every week.
Just for the record, you know how they get their white beer so bubbly?
HUMAN SKIN.

Perdre Ses Illusions

Have I really not updated this thing since January? Oops.
The last couple weeks have been a busy mixture of decadence and maudlin self-reflection on my life here. Part of it has sprung up from conversations I've had with the only other American student I've met at my school. What it comes down to is this:
I remember reading this book called "The Demon Headmaster" when I was little about a British school where all the kids were hyponotized by--you guessed it--THE DEMON HEADMASTER. The heroes of the book were a group of kids that were immune to hypnosis who ended up foiling the headmaster's dastardly plan to get on TV and take over the world.
I feel like me and the other American are those two kids at our school.
I remember my teacher telling me that L'Ecole Normale was the "Julliard of Europe." Either my teacher was slightly exaggerating this claim, or Julliard sort of sucks. Or maybe Europe sucks. Who knows?
I will not turn this into a "vent" post by spewing a metaphorical, viscous, black substance representing my discontent onto my blog readers. But, like the other American, I am far from happy with my school and living situation here.
As I've explained to a few people at this point, I don't feel like I'm in school. I feel like I live alone in Paris and take piano lessons once a week in a pretty, albeit crumbling Art-Deco building. I have classes three days a week, and most of them aren't worth attending. Examples of my classes:

SIGHTREADING: This may literally be the worst class I've ever taken in my life, at any school, and that's counting my 8th grade French class with Mrs. Wheeler. The class is supposed to be two hours, but people come and go as they please. The invariably intoxicated teacher puts random sheet music in front of us that we sloppily run through once or twice, as she cackles and screams about it being "horrible." The last time I went, she twisted my pinky and laughed when I winced in pain. The final exam has something to do with Bach chorales, but we haven't gone over this.
What am I getting from this class that I wouldn't get from playing around with my Stevie Wonder songbook for 20 minutes? It is a class about nothing, for no one.

ANALYSIS: This class is 2 1/2 hours long without a break. Maybe it ends with everyone breaking open a pinata and having an orgy--I wouldn't know, because I've never made it to the end without leaving.
Our weekly homework is to do pretty basic analysis on one or two short exercises. I have yet to see anyone bother to do the work. In class, we correct the exercises--what should take fifteen minutes is grotesquely inflated into a 2 1/2 hour class by endless anecdotes and lots of metaphors for what chords sound like. This is all done at a painfully slow pace.
Every week I tell myself that I'll make it to the end this time. And every week, half an hour early, I suddenly find myself running out of the door screaming "Sacre Bleu!"

MUSIC HISTORY: This is a Wikipedia article in class form. Our teacher shows us Powerpoint slides that list the works of Tchaikovsky. Then a slide that lists the works of Stravinsky. We learn little fun facts about their lives. I look around in amazement at the kids that actually manually copy this down. If our teacher is feeling especially silly, she'll throw in a picture of a cat wearing glasses, as she did for a slide about "Carnival of the Animals." I'm still laughing thinking about that slide today--a cat with glasses! How drole!

SOLFEGE: This is another class full of meaningless exercises, such as writing a minor scale in its three forms. If anyone is familiar with music, this is the kind of thing you do during the first week you start playing an instrument. My teacher asked me a week ago if I was familiar with the harmonic minor scale. Never heard of it. It's probably not important.

And there you have it.
Skipping class is a bad thing, and something I didn't indulge in too much at Carnegie Mellon. But my philosophy here, as it was at CMU, is that if I'm literally wasting my time when I could be practicing piano or staring at girls in the metro as I whittle wooden busts of them, there's no point in going.

This is an awful lot of complaining for one blog entry--but as with the other American, I find myself with endless stretches of free time with little to do and no one to see. Yes, making cocktails and serving salmon burgers in my pub has helped, as has some much needed "American study-abroad student" decadence, such as clubbing on the Champs-Elysees until 7AM (IES Paris '08!!!!! Shout-out to my pplz!)
But I don't like the creeping feeling of un-productivity and disillusionment that's been haunting me recently. And I am puzzled by those who seem to be paying attention and taking the classes seriously. I guess breaking out of THE DEMON HEADMASTER'S spell can be difficult.

A friend informed me that he would be putting together and sending me a "pornucopia" to cheer me up. I did not request such a thing, nor am I familiar with the term "pornucopia," and I'm not sure I really want such a thing in my apartment. But I'm still checking the mail multiple times a day.

Bummer

Okay, so my life has had some bummers in it lately, but I'm learning to "look on the bright side" and see the good in everyone.

The Bad: I vacummed my apartment last night with my new "Euro Deutches Ultra PowerVac 9000 Ja! Ja!" that would probably be illegal in America. At one point, I opened it and spilled dust everywhere. I spent ten minutes trying to reattach it until, predictably, I grabbed it by the handle and bashed it into the floor repeatedly.
The vacuum is fine, but I done jacked up my right hand.

The Good: Cuts on your knuckles actually look pretty badass. I noticed a girl in my choir looking at them last night with what was probably some form of admiration. I gave her a hard, steely gaze and turned away.

The Bad: I would be astonished if my new job didn't violate a few labor laws in Paris. Friday I worked from 6:30PM to 3:30AM with one fifteen minute break. They have now made a rule that you cannot eat during your breaks.
I subsisted off of onion-flavored chips and those little chocolates that they serve with coffee for about 11 hours (I didn't get home until 5:30).
My trainer left me at the bar alone for a long period of time. I did not have a key to the cash register, nor did I know how to make a "Sex in the Sea." People got angry.

The Good: The people are so nice! And we get pints of home-brewed beer for one euro.

The Bad: I don't know why I thought I could still have an interesting conversation after three pints, two glasses of wine, and a pina colada. I cracked out my "magic trick" for everybody (the 7 of hearts one, if you know me), which is a sure sign that I should be more sober.

The Bad: The girl on the moped (see a few posts ago) did not answer her phone when I called.

The Good: I accidentally kept a pair of her gloves that I used for said moped ride. I'm not actually creepy enough to keep/wear them, but at some point, I hope her hands get real cold...yeah, real cold-like.

The Bad: Schumann's "ABEGG Variations" are a bitch.

The Good: I can play Albeniz' "El Puerto" like a true Spaniard.

The Bad: I have two busted pipes in my bathroom. The plumber informed me he was calling my landlord to complain.

The Good: There is nothing good about busted pipes.

The Bad: I had to turn down an invitation to EuroDisney World.

The Good: I did not have to go to EuroDisney World.

Du Boulot

Remember the British pub I tried to work at last time I was here? They didn't hire me, and even took the trouble of sending me a formal rejection letter, which was written with more care than the one Northwestern University sent me in 2003.
Well, somebody's come crawling back. And that somebody is me.
I already had an interview for another British pub in Paris a few weeks ago. I botched it. Example:

Interviewer: Now, we're really looking for a social kind of guy, someone who will go out on the floor and get the party started when it gets late.

Me: (stares ahead with blank expression)

Interviewer: Uhh...yes?

Me: Huh? Uh, yeah! Party guy, that's me. Make some noise, yeah! No, seriously, I uh...like people. A lot.

(interviewer hastily scribbles something bad on notepad)

Interviewer: And you have experience in bartending?

Me: (stares ahead with blank expression)

Interviewer: Are you okay?

Anyway, I tried my luck at the one I tried in 2006 with surprising success--I didn't even have to crack out my "true" story of working at Park Bench in Emory Village for a summer and sheepishly admitted that my cocktail-mixing skills were far from Tom Cruise's in "Cocktail."
My boss informed me that some people have "it" or don't, and that he'll often tell trainees to leave after a week if they can't handle the job.
Obviously I have "it," despite Philip's frequent claims to the contrary in these situations.
The uniform requires a pair of tight black pants--I guess they don't actually have to be incredibly tight, but I accidentally bought a size or two too small. It also requires that workers are cleanly shaven or have a full "beard"--I'm still deciding which way to swing this one.
Anyway, if you're down at Bercy Village and you want a flaming Manhattan on the rocks, I am now your man. Ha ha ha! (note: I'm going to work on laughing a lot for my new job, since bartenders always seem to be "peppy.")

I just did another one of those "Epiphany" parties with the cake and the plastic figure inside (my 5th so far). I lost again. This is going to be one hell of a rough year.

Legale!

I have a carte de sejour! I'm legally here!



















Note: I realize posting a picture of my personal documents is probably a bad idea. Hence the large gray bars and the subtle changing of "Jaffe" into "Jones." Take that, would-be counterfeiters.

The last leg of this visa process took place a couple days ago with a routine medical exam. The doctor informed me that, while in good health, I was at the limit of being underweight.
Just for the record, here are ten things I would like to eat to gain weight:

1. Mallomars
2. Jack-o-lantern full of sour cream
3. Thin stew of gin and pickles
4. Still-beating lamb heart served in a KFC bucket
5. Croissant filled with my fears and insecurities
6. Four-day old "Big Montana" burger from Arby's
7. Script to the movie "Roadhouse"
8. Giant turkey leg served to me by mysterious pirate who turns out to be Rick Santorum in disguise (wearing pirate costume due to a severe chemical burn)
9. LASER Malt Liquor













10. Mallomars.


I guess I've come a long way since my "deuce" days.

Nuts

Why does this kind of thing always happen to me, despite my best efforts to avoid it?
Last night, while I was on my computer at a cafe, I noticed the guy at the neighboring table was staring at me. He finally walked over:

Him: I have a question about Wifi.

Me: Uhh, yes? Go ahead.

Him: Well, I don't have internet at home. But could somebody have installed an antenna on top of my building and be using it to beam images onto my television? Can people do that with Wifi?

Me: Uh, no, that is absolutely impossible.

Him: Because there are very pornographic images coming up on my TV, and somebody must be putting them on there using an antenna.

Me: No, again, that is definitely impossible. Don't worry.

At this point, I still thought the guy was sort of sane, even if "very pornographic images" were popping up on his TV.

Him: Well, then what about webcams? For example, I've heard of people breaking water pipes and slipping webcams through the pipes.

Me: I...uhh, I have never heard of that.

Him: I have a very large genealogical chart at home, do you think people may be using webcams to watch me and take pictures of the chart?

At this point I was pretty sure I was in an Ingmar Bergman movie.

Me: What? Well, webcams aren't that small, you'd probably notice one just hanging down from the ceiling.

Him: Oh, so webcams...they're significantly big? I would see them? But...what about nanotechnology? People could just be using tiny wires and slipping them into my apartment.

Me: I've never personally heard of that...I really wouldn't worry about it.

Him: Sometimes my CD Rom drive will open by itself. This must be people playing around with my computer from far away.

Me: Um, I don't think so, that happens sometimes.

He then proceeded to tell me about his favorite female French popstar. As soon as he realized I was American, he began to speak in broken English and tell me the history of the Statue of Liberty. At some point he wore himself out and moved back to his table. I wished him a nice evening.
I'm never leaving my apartment again.

Encore Ici..

I have the feeling that for the past couple weeks, this blog has become a black hole of nothingness. Perhaps this is because nothing much has broken my routine of buying cheese, drinking coffee, practicing, ad infinitum.
Although I've just had several glasses of hard cider and a rum cocktail (it's "Epiphany" here, which is some sort of holiday), here's everything I've learned over the past few weeks that I've been too lazy to post:

1. Prague is like Disneyland, and more in a "drinking alone on Pleasure Island" way than "eye-popping orgasm on Space Mountain" way. The pretty parts are all in the center of town, which must have the most souvenir shops per capita than any city in the world.
On that note, who the hell buys that stuff? Laughing electronic witches? A "Prague Drinking Team" sweatshirt? It's like the yard-sale from hell, and trust me, I've seen some miserable yard-sales.
Now imagine Disneyland is in the middle of East Germany. As soon as you leave your lovely tourist cocoon, you're in a world of graffiti, trams, and the need to hide your true thoughts behind a facade of nonchalance.
I discovered this underbelly of Prague because of my insistence to stay in a hostel and be "social," versus Philip's desire to stay in a hotel and be "comfortable." Misreading the hostel website, I accidentally booked us an apartment rental service in a "gritty" (the word used by my Prague city guide) suburb of Prague, which left us a 25 minute walk from the center. Our breakfast consisted of a few slices of American cheese and a juicebox. Philip has not spoken to me since.
If I give the impression that I did not enjoy Prague, it is wrong--I just have that feeling that I did not discover the "real" Prague, if such a thing exists. It is still an excellent city with a soaring castle, a cool bridge, excellent brews, heavy dumplings, and lots of empty casinos. I mean really, totally empty casinos.

2. A girl took me on a moped spin through Paris a few nights ago. I felt like James Bond. Except the girl was driving. And I was on a moped.

3. Said girl cannot hang out again until the 20th (precise date named), due to exams. This is either an excuse, or the most studious girl in the world. Probably the former. To be determined.

4. Said "Epiphany" holiday here involves eating lots of almond-flavored cakes and hoping that you find the "feve" in yours--basically a little plastic figurine, which means you get to wear a crown and be "king" for the day.
I have eaten four cakes in the last twelve hours and have not won. In general, finding the "feve" has usually been an accurate indicator of how the year will go. Since I have yet to ever win, I guess I can expect more of the same this year.
Why can't I just be king for once? Just once?

5. The French kid next to me is screaming because "World of Warcraft" froze on him. I've rarely seen anyone so angry. I don't know much about this game, but please just stay away from it.

6. Spending New Year's in a gay bar in the Marais (I didn't know it was gay, I promise...*wink wink*...no, I actually really didn't, seriously) and going to bed by 2AM is actually a more enjoyable way to spend the day than being forced to dance at an unknown person's house in the Parisian suburbs until 5:30 AM.

7. Spending 5 hours in a cafe and watching "Gone Baby Gone" is the perfect way to spend New Year's Day, minus the "Gone Baby Gone" part.

8. Christmas pudding still tastes like goose asshole.

School starts up again on Tuesday! Not that I'll really be able to tell the difference.
Here's to the second trimester of this zany (and often totally uneventful) French adventure.

Malade

While at a screening of "Singing In the Rain" by myself last night (don't ask), I suddenly realized I was shivering violently. While part of it was clearly due to excitement from watching Gene Kelly tap-dance, I quickly concluded that I had come down with something nasty.
And indeed, I slept twelve hours last night and experienced some of the most insane fever-dreams of my life--something about being in a maze and being chased by the Italian government.
This was the first time I missed living with a host family--the last time I was in Paris and fell ill, my host-mom cooked up a plate of grated carrots and garlic for me as a homeopathic remedy. I ate half of the plate and promptly vomited. But nonetheless, it's always nice to have some sort of company when you're ill. If somebody wants to come bring me a Powerade or a sack of soup, please feel free.

Le Jour de L'An

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