Gothic Paris

Yesterday I woke up, took one look at the gloomy sky and decided that, yes, it was the perfect day for exploring Gothic Paris. The day began well, as many Gothic narratives misleadingly do. After much time spent in front of the mirror attempting to make myself appear vaguely Parisian, I stepped out into the street feeling, if not entirely stunning, then at least mildly confident in my new dress. I had a wonderful time promenading my way down the boulevards (Parisions don't walk, they promenade) pretending I was a part of the glittering world of Parisian chic. Then I reached my first site of Gothic interest: the catacombes.

At this point I ought to point out that, while I can handle and rather revel in any amount of terror on the page and screen, in real life the sight of blood turns my bones to jelly and the mere idea of a corpse has me quaking with terror. In short, I'm a big fat fraidy cat. So deciding to explore the catacombes in my lonesome probably wasn't such a flash idea in retrospect. There are the remains of thousands down there, twenty metres below street level. What's worse though, is how their displayed: walls of neatly stacked thigh bones with skulls interdispersed to make patterns, and plaques bearing quotes about the nature of death. Oh and there's a nice display board of pics from when the corpses were originally stored whole. They were lovely. And the tunnels are never ending, stiffling and humid with the smell of damp and rot, the ceiling so low I had to stoop, and dripping. Ten minutes down there and I wanted out. I could almost feel the walls closing in and I could see the headlines: 'Australian tourist burried alive in catacombes collapse!' by the time I reached the base of the spiral staircase that would eventually deliver me back up to the street I was almost running. But emerging, gasping and out of breath into the natural light, I was far from a happy ending. My descent into the catacombes had served as the literal descent into madness in my little Gothic narrative. I was disoriented, the catacombes did not end where they began and I couldn't get my bearings. The geography on myap seemed to alter everytime I opened it and I couldn't seem to match it's directions with the streets I was walking. Worse still, where the day before all Paris appeared blissfully bilingual, yesterday no one spoke English and I could not seem to make myself understood. When I tried to order lunch the girl behind the counter got her friend to come laugh with her at my garbled french until I wanted to yell at her that I was Australian, not stupid and tell her to go choke on a baguette. Harsh, but like I explained int last blog, these guys are all preternaturaly beautiful, and having pretty people laugh at your incompetence is pretty much the kiss of death for your self esteem.

Oh, and it was raining again, did I mention that? The kind of downpour that laughs in the face of your umbrella and soaks you socks to spite you.

I was originally planning on following my trip to the catacombes with a visit to the nearby cemetery where lots of famous people are buried, but wandering alone, brooding, in a cemetery, in the rain is really only considered romantic behaviour if one is a character in an Anne rice novel or has 'byronic hero' firmly stamped across their forehead. For me, I feel it merely would hav looked a little pathetic, and besides, I couldn't fond the damn thing.

Instead, I decided to improve my mood with a little retail therapy an prompty set about buying the perfect damsel in distress outfit in hopes of attracting a knight in shining armour to turn my Gothic into a romance. Outfit purchased, my knight quickly followed: Leo di caprio stared heroicly out at me from dozens of shutter island posters. The prospect of hearing my first heartthrob speak English for 2 1/2 hours was inately appealing. I found a cinema an bought a ticket.

A note on French cinemas: they're insane. At 4pm on a Thursday there were hundreds of people crammed into the foyer with a dingle usher trying to order everyone into the right lines, in French.
Merde. I eventually persuaded one of the ubber gorgeous young men to translate for me, which he did, then gave me a lopsided smile dripping with arrogance and superiority (like I said last blog, I'm in the land if Cullen clones). I wanted to slap him, or at least mess up his too-perfect hair.

But by the end of the film it was mr who was smirking. Even with my limited French, I could tell the subtitles were a poor translation and I'm sure I was the only one who had any idea what the film was about, well that's what I told myself anyway.

Stepping back into the street I felt revived, oriented. There us nothing like a good movie to cheer me up.

Today was much better, there was even sun this afternoon. I saw the Eiffel tower ( though with the sun the line was several hours ling, so will have to go up another day), went to a cool contemporary art museum, wandered along the seine, had my first taste of French wine and cheese and sampled more delicious desserts!

Paris, j' ai teme! (no idea if that's how you spell it!)

Margs
xo xo