I made an nice acquaintance this Saturday. It’s a guy from Algeria. He looks completely like a French, at least not like a Muslim. His slight accent, though, betrays his foreign origin. He’s a painter but he cannot make money as an artist so he, mathematician, works at the same time at a famous French gas company. He loves blue colors and all the time makes jokes about his ‘manias’ and about everything around reacting vividly to any comment or phrase of mine. His and our manias concern everything in our everyday life; I think the way we organize space we inhabit is marked to a great extant by our phobias and manias.
I came to his perfectly clean flat in a close South Parisian suburb, and my mission was to clean it even better. “Don’t you regret of coming here?” he asked. “Of course not. I’ll always find what to do even when there’s nothing to do”. He explained meanwhile his philosophy of the “fainéant”, of a lazy man: “I hate doing a lot of job, so I prefer to do it gradually, in small portions. For example, it’s better to wash a cup of coffee right away, as soon as I finish my coffee. I never leave an unwashed dish for the next day, I can’t sleep if I know there’s something not done. I wash it, only then I go to bed and my mind is zen. I iron all of my chemises in advance because in the morning I only have 30 seconds to put one on.”
When I came he first made me coffee, natural, strong, tasty, not in a capsule coffee machine, offered some chocolate fait maison. As it took some time I wondered, “Am I going to work today at all?”
His womanish manners (is he gay?), his laughter, his jokes… I had an impression to have met a very educated person, generous, attentive, with his mind open… So this visit was not really cleaning someone’s apartment but like a good friends’ meeting.
I also learnt something important: amour, love in French, is in singular a masculine noun, but mes amours (plural) becomes feminine…
Tag: life
Je repars à zéro
Voilà one week left until I defend my post-doc diploma. What have I got? No regular babysitting, no housecleaning at all, no other job, no ideas what to do next. Got enough money to pay the rent for the next month (670 euros), but nothing to buy food and monthly transport pass, nothing to celebrate the end of my studies just after the defense (to offer some drinks to my professors and to the friends who will be there).
A lonely Mister (I think he’s about his 70s) is trying to persuade me to not only clean his flat, but also to do massage. “I’ll pay you more. Nobody will know… But I’ll pay you more than for the cleaning… But we will know each other… I’ll pay you. I am single”. Oh my GOD, poor man! No, Sir, I wish you good luck in your (I think quite desperate) search. I’ve already tried once and run as quickly as possible. The man (Michel, comedy actor) who said on the phone he was 48, was in fact about 58. He wanted massage sensuel. You get naked so that it gets a bit sexy, you mass my whole body, you mass my penis, the aim is to excite me. 50 euros per hour.
NO I’m not going to do that! to mass your cock, are you crazy? – What’s the problem? You know, you imply moral judgment, you refuse an interesting sensual experience! – Yes, I do, I don’t need it. I was really lucky he was not a maniaс. So I run away veeeery quickly and he let me run. F…..ck!
I’ve never thought it’s possible that all the small jobs one manages to find disappear almost simultaneously. Maybe a golden era is waiting for me and the gods deprive me of all the non-qualified jobs? Or are they trying to tell me, “Valeria, it’s better that you prepare your presentation, spend more time on it!” Thanks, gods, I appreciate. But could you please also show me the path where to move? Thank you, gods, in advance.
Last week, I had to prepare three copies of my work, for each member of the jury. My school did not reply if they refunded such kind of expenses. Luckily, my colleagues from the library printed two copies for free, so I had only to pay the cover. No need in the third copy: one of the members of the jury said she had already did it. These small gestures are so touching and so important when one keeps body and soul together. Thank you, friends.
Deus ex machina
![20191014_090433[1]](https://surviveinparis.home.blog/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/20191014_0904331.jpg?w=1100)
He wanted to help me with my “problems”. “What do you propose?” he asked me. “I’ve posted many announcements, babysitting for exemple”. He asked if I wanted to do the massage, nothing more. “No thanks”. It was a long enough conversation, which touched finally upon my situation and the limits imposed on foreigners…
“There are always by-passing ways to avoid the limits”. “Doing what? massage???”
* * *
дзвонив боженька по телефону. запевняв, що всі тимчасові труднощі в житті плинні, і взагалі їх можна оминути… є всякі шляхи… і запропонував масаж
Angry bird
I am an angry bird today. The representative of the Saudi family called me this morning again. Again, they propose me to give French lessons for 20 euros / 1,5h, or for 15 euros / 1h. So, once again, we’re at the beginning of our highly diplomatic dialogue.
For those who doesn’t know: in Paris, this is more or less what one can earn as a housecleaner. NOT as a professor speaking 5 languages and having his/her PhD degree.
And although I do need money at the moment and I love money, the principle is much more important: if there is no respect for the teacher’s work, adieu!
Burning from anger, I’ve made all the way back home by foot, from 2e to 19e arrondissement. The weather is changing all the time, and there are very few people outside.
![20191009_150415[1]](https://surviveinparis.home.blog/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/20191009_1504151.jpg?w=1100)
This world is sick
During the last ten days I’ve met four families to talk about and probably to arrange babysitting. I’ve liked most the last one with three autonomous kids of 4, 6, 8 years old. Their mom had to present me to their school director yesterday, she could only wait for 10 minutes for me, but for the first time in my life my highly developed sense of space orientation was hacked, and I couldn’t find the school. Mme AC, instead of explaining how to find her said ”if you don’t come in a few seconds…”, ”i don’t know where you are…” etc., etc. Her voice was nervous and angry. She couldn’t wait, she had a meeting.
And that upset me. Instead of helping (in half an hour I finally found the school when it was too late, 30 minutes earlier I was just in a few steps from it), she was nearly shouting at me. I don’t want such families. I don’t want to have anything with people who are smiling now but the next moment are ready to reduce you to dust. This world is sick.
– Madam, I’m not your husband, I’m not your daughter to talk to me this way. I’m a stranger. When someone takes it out on a stranger, then the stranger automatically becomes your therapist. Just remember, his job costs money.
Supper for 1 euro
This evening we’ve come with my ex-coloc to the Refettorio de la Madeleine, but they haven’t let us in. “Are you tourists?” Hahaha… NO. We’re survivers in this wild, wild capitalist West. The entrance is only for the really poor people, for those with no house… You may buy a card, though, they tell us, it’s 5 euros. And there are lunches, you only pay 10 euros for your lunch if you’ve got this card.
Oh, no. Thanks, i’d better eat at home.
Want to work hard
I don’t feel time passing by when at my actual work place. I’m so get used to be exhausted that I’d rather work really hard, please gimme some work, I’m so a little bit bored!
These days trying to save or rather not to spend money at all as long as my closest further is not clear. So I am looking for the charity restaurants and other life hacks not to be hungry. With my ex-coloc we’ll try to have supper at the Foyer de la Madeleine tonight, they say it’s for 1 euro per person. I think that’s a reasonable price. I’ve just discovered the place online, it’s in the Crypt of the Madeleine Church and would like to become a volunteer cook or a waitress there. I’m empathetic to those who are in a precarious situation just like me or even worse.
I’ll share a recipy for those interested in how not to buy chocolate and still eat some sweat. You still have to buy something, but buying this will save you some money:
- cacao (1,5 euros 200 gr)
- butter (1,70 euros 250 gr)
- sugar (don’t remember the price)
Put cacao, 3-4 full tablespoons, into a cup, add 2 teaspoons of butter and 1 tablespoon of sugar. Pour a bit of hot water into the cup and mix the mixture. You’ve got (almost) hot chocolate! Bon appétit !
Нечеловеческое
château de Versailles против всего человеческого. всего два wc – на входе и выходе (что там в садах – не знаю), куда в течение дня образуются чуточку менее длинные очереди, чем у входа перед открытием. после прохождения секьюрити отбираются все коляски и рюкзаки с едой. ходите с детьми на руках, голодные и жаждущие – даже воду нигде не раздобыть внутри шато, не говоря уже о легком недорогом перекусе. разве хлебать из-под крана в том же wc… перекус в самом шато может быть только класса люкс, в “Анжелине”. в садах ситуация другая, но раз покинув шато, обратно можно попасть, лишь повторно выстояв вон ту сумасшедшую очередь снаружи. коллега из Испании сказала, сюда приезжают “разделить момент удовольствия”, как бы не так! шато к вашим услугам, чтобы этого не произошло!
и вот эти вот аудиогиды. Orpheo поддерживает всего лишь 11 языков, при том что компания появилась в 1992. все шато виновато, якобы оно заказывает языки. уже в следующем году введут экскурсии на арабском! прогресс. множество голландцев хотят родной Dutch, румыны – румынский, сербы сербский, а хорваты хорватский, португальцам и полякам неожиданно повезло, греки не жалуются, терпят, в последнее время возрос спрос на иврит, однажды прозвучало пожелание – на иврите или арабском, сильвупле. тайский, тамильский, хинди, филипино… все это остается за пределами так сказать цивилизации
вчера было дефиле японцев. а позавчера – волнами чередовались китайцы и корейцы. незабываемое зрелище и ценное: кажется, я совсем близка к тому, чтобы их всех различать
Versailles. Easter holidays
Versailles. Someone’s working during Easter holidays.
Versailles. Easter
It’s stunning to see crowds of people waiting patiently in a long line for the audioguides in Versailles. The guides are “free of charge” or, rather, included in price of the Billet Château. Some know that, others don’t but follow those who know, yet others are informed by us on the spot and then stand in line. This is not the desire of knowledge but the power of money and of what is seemingly free.
One of the last days, our team distributed around 100 000 guides. The price of the ticket is 18 euros. Now count how much money gets the Château de Versailles during holidays. Don’t forget that the audioguides are distributed only to the 50% of the visitors or even less.
I worked there yesterday from 8.45 to 18.30. It was Easter, and all of us were dead by the end of the day. I think that before I was not really tired. Everything is relative.
The Chinese people want the guides especially bad – for the third reason: because their human Guide told them to take the guides, and they obey.
Seems like the Chinese suffer most of all from the cultural shock. After them the Russians come: the representatives of both nations look really disoriented and… wild. But they express the shock in different ways: the Chinese are afraid of getting lost, so they move around in big cohesive groups menacing to smash everything and everyone who is on their way. It’s a collective body with no individuals. The Russians are not that “collective”, but an overt astonishment and failure to communicate is often drawn on their faces.
Here are some of the less FAL (frequently asked languages): Dutch and Deutsch, Arabic, Romanian, Swedish, Breton, British, Hindi, Farsi, Hebrew (asked once only), cantonal Chinese…
- In which language?
- Breton.
- British.
- Dutch.
- Deutsch.
How to survive in Paris 