By jkichton
I write this post perched on my bed in Commugny, Switzerland with my host mom’s cat, Ronja, purring away by my side. I just returned from Paris three hours ago, and am completely and utterly exhausted. The “study trip” was the perfect length: one week. Just enough time to run around haphazardly doing most of the touristy things but it also allowed for some rest and relaxation. However, that said, I am still tired and wanting to hole up in my room for the next three days straight instead of go anywhere or talk to anyone. Traveling is hard! This post will be dedicated to my very confused and bewildered perception (and reflection) of Paris.
To begin, Paris is cool. But, that’s about it for me. I can name several of my friends who have “fallen in love” with Paris, the city of love and lights! They gush at the Parisian lifestyle, their mouths water at the thought of being independent in one of the largest and most chic cities in the world, they awe at the history and culture that spills out of its streets. But for me, it was just meh. I went to the Tour Eiffel, Église Saint-Louis-des-Invalides, Jardin du Luxembourg, Notre Dame de Paris, Museé du Louvre, École Militaire, UNESCO, and the OECD. So yes, I was able to experience many of the touristy/stereotypical/classically Parisian things and I am grateful that I was even able to have this opportunity to do so. But for me, they have all become a blur of pretty buildings and smelly metro rides. I had only four days in Paris and I am realizing how hard it is to fully visit and appreciate a city with only a limited number of time and energy.
This is a question of breadth verses depth. Breadth meaning, how many places can I experience? Depth meaning, how tediously, intensely, and fully can I experience a place? For me, I am beginning to realize I appreciate depth. Let us take the example of Paris: I ran around getting 6-7 hours of sleep every night trying to take in all Paris has to offer. This involved worrying about time and efficiency. What time would we have to wake up in order to take the metro to this place? How could my friends and I organize our days so that we could all be able to hang out during the gaps between our interviews? How could we all manage our time correctly so that we didn’t waste any of it waiting for people to show up or finish what they were doing or do a certain task? How do we balance out all of the wishes of the whole group in regards to what sites people wanted to visit and what events people wanted to participate in? How does money factor into all of this? How do we do all of this without getting extremely angry at each other? How does having no cell phone service and only being able to communicate via Wi-Fi affect this? As you can see, Paris was crazy. And due to my “Type A” personality, I inadvertently made it even crazier because I wanted to plan every single hour of our trip in order to be sure that we did not waste any time.
Now, I think everything I said above shows how utterly horrible breadth is. For example, the best parts of my trip were the quiet times. One was when I went to a local bakery and ordered a demi baguette (in French) for my friend’s breakfast. Or the time where my friends and I walked in the opposite direction to the Tour Eiffel and ended up eating lunch at a Crêperie along the way. Or the time where I sat under the Tour Eiffel at nighttime for 25 minutes. Or the time where I saw one of my other friends from the program on the opposite metro platform as us as we were both about to board our trains and we yelled “Hi!” Or the time I just looked around a French grocery store for 15 minutes trying to find something cheap for dinner. It were these small, isolated, instances when I wasn’t in a rush, usually transitioning from one place to another, and were sometimes alone, that I enjoyed Paris the most. These moments made me feel like a Parisian and made me experience Parisian culture much more than standing under the Arc de Triomphe snapping away pictures from every possible angle ever will.