Day six: July 14, 2004
Destination: parc Larousse, ville de Malakoff
Weather: glorious
Time of departure: 1.30pm
Canine breakdown (parading of dogs obviously illegal on national holidays): 1 poodle, 1 poodle cross & 1 choc Labrador cross sitting in passenger & driver seats of abandoned car
Public transport options: PC1 and 89 buses, metro line 4 to porte d’orléans
This particular project may have been hexed from the start. Several days of freezing rain made it impossible to do any kind of sitting around in a park. Last night it cleared up and I set off, only to realize half an hour into the trip that I had forgotten my dictionary. Trip aborted. Today I had already reached malakoff before I worked out that my camera was still in my room. But the weather was glorious, it’s a national holiday, and I refused to go back.
So no pictures. I would write about the fascinating RER harassment unscandal going on here right now, but maybe I’ll just point you here, as it has absolutely nothing to do with this site.
Walking down boulevard Jourdan to boulevard Brune, there is nothing but fumes and bleary-eyed people, hungover from dancing with the pompiers last night. The buses have little French flag ears, fluttering in the wind as they come speeding down the boulevard. Traditionally, the president of the Republic pardons criminals on Bastille Day (although this year he’s decided that race crimes and sex crimes will not be forgiven… and it’s the first time!!) and so I think that the bus drivers all break the speed limit on purpose, five times over, thinking that there will be a reprieve. It’s just that the policemen are also hungover, and have more important things to worry about today.
I take a left at Porte de Chatillon and immediately everything takes on an ambience of strip mall. There’s a super GO SPORTS across the road, claiming to cover some 3000 sq m of space. It’s pretty big. And then a SUPER MONOPRIX which, being more patriotic than the GO SPORTS, is closed. None of the other Monoprix branches are closed today. Perhaps that’s why this one is super.
Crossing over the periphérique feels a little like sticking my nose in an exhaust pipe and breathing in deeply. But once I turn off the thoroughfare and onto avenue Larousse, the city ceases to be sprawl and becomes a town. Bars and brasseries, all very male-dominated. Little alimentations. Bakeries on vacation, with lists of other non-vacating bakeries on their windows. The parc Larousse, when it appears on my left, is rather small. Not even so much of a park, at least not when compared with the likes of Buttes Chaumont or André Citroën or even my own Montsouris. It’s closer to one of those narrow meridians in the city proper, with a few trees and some gravel and some old men playing pétanque. Except this one has eradicated the old men in favour of a kiddies’ playground. The kids don’t seem to care. There’s very little grass here, and so parkgoers are spread out on a series of green benches. One holds three youngish men, one with a guitar. They are later joined by a couple with two young children. At one stage an old man comes into the park and hands one of the young men a plastic bag. Then he leaves. Another bench features a middle-aged man and his bag. They’re reading. Also reading is the young man with the ponytail on my right. Beside him, two 20-something year old women, gossiping. They are interested in my dictionary. And then there’s the woman with a towel wrapped around her waist, trousers rolled up, baseball cap, rugby shirt, washing vegetables and clothes in the drinking fountain. Next to her, a sunbather, lying on her back. Behind is a high-rise, all pink with balconies. Les chiens sont interdits. So no dogs, but lots of pigeons.
My random words:
Mutiné(e) adj mutinous, rebellious n m/f . mutineer, rebel.
Catégoriel, elle adj 1. category; classement ~ classment by category. 2. SOCIOL: revendications ~les: sectional claims. 3. LING & PHILOS category.
Commendataire adj. Commendatory.
Se jeter vp (emploi passif) un rasoir qui se jette – a disposable razor.
vpi. 1 [sauter] to throw o.s. ou to hurl o.s. ou to leap (off) into empty space. 2. [se précipiter] to rush [headlong]. 3. se ~ dans [commencer]. 4. [cours d’eau] to run ou to flow into. vpt loc. S’en jeter un (derrière la cravate] to have a quick drink.
Rattrapable adj.: une telle erreur ne serait pas ~. A mistake like that couldn’t be put right.
My story
Le soir, au crépuscule. La mutinée est entrée dans le parc. Elle regardait les gens autour d’elle, en essayant de les mettre dans un classement catégoriel. C’était commendataire, mais un tel but n’était pas rattrapable. En se rendant compte de ce fait, elle est montée dans l’immeuble rose en face et elle s’est jetée par la fenêtre.
Words found for Jean Moulin
Cher M. Moulin,
Veuillez noter ces trois mots :
FENDILLEMENT
RIPAILLER
MOUCHARDER
Merci,
Nicky Agate
A fendillement is a cracking, spitting, splitting, springing, crackling or crazing. Ripailler is an outmoded verb that means to have a feast. Moucharder is to tell tales or grass on someone. I leave these words on a scrap of my notebook on the avenue Jean Moulin, chef du Conseil National de la Résistance. A wall, half tumbled-down, looks like it should have been here when he was. I tuck the piece of paper between the stones and watch its erratic descent, past spiders’ webs and memories, to a niche behind some wood.
Weather: glorious
Time of departure: 1.30pm
Canine breakdown (parading of dogs obviously illegal on national holidays): 1 poodle, 1 poodle cross & 1 choc Labrador cross sitting in passenger & driver seats of abandoned car
Public transport options: PC1 and 89 buses, metro line 4 to porte d’orléans
This particular project may have been hexed from the start. Several days of freezing rain made it impossible to do any kind of sitting around in a park. Last night it cleared up and I set off, only to realize half an hour into the trip that I had forgotten my dictionary. Trip aborted. Today I had already reached malakoff before I worked out that my camera was still in my room. But the weather was glorious, it’s a national holiday, and I refused to go back.
So no pictures. I would write about the fascinating RER harassment unscandal going on here right now, but maybe I’ll just point you here, as it has absolutely nothing to do with this site.
Walking down boulevard Jourdan to boulevard Brune, there is nothing but fumes and bleary-eyed people, hungover from dancing with the pompiers last night. The buses have little French flag ears, fluttering in the wind as they come speeding down the boulevard. Traditionally, the president of the Republic pardons criminals on Bastille Day (although this year he’s decided that race crimes and sex crimes will not be forgiven… and it’s the first time!!) and so I think that the bus drivers all break the speed limit on purpose, five times over, thinking that there will be a reprieve. It’s just that the policemen are also hungover, and have more important things to worry about today.
I take a left at Porte de Chatillon and immediately everything takes on an ambience of strip mall. There’s a super GO SPORTS across the road, claiming to cover some 3000 sq m of space. It’s pretty big. And then a SUPER MONOPRIX which, being more patriotic than the GO SPORTS, is closed. None of the other Monoprix branches are closed today. Perhaps that’s why this one is super.
Crossing over the periphérique feels a little like sticking my nose in an exhaust pipe and breathing in deeply. But once I turn off the thoroughfare and onto avenue Larousse, the city ceases to be sprawl and becomes a town. Bars and brasseries, all very male-dominated. Little alimentations. Bakeries on vacation, with lists of other non-vacating bakeries on their windows. The parc Larousse, when it appears on my left, is rather small. Not even so much of a park, at least not when compared with the likes of Buttes Chaumont or André Citroën or even my own Montsouris. It’s closer to one of those narrow meridians in the city proper, with a few trees and some gravel and some old men playing pétanque. Except this one has eradicated the old men in favour of a kiddies’ playground. The kids don’t seem to care. There’s very little grass here, and so parkgoers are spread out on a series of green benches. One holds three youngish men, one with a guitar. They are later joined by a couple with two young children. At one stage an old man comes into the park and hands one of the young men a plastic bag. Then he leaves. Another bench features a middle-aged man and his bag. They’re reading. Also reading is the young man with the ponytail on my right. Beside him, two 20-something year old women, gossiping. They are interested in my dictionary. And then there’s the woman with a towel wrapped around her waist, trousers rolled up, baseball cap, rugby shirt, washing vegetables and clothes in the drinking fountain. Next to her, a sunbather, lying on her back. Behind is a high-rise, all pink with balconies. Les chiens sont interdits. So no dogs, but lots of pigeons.
Mutiné(e) adj mutinous, rebellious n m/f . mutineer, rebel.
Catégoriel, elle adj 1. category; classement ~ classment by category. 2. SOCIOL: revendications ~les: sectional claims. 3. LING & PHILOS category.
Commendataire adj. Commendatory.
Se jeter vp (emploi passif) un rasoir qui se jette – a disposable razor.
vpi. 1 [sauter] to throw o.s. ou to hurl o.s. ou to leap (off) into empty space. 2. [se précipiter] to rush [headlong]. 3. se ~ dans [commencer]. 4. [cours d’eau] to run ou to flow into. vpt loc. S’en jeter un (derrière la cravate] to have a quick drink.
Rattrapable adj.: une telle erreur ne serait pas ~. A mistake like that couldn’t be put right.
Le soir, au crépuscule. La mutinée est entrée dans le parc. Elle regardait les gens autour d’elle, en essayant de les mettre dans un classement catégoriel. C’était commendataire, mais un tel but n’était pas rattrapable. En se rendant compte de ce fait, elle est montée dans l’immeuble rose en face et elle s’est jetée par la fenêtre.
Cher M. Moulin,
Veuillez noter ces trois mots :
FENDILLEMENT
RIPAILLER
MOUCHARDER
Merci,
Nicky Agate
A fendillement is a cracking, spitting, splitting, springing, crackling or crazing. Ripailler is an outmoded verb that means to have a feast. Moucharder is to tell tales or grass on someone. I leave these words on a scrap of my notebook on the avenue Jean Moulin, chef du Conseil National de la Résistance. A wall, half tumbled-down, looks like it should have been here when he was. I tuck the piece of paper between the stones and watch its erratic descent, past spiders’ webs and memories, to a niche behind some wood.
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