En Route

Hello and welcome to a traveling Saturday here at the Wannaskan Almanac. Today is May 10th.

As I type this, the Seventh Grader and I are en route to Paris via Montreal. This trip is already like no other. First of all, we’re not going to Czechia. In fact, I’m realizing just now that the last time I went to Europe for non-Czech, non-family visits was in 1997 when I spent a summer in Holland with the SPAN program through the University of Minnesota. That would be a year before I would meet my future Czech beau.

This trip was inspired by jealousy. I have a cousin who likes to travel for fun to destinations like Italy, the Oregon Coast, Florida, Germany - and, yes, even at least one prior trip to France. She does the tourist type of travel. She learns the history of a place and then shapes trips around what she would like to see. After drooling over her Facebook photos and relishing her travel photo books, a year ago, like the animals in Mary Casanova’s book, One Dog Canoe, I asked my cousin, “Can I come too?” I realized I had never been on a touristy trip. Our travels have always revolved around visiting relatives - who are all lovely people and who I enjoy seeing - but, I thought, wouldn’t it be nice to go on a trip that was about the destination? Isn’t there something to be said for a little sight seeing sans seeing relatives?

To my delight (and relief, because, believe me, she’s the kind of person who has no problem saying no), my cousin didn’t say, “Sorry! It’s a one-dog canoe!” Instead, she said, “Sure! I was thinking to go to Paris next year if you want to come along.” I said YES the way a bride-to-be says it when her sweetheart gets down on one knee and asks, “Will you marry me?”

With the verbal commitment in place, we sealed the deal last spring by securing an AirBnB across the street from the Louvre. (Travel tip: If you want a supreme location like the one we snagged, book it a year in advance!)

The experienced-traveler cousin created an itinerary and timeline. She researched excursions and good deals. “Do you want to go to Giverny?” she texts, P.S.es with a follow-up text: Monet’s house and gardens. “Chocolate tour? Y/N?” Mais, oui!

“How about we read books about Paris?” I suggested. An avid reader, she made a Google spreadsheet. I’d just finished the historical novel Jaqueline in Paris, and added The Paris Novel and The Art of French Eating. My cousin surpassed me with a host of reads ranging from nonfiction to fiction that she says I can tell you all she recommends, including Paris (the novel), The French Ingredient, Paris to the Past, The Paris Bookseller, The Paris Letters, The Sweet Life, Phantom of the Opera, Mad Enchantment, The Paris Judgment, and is currently reading The Nightingale.

The Seventh Grader and I have been doing French lessons on Duolingo. Honestly, French sounds like mush in my ears. Unless it’s bonjour, OK, salut, and cool (which sounds like a German “kühl” to my ears), I am completely lost. Conversations with Duolingo Lily go like this:

Lily: Bonjour.

Kim: Bonjour, Lily!

Lily: Zhzhzhjzh piz-ZAH?

Kim: Uh…oui?

Lily: Bonne.

Chairman Joe generously gifted me some French Pimsler CDs and a DVD of the film Before Sunset in preparation for our voyage. The Seventh Grader and I listened to CD 1, faithfully repeating the phrases we heard, or rather, what we thought we heard. I’ve studied enough languages (including a semester of French when I was an exchange student in 1993-94 in Belgium) to realize that “compreemee français?” (my own spelling, here) is probably not the correct way to say, “Do you understand French?” 

I was pretty excited about the film homework, though. I remember Before Sunrise, from my own twenty-something years, when Ethan Hawke was going through his dreamy-looking phase. I ate up the love story of the chance meeting of an American boy and a French girl, the way my junior high daughter is eating up the love story of Sal and Ben in her current read, Walk Two Moons. Before Sunset, the sequel to Before Sunrise, with the one-night lovers reconnecting as thirty-somethings, had me thinking more about the streets and shops in Paris. “There aren’t many people on the streets,” I remarked to my husband, noting the people in the background. While the slow burn between Celine and Jesse built, I was wondering if the water taxi would take tap-to-pay.

“Hey,” I said, nudging my cousin while waiting to board our first plane yesterday morning. “This is the first time I’m traveling with someone who isn’t in my immediate family.” I mean, she is family, of course, but what I meant was, since 1997, I’ve only flown with my spouse and/or children. (Note: Our little group also includes a cousin-in-law, rounding out our little entourage.)

What’s been on my mind most during our preparations is the anticipation of experiencing a sense of place. “Sense of place” is a phrase I’ve uttered multiple times, especially since I’ve been on three roadtrips in the last six weeks and have had ample time to think about travel. “I’m curious to experience a sense of place,” I mused ad nauseum to the chagrin of my family and friends, who, at this point, probably only here, “Zhzhzhjzh place, non?” (Insert eye roll.) Despite how snooty and high fallutin’ it sounds, I’m sincere in my speculation that my favorite part of travel is being present wherever I’m at. I’m as excited about just being there as I am about seeing famous landmarks, churches, and art. A day-in-the-life feeling. And a few macarons to go along with the view.