Arrival in 0h 58m
As I write, a guy's voice announces that we're about to start our descent to ORY, one of the Paris airports.
A couple of weeks ago I wrote that if I got the green card on time I would consider joining Vivi and the kids for the last part of their Europe trip.
I did both.
The combination that best worked for me was to do a round trip from Newark to Paris and spend four nights there. Originally, I was supposed to get there Saturday 2:30pm local time, but my French freres that work at the airports decided to start a strike one day before my plane left so I got an email letting me know that my flight had been delayed for a day.
I didn't like the news especially having in mind how short my Parisian stay already was. I somehow forced myself to reframe my mindset and just go with the flow.
Arrival in 0h 43m
This is not my first time in Paris. It is actually the European city I've visited the most.
Let's see, I was first here for less than a day in 2002 when my Catholic school organized a trip to Rome in high school.
Then, I came back in 2006 as a tutor / guardian (?) for a high school graduation trip. As I read from my notes on the original Mondoli, we stayed for one day.
In 2008, I visited also taking care of high school kids that spent a summer in London and then five days more in Paris. It was the longest I had been there, and by the end I kind of felt that I knew Paris. Here's a picture from that trip walking in Versailles with Walls.
In 2009 I came back to London in the same role, but stayed in Paris just for a couple of days.
In September 2017 my father-in-law decided to take everyone in the family to a Europe cruise vacation during the summer of 2018 after he survived the Mexico City earthquake. We took Gabriel (3) but left Eva (1) with a friend in Monterrey. Great short-term decision, terrible long-term decision that, according to Vivi, messed with Eva's sense of abandonment. Don't judge us.
We flew to Paris, then took a train to Bourdeaux, then to Carcassonne, and met the rest of Vivi's family in Barcelona, from where the cruise took off.
There's a now family famous story about Gabriel in Paris. He was SO into the Cars movie characters, and especially into a really cool set of mini Cars Hot Wheels.
The story is that we were on the open second floor of a Red Bus—a Vivi's favorite—around Paris while Gabriel played with his Hot Wheels. Just as we approached the Eiffel Tower, Gabriel dropped Luigi—the Italian mechanic—to the street.
Gabriel was one month short of turning three and had still yet to talk like a person. He babbled like a Minion due to a hearing problem that was caused by his adenoids.
He did manage to say LUIGIII when his little Hot Wheels fell.
Arrival in 0h 23m
The kids don't know that I'm meeting them in Paris. They know that I got my green card—I talk to them every day—but resigned to the possibility of me actually joining them. I'm trying to think how to surprise them beyond just appearing at the hotel.
We're having dinner at a fancy place tonight, doing a bike tour tomorrow with Victoria, León, Ian, and Olivia, the Mexican family who adopted us when we moved to Mexico City, and walking around Paris the rest of the express visit.
I plan to visit either the Louvre or the Orsay Museum. I've been a couple of times at the former, but never at the latter. I'm beginning to think that art museums will be more and more important in whatever time I have left alive.
I'm also looking forward to having at least three CROIIIIISSAAAAAANTS and a couple of pain aux chocolats. Yes, fuck healthy eating this next couple of days. At least I know that I'll easily get to my calories by walking around.
Arrival in 0h17m
For the past three years I've been so centered in the US that I’ve gradually forgot my love for Europe, and especially for France.
For a couple of years, I taught European history—in reality it was Catholic Church History, which for the most part of its existed only/mostly in that continent—at the high school where I graduated from. I still have my Keynote files filled with presenter notes. I remember reading a couple of books for every hour of class.
Then, I taught a class on Medieval Law at my law school which, again, focused mainly on Europe.
Finally, I did my first master's thesis around
(GOT REPRIMANDED IN FRENCH, HAVE TO PUT LAPTOP AWAY. WILL CONTINUE.)
Landed
As I was saying, I wrote my first master's thesis on how the French Revolution was perceived in London, so I had to read at least a thousand pages on what happened during those years both in France and in the UK.
Later that day
#day187
French doritos must hit different