Hemingway Walk

After robotically walking back to our room yesterday after class, plopping into bed and going through a continuous cycle of passing out then lying awake in delirious fever-inertia, then soon to pass out again until 9:45 a.m. this morning, I felt normal again! That is about 16 hours of sleep. I convinced myself throughout the night that it would be only a 24 hr bug and could not spare to miss the next day's (today's) scheduled activity: the Hemingway Walk, which I have been anticipating since I first saw it marked on the syllabus.

Two things before I get to the actual walk:

1. Around 4 in the morning I woke up with a splitting headache and figured it had to do with whatever I was sick with and went back to sleep. When I finally woke up for the day, I still had it and remembered that I had not had any caffeine the day prior and thought, "Oh, this would be so silly if this is a 'caffeine headache,' but a sure quick-fix." Alas, it was. Went to grab some take-away coffee at Les Artistes on the corner before we had to leave and it solved the trick of a 6 hour headache. Voila.

2. Since I had not eaten in 36 hours, I realized when we were waiting at our destination at the Cardinal Lemoine metro station that I was, indeed, hungry. Looking around, I saw a patisserie across the ways and made a beeline for it, coming out with an eclair. Coming back to my senses post-eclair annihilation, I realized how ridiculous coffee and eclairs are to me.

But it doesn't matter because it was one of the best eclairs I have had here (trust me, I've consumed like one per day here, on average).

^ Dangerous.

Hemingway's first Parisian apartment (topmost floor, shuddered windows)! In the Sun Also Rises, he refers to this first apartment and dance hall which is now a librairie on the bottom floor.

Book from the librairie beneath Hemingway's first apartment (Women Who Read Are Dangerous, heheh).

We saw another, later residency of Hemingway's close by the same area. Back when he and the other expatriates resided in Paris, it was generally quite cheap to have a comfortable living. The parts where Hemingway resided were considered to be less expensive outside the city walls. Now, however, it is a more exclusive area, though still occupied by students as it is located in the Latin Quarter.

And for all those who do not appreciate or more so do not understand Hemingway, must recognize that he was quite innovative for his time, for writers amongst and before him only wrote in the flowery, Victorian style. His own is simple, straightforward and true.

So, purely, "write the truest sentence you know." (A Moveable Feast)

Also, Honore de Balzac died from caffeine? He would have 25-30 espressos / day on average.

Tonight was bittersweet as it was our last picnic all together. As expected, Dalton and Susser brought along French food delicacies which consisted of pig snout, pig face, rabbit, more foie gras (force-fed goose), select cheeses and calf heart as a prized possession. As a vegetarian it really doesn't bother me to see the "weird" food in front of me or to see others around me eat it (ok, except for the calf heart). All I really wanted to do was eat fruit, smoke cigarettes and drink bottles of water. I can't believe the day has come, but I am sick of bread products.

Also, maybe we're completely ignorant over here of anything domestic-related, but did you know that lettuce can leak purple?