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| LAST ENTRYI'm back at home now, I was really happy to see my dogs. Gizmo lost some weight. I saw two large pizzas on the dining room table and thought man that's a lot of food but then when I went into my room it turned out Michelle, Bryan, Sling, Eugene, Albino, and Edwin were there and wanted to surprise me. My brother set it up. That was nice.
I miss Paris, I know that's expected, but I do. The day I left Eddy, Victoria, and Bo woke up early to say goodbye.
If things had went completely according to plan, instead of this entry, I would've posted a small rendition of "I Don't Want to Live on the Moon" by Ernie on Sesame Street. I would've gone to Cannes to see famous people, Cinque Terra where it's peaceful, and the beaches south of France to meet up with Jonathan to retrieve my kapo and learn to surf. Things dont always go according to plan for me but I'd like to think that it happens that way for a reason. I went to France mostly with the intention to think and change. I wanted to grow up. But instead, I feel like this whole being in Paris thing was more like a stripping process, in fact, it still is. I've taken away more from myself than I've added on and strangely, I've never felt more... like myself, if that makes any sense.
Anyways, enough cheese, pictures that I should've posted a long time ago:
My room when I first came. It looked completely different after I left and a billion times messier.
My desk of productiveness.
Victoria wearing my glasses. Fanny, Karine, and I had a long deep talk two days before I left. Mostly about kids who we thought were going to have the most problems when they reach adolescence. Victoria was ranked number two because she exhibits early signs of being hysterically bipolar. Sweet girl though.
Eddy wearing my glasses. We celebrated his birthday the day before I left and I gave him a can of picked lettuce for a present as a joke. The look he had was classic.
Fanny and Karine in the metro on our way to Montmartre.
It was beautiful. I wish there weren't as many people there though.
Lou Lou, the Madame's grandaughter.
She's the only baby I know that loves to eat. She cries when she doesn't get to hold the spoon and also when she sees that her bowl is empty.
Before I left the Madame's house, I made 7 cutouts of myself and hid them all around the house. I'm not sure how she'll react when she finds them...she'll probably think I'm either the strangest or creepiest tenant she ever had.
On my plane ride home, I had one stopover at Chicago. I meet a black guy named Joe (nicknamed "Internationale") who saw me doodling and asked me to design a tatoo that will go across his back. I did a sketch for him and he liked it and kept telling me "Yeah man, you see that there? That's hot." Crazy, my doodle is going to be on this guy's back, for life.
Thanks to everyone who kept in contact with me while I was abroad or even left me comments. I know I wasn't consistent in replies so I apologize. But it did mean a lot to me.
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| LOB STE RCL AWToday is Mother's day. Fanny and Karen and I went to the flea market to look for things to give Diane. I had to do a lot of souvenir shopping. I ended buying a lighter for my dad and it's shaped like a lobster's claw. I'm not sure if he will like it, but he'll know it's from me. For Diane, I got orchids, to replace the ones Eddy knocked down.
Yesterday Fanny and I went to the movies at a fancy theater. The French people know how to watch movies. The place was like an airport on speed and the theater chairs were like sofas. We watched Zodiac. It was a good movie but completely wrong for the occasion. Once, I invited friends over my house once to watch Capote thinking it was going to be a blast and that's how it felt like.
(mom don't tell dad what I got him) | | |
| I DON'T WANT TO GROW UPI am a tad concerned about what kids watch here. I was trying to look for a good dvd to watch and Eddy kept insisting that I watch one of his movies. So I said fine, let's watch one of yours and he brings me one of those epidsodic kid shows on DVD. It wasn't anything like "The Wiggles" (that alone raises enough questions), it was called "Samantha!" and it features the quirky adventures of two grown men dressed in drag.
Before "Samantha!" he was trying to find "Night at the Museum." We looked everywhere for a half hour and Eddy told me to bring him a sharpie. I did but I was confused. He got the marker and he wrote "Night of the Museum" on a blank DVD and put it into the DVD player. I was laughing but Eddy was frustrated because it was taking a long time for the movie to play. I wish I was a kid again.
Just to clear some of the ambiguity caused by my brother Bobby about the date I'm coming back, it's June 6, a WEDNESDAY. Six days left in Paris... | | |
| EXPECT MORE ENTRIES LIKE THIS BECAUSE I'M DRYER THAN A PRUNESomeone gave Diane a gift yesterday, "Cyrano de Bergerac" on dvd, directed by Jean-Paul Rappeneau.
On a random note, because I have nothing to talk about, this reminded me of the first movie I made in English class during my sophomore year with Ms. Brown. Brandon, Camille, and Gary were in my group. It was a documentary on Edmond Rostand, the author of the play. It's nostalgic thinking about it right now because of how primitive we did things. We shot most of it at Camille's aunt's mansion of a house in Whittier (I remember their home being close to a particular child star in Nickelodeon's "The Brothers Garcia") and Cam played the Host and did back ground music. Background music meaning she was in the background with a keyboard playing music because we were unfamiliar with any editing programs at the time. Brandon played a professor...of what I don't recall, but I remember I couldn't hold the camera steady because I was laughing too hard. Gary played Rostand, only he played him as a gay man, and that made Ms. Brown uncomfortable when she watched it.
When we were doing the credits, we printed out the names on xerox paper and taped it to the wall and had the camera scroll down. We had to do that a couple of times, it had to be perfect.
Camille did the editing. Not on the computer but on the VCR. There was a particular segment I didn't really like so I tried changing it myself but I screwed the whole thing up and Cam had to do it all over again. We got an A. | | |
| Thursday I was sad because I moved out of the Madame's home. My second grandma, we had dinner together before we left. I gave her a watercolor portrait I did of her and Lou Lou (short for Louise) and she liked it. I had to make two trips moving into my aunt's home, who lives about an hour away in Chinatown. It was more depressing the second time because when I came back for my Fender she had all the furniture rearranged in my room and it looked completely different.
But you move on.
So I've been living at Diane's now for about two days. I hang out with Eddy most of the time because he's usually the only one at home besides Diane. He's 10, and we get along even though I don't have any idea what he's saying half of the time. We practiced his headbutting yesterday in the living room, for soccer, and he kept on yelling at me to throw the ball at his head harder so I chucked it hard against his face and it bounced off hitting one of Diane's orchids. We cleaned up the mess quietly. Diane noticed the orchids a couple hours later but she just gave an "Oh" look, like it was completely natural that her flowers, earlier in full blossom, are now headless green stems. I thought it was very funny in a "Diane" sort of way. She spends all day in the kitchen inside a house cluttered with kids and plastic stackable furniture and the only thing that represented something outside living necessities were those orchids and Eddy chopped them off clean with his soccer ball. Whatever, it was his fault.
Souvenirs are always hard for me. I usually try to avoid touristy things because it's no fun that way. I was at a flea market the other day and I realized that I kept shopping for people I already bought things for. Not that I favor them more than others, of course. Some people are just easier to characterize in objects.
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