Day Nine - "You Were Not Totally Bad Today"

Went to a great dress-up store today at Hotel de Ville! Bought myself a fake moustache and some really good glue. The shop had heaps of stuff and was very colourful. The kind of place an adult can spend all day in feeling like a kid again.

I especially loved the awesome balloon ceiling.

Because I've finally got my costume sorted (touch wood) I had some time this morning to do some sight-seeing so I went to Notre Dame!

Notre Dame.

It was stunning from the outside - very tall and powerful. Very Gothic. The inside was absolutely breath-taking. Or maybe it was breath-giving. Everytime I walk into these big beautiful churches I can't help but stand taller and breathe fuller. Again there were heaps of tourists around (me included) but unlike the Sacre Couer, at Notre Dame photography was allowed. Note the interior shot below.

This is from the back of the church. The golden light at the bottom centre of the photo is Jesus on his cross.

After a bit of wandering I was inspired to put on my ipod and stand in the centre of the church. I put on 'Beautiful Saviour' by Vocal Spectrum (a great Barbershop quartet: www.vocalspectrum.com) and just stood and took in the building. I'm not a religious person but these buildings make converting seem rather appealing!

The Gargoyles.

Disney's Gargoyles.

The Bird Man of Paris. Intense.

You shall not pass!

In class today we played Musical Chairs as our characters with our selected partners (yesterday we were all put into 'families'). My character was partnered with Mark's fascist-Hitler-Army-guy character. We are a gay couple. When a family missed out on finding a chair they had to immediately jump into an improvised scene with the theme of jealousy. Most fell flat. Mine fell flat quickly - mostly because there was a mistake and two families were left chairless. So I improvised and tried to incorporate all four of us into the scene but was really holding it all by myself whilst the others just looked confused. A few worked and the family dynamics naturally formed through their playing which was joyful to watch.

We then moved on to scenes with our partners. That was pretty much the only criteria to the improvisation. And somebody else was assigned as the 'saver' of the scene. Their job was to come on when needed and provide something (a message, a new rhythm, a box of tennis balls in Richard's case) that allows the actors onstage to get away from the block they have found themselves in. I got a bit nervous for some reason and sat and watched for most of the class. But as the last fifteen minutes approached I reminded myself of my personal policy to always get up and try no matter what (since time is short and a lot of money has been spent!) and Mark and I had a go. Lib, who was dressed as a fat old hooker (or something that looks like that description), was the 'saver'. 

I entered on stage tall with my sternum open, and I was giggling to myself in a low voice. I used a low voice to speak with throughout this scene and it seemed to work. Mark entered and we started talking about what I was 'crying' about. I said that my mother had died. Then Mark said that she had died last week. So I said, "oh yes, actually it was your mother that died". This was kind of okay. But somewhere along the line I called his dead mother a "fucking bitch" and combined with my chuckling this gained a positive reaction from the audience. So I kept on with this swearing chuckling character which continued to gain reaction. It went a bit stale after a while until Lib came to the rescue. She played an angry neighbour who yelled at Mark and I then left. I called her a "fucking bitch" too and then the scene eventually turned into Lib yelling at Mark and I and kicking us off the stage. Philippe instructed Lib to kick us off the stage - which I thought meant that we were bad - but I think it was actually because it was fun seeing Lib do this to these two idiot characters. I was off stage for a bit after being kicked off, and then the stage became clear, and I thought we were done, that we were about to get gonged any second now, but no. The scene carried on! We had fun together, I definitely felt pleasure once we got into it, and there was a fair amount of complicite going on too. At the end we got an applause (which doesn't happen very often and means we did okay) so I was pretty happy. I feel atleast that I have had a taste of what it feels like to discover a scene with others onstage, and then play together whilst listening to the audience. Philippe's feedback to me is that I could find more than just a chuckle - he needs more variety - but that I was "not totally bad today". Which is a good enough complement for me! It's amazing how after being killed so often can make a slight success feel really good.

After class Oli and I caught the train to Denfert-Rochert where we met Kate who just arrived in Paris. We dropped off her stuff at Oli's house (where I had a fairly good/semi-okay conversation in french with his landlady. We then went to Saint-Michel for dinner. We found a restaurant that had three course meals for 12 euros so went there. The food was average but the company was great.

AND I had Escargot as my entree. Six snails. 

The initial look.

About to eat my first snail.

After half chewing two snails and then spitting them out, I finally made friends with one of them. 

I couldn't get the idea out of my head that I was eating slugs coated in garlic sauce, which made life difficult, but after squidging about and telling myself this is what it takes to be a real Parisien, I ate the last four. Yum...?

Me and Kate.