Ambulante
After a long lunch of crêpes and catching up at our usual Bastille haunt, I left Katia to her work, and decided to wander down Rue Saint Antoine. My stomach was full, there was a book I was considering buying, but mostly I was in search of something imprévu.
I stopped at the press kiosk that sits like a dwarf next to the Opéra Bastille and looked for a magazine to read on a bench in this glorious sun, perhaps along the Bassin de l'Arsenal. After a couple of minutes of scanning, the agent inquired if I was looking for something in particular. "I'm curious to see the subject of this month's Magazine Littéraire," I replied just as my eyes made contact with said edition's cover, a caricature of Voltaire leaping off the page. He handed me both the gift and normal versions, and as I contemplated which would make me happier, he remarked, "C'est les Américains qui débarquent!" smiling at me, apparently expecting a conspiratorial reply. I turned around, expecting to find a troupe of gregarious amerloques, athletic socks pulled up to the knees, baseball caps on tight, popping gum bubbles over an outstretched map of Paris. Looking at the agent quizzically I said, "Well, I'm American, and I don't see - or hear - any of my kin around, so..."
He pointed at the air, eyebrows raised, a delighted grin digging deep trenches in his face. Ah. Sirens. Loud, whining, neurotic sirens imploring blasé Parisians to part the sea of traffic they were frustratedly lodged in.
"But no!" I laughed at him, "Our sirens don't sound like that! American sirens sound like this," and, widening my eyes in cartoon shock, with exaggerated enunciation, belted out, "Reeeeeeeeeee-errrrrrrr reeeeeeeeeeee-eeeeeeeerrrrr" my head punctuating the syllables with some sort of chicken walk bop.
Not flinching, as I later realized with great admiration, he smiled and nodded his head in deference, shrugging acquiescence to my obvious expertise, which I confirmed by explaining that as a former resident of K-Town, Los Angeles, he was indeed in the presence of an expert on the subject.
Poor guy. Eventually I left him alone and wandered down to La Maison Rouge, wondering if working at home has anything to do with my newfound propensity to instruct random vendors on the international variations of ambulance sirens.
I stopped at the press kiosk that sits like a dwarf next to the Opéra Bastille and looked for a magazine to read on a bench in this glorious sun, perhaps along the Bassin de l'Arsenal. After a couple of minutes of scanning, the agent inquired if I was looking for something in particular. "I'm curious to see the subject of this month's Magazine Littéraire," I replied just as my eyes made contact with said edition's cover, a caricature of Voltaire leaping off the page. He handed me both the gift and normal versions, and as I contemplated which would make me happier, he remarked, "C'est les Américains qui débarquent!" smiling at me, apparently expecting a conspiratorial reply. I turned around, expecting to find a troupe of gregarious amerloques, athletic socks pulled up to the knees, baseball caps on tight, popping gum bubbles over an outstretched map of Paris. Looking at the agent quizzically I said, "Well, I'm American, and I don't see - or hear - any of my kin around, so..."
He pointed at the air, eyebrows raised, a delighted grin digging deep trenches in his face. Ah. Sirens. Loud, whining, neurotic sirens imploring blasé Parisians to part the sea of traffic they were frustratedly lodged in.
"But no!" I laughed at him, "Our sirens don't sound like that! American sirens sound like this," and, widening my eyes in cartoon shock, with exaggerated enunciation, belted out, "Reeeeeeeeeee-errrrrrrr reeeeeeeeeeee-eeeeeeeerrrrr" my head punctuating the syllables with some sort of chicken walk bop.
Not flinching, as I later realized with great admiration, he smiled and nodded his head in deference, shrugging acquiescence to my obvious expertise, which I confirmed by explaining that as a former resident of K-Town, Los Angeles, he was indeed in the presence of an expert on the subject.
Poor guy. Eventually I left him alone and wandered down to La Maison Rouge, wondering if working at home has anything to do with my newfound propensity to instruct random vendors on the international variations of ambulance sirens.
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