Saturday morning I woke up early to put together the finishing touches on a fruit salad and outfit selected in preparation for an enterrement de vie de jeune fille (VDJF), or Burial of Life as a Young Girl party. Or, in American terms, a bachelorette party.
In France, where these parties have become all the rage recently, it’s less of a “girls night out” as an “ambush and humiliation of the bride” weekend. I’d seen a few troupes of girls marching around Paris, wearing identical shirts and frog-marching the hapless bride-to-be around town in a costume. Throw in the obvious language barrier, and needless to say, I was wary.
As I was getting ready to go, Dave took off for a football match in Paris with our friend Guillaume and his friends. Guillaume is a lot of fun to be around these days, after a 5 week-long business trip to India has made him appreciate his city, his job, and his friends more than anything in the world.
Anyway, off I went to meet up with my co-conspirators. They turned out to be a really nice group of girls who welcomed me warmly. After everyone was assembled, we were given our assigned t-shirts and went off to kidnap our bride-to-be, Audrey.
Audrey was certainly surprised, and probably more than a bit overwhelmed as we filed past her into the small apartment. The girls dressed her up – although not too obnoxiously – and off we went, future bride in tow.
We had lunch in the Champ de Mars, a large lawn in front of the Eiffel tower, popular for picnics. Each girl unloaded her assigned food and we sat chatting (or, in my case, listening) and eating. Of course, a French picnic is not complete without wine and baguettes, of which we had plenty.
After lunch and some games I didn’t quite understand we packed up and went off to one of the girl’s apartments. Charlotte has a cute apartment with an even cuter garden balcony that’s easily the same size as the apartment. I was so envious of the garden, and I know David and Oliver would have loved it.
On the balcony we went through some other bachelorette rituals, including burning some of Audrey’s less-than-cute underwear. Then Charlotte brought out a big bag of art supplies and a large canvas and we all went to town, making Audrey a masterpiece of girliness that I’m sure Benoit (groom-to-be) will be thrilled to hang on their walls.
By then it was early evening and we were instructed to change into our uniforms. I saw that from all of the mails I had received from the girls over the past week I had interpreted the instructions correctly: dark skirt, white shirt, and tie. I didn’t get the point of the whole private school girl get-up, but once assembled we made a pretty amusing sight.
We marched from Charlotte’s apartment to the metro, where a whole train car was treated to a group of pole dancing private schoolgirls. We ended up at a wine shop, where we enjoyed a sampling of wines and camembert cheese. The shop owner obviously enjoyed his late-night clientele, and after we were all full of cheese and silly with wine, we left for out next destination, the nightclub.
So there we were, ten full-grown private schoolgirls, wandering down a street and peering at addresses, looking for the club. We stopped at a dark, non-descript door and talked it over. It certainly didn’t look like a club. Then we noticed three full-grown private school girls smoking nearby. One of them thrust a thumb at the door and said “Yes, this is it”.
As the girls started to file though the door, I stared at the others with confusion. Why were those girls dressed just like us? And then I stepped inside.
Grown-up private schoolgirl heaven.
Apparently I missed this in one of the many French e-mails I had received during the week, but one of the girl’s former high school was having a private party in the club. Alumni were allowed to bring guests, so she signed all of us up.
And no, it wasn’t a private school; that was just the dress code. Every single person was dressed the same as we were. Although the boys weren’t wearing skirts, obviously. Suddenly it all made sense.
So we danced and drank and laughed and took photos and had a lot of fun all night. Finally I was exhausted and made an exit with Jeanne, who helped me flag a cab to take me home.
I walked in the door around 3 a.m. to find David asleep on the couch, the lights and tv still on. The first thing he said after waking up was, “I hurt my wrist playing soccer”.
And thus began our first French hospital adventure.
David was sure it was just a sprain, and the next morning walked out to the market with me to find an open pharmacy. That took a bit of hunting, but finally he bought himself a self-adhesive bandage and carefully wrapped his right wrist.
The morning passed, and after late afternoon naps we sat talking about the injury. His wrist had swollen and it hurt to do just about anything. Eventually he surmised that if it was broken, we’d have difficulty going to the hospital during the work week. So we might as well go today just in case.
So we walked to the other side of the Levallois and wandered into the emergency ward of one of the hospitals (there are two hospitals within a 2 block radius…does that make any sense?). We settled into the waiting room, preparing ourselves for a good hour-long wait, but fifteen minutes later he was retrieved. Ten minutes after that he was wandering back to the reception, clutching an order from the doctor, looking for an X-ray technician. Twenty minutes later, they were re-wrapping his wrist – which was thankfully, not broken – and we were standing back at the reception, asking for our bill. They shooed us out and said they’d send something in the mail.
The whole episode cost us about an hour and a half (including walking time) and 56 euros when the bill finally came. Which, of course, will be fully reimbursed as soon as I file the expense report. Sweet.
By the way, my colleagues later informed me that a 15 minute wait time is very unusual, and that usually it’s closer to an hour or more. So I guess we just got lucky.
Anyway, after we got gotten safely back in the apartment, I had to turn around and run back to the metro. I met Wally at Gare de Lyon, apologizing profusely for my tardiness and figuring that a near-broken wrist was a pretty good excuse.
Wally and I walked along the Seine while I told the story in my bad French, and finally stopped at a red boat docked along the bank. Wally, being the superstar rock journalist that he is, had managed to get us tickets for The Weakerthans concert onboard.
The Weakerthans are a fun band from Winnipeg, Canada, and one of my brother’s favorites. Wally and I had been to a Weakerthans concert in Detroit four years earlier, in a fair-sized venue that easily held over 1,000 people. However here in France, The Weakerthans play a boat for about 150. And, as it turned out, almost everyone there was Canadian.
It was a great concert, lots of fun, and they played all of my favorite songs. Wally took some photos and posted one on his blog here.
After the show I jumped back on the metro for home, and was into bed by 12:30. It wasn’t so late, but after the exciting weekend I was exhausted on Monday morning. I might be getting too old for these packed Parisian weekends.
In France, where these parties have become all the rage recently, it’s less of a “girls night out” as an “ambush and humiliation of the bride” weekend. I’d seen a few troupes of girls marching around Paris, wearing identical shirts and frog-marching the hapless bride-to-be around town in a costume. Throw in the obvious language barrier, and needless to say, I was wary.
As I was getting ready to go, Dave took off for a football match in Paris with our friend Guillaume and his friends. Guillaume is a lot of fun to be around these days, after a 5 week-long business trip to India has made him appreciate his city, his job, and his friends more than anything in the world.
Anyway, off I went to meet up with my co-conspirators. They turned out to be a really nice group of girls who welcomed me warmly. After everyone was assembled, we were given our assigned t-shirts and went off to kidnap our bride-to-be, Audrey.
Audrey was certainly surprised, and probably more than a bit overwhelmed as we filed past her into the small apartment. The girls dressed her up – although not too obnoxiously – and off we went, future bride in tow.
We had lunch in the Champ de Mars, a large lawn in front of the Eiffel tower, popular for picnics. Each girl unloaded her assigned food and we sat chatting (or, in my case, listening) and eating. Of course, a French picnic is not complete without wine and baguettes, of which we had plenty.
After lunch and some games I didn’t quite understand we packed up and went off to one of the girl’s apartments. Charlotte has a cute apartment with an even cuter garden balcony that’s easily the same size as the apartment. I was so envious of the garden, and I know David and Oliver would have loved it.
On the balcony we went through some other bachelorette rituals, including burning some of Audrey’s less-than-cute underwear. Then Charlotte brought out a big bag of art supplies and a large canvas and we all went to town, making Audrey a masterpiece of girliness that I’m sure Benoit (groom-to-be) will be thrilled to hang on their walls.
By then it was early evening and we were instructed to change into our uniforms. I saw that from all of the mails I had received from the girls over the past week I had interpreted the instructions correctly: dark skirt, white shirt, and tie. I didn’t get the point of the whole private school girl get-up, but once assembled we made a pretty amusing sight.
We marched from Charlotte’s apartment to the metro, where a whole train car was treated to a group of pole dancing private schoolgirls. We ended up at a wine shop, where we enjoyed a sampling of wines and camembert cheese. The shop owner obviously enjoyed his late-night clientele, and after we were all full of cheese and silly with wine, we left for out next destination, the nightclub.
So there we were, ten full-grown private schoolgirls, wandering down a street and peering at addresses, looking for the club. We stopped at a dark, non-descript door and talked it over. It certainly didn’t look like a club. Then we noticed three full-grown private school girls smoking nearby. One of them thrust a thumb at the door and said “Yes, this is it”.
As the girls started to file though the door, I stared at the others with confusion. Why were those girls dressed just like us? And then I stepped inside.
Grown-up private schoolgirl heaven.
Apparently I missed this in one of the many French e-mails I had received during the week, but one of the girl’s former high school was having a private party in the club. Alumni were allowed to bring guests, so she signed all of us up.
And no, it wasn’t a private school; that was just the dress code. Every single person was dressed the same as we were. Although the boys weren’t wearing skirts, obviously. Suddenly it all made sense.
So we danced and drank and laughed and took photos and had a lot of fun all night. Finally I was exhausted and made an exit with Jeanne, who helped me flag a cab to take me home.
I walked in the door around 3 a.m. to find David asleep on the couch, the lights and tv still on. The first thing he said after waking up was, “I hurt my wrist playing soccer”.
And thus began our first French hospital adventure.
David was sure it was just a sprain, and the next morning walked out to the market with me to find an open pharmacy. That took a bit of hunting, but finally he bought himself a self-adhesive bandage and carefully wrapped his right wrist.
The morning passed, and after late afternoon naps we sat talking about the injury. His wrist had swollen and it hurt to do just about anything. Eventually he surmised that if it was broken, we’d have difficulty going to the hospital during the work week. So we might as well go today just in case.
So we walked to the other side of the Levallois and wandered into the emergency ward of one of the hospitals (there are two hospitals within a 2 block radius…does that make any sense?). We settled into the waiting room, preparing ourselves for a good hour-long wait, but fifteen minutes later he was retrieved. Ten minutes after that he was wandering back to the reception, clutching an order from the doctor, looking for an X-ray technician. Twenty minutes later, they were re-wrapping his wrist – which was thankfully, not broken – and we were standing back at the reception, asking for our bill. They shooed us out and said they’d send something in the mail.
The whole episode cost us about an hour and a half (including walking time) and 56 euros when the bill finally came. Which, of course, will be fully reimbursed as soon as I file the expense report. Sweet.
By the way, my colleagues later informed me that a 15 minute wait time is very unusual, and that usually it’s closer to an hour or more. So I guess we just got lucky.
Anyway, after we got gotten safely back in the apartment, I had to turn around and run back to the metro. I met Wally at Gare de Lyon, apologizing profusely for my tardiness and figuring that a near-broken wrist was a pretty good excuse.
Wally and I walked along the Seine while I told the story in my bad French, and finally stopped at a red boat docked along the bank. Wally, being the superstar rock journalist that he is, had managed to get us tickets for The Weakerthans concert onboard.The Weakerthans are a fun band from Winnipeg, Canada, and one of my brother’s favorites. Wally and I had been to a Weakerthans concert in Detroit four years earlier, in a fair-sized venue that easily held over 1,000 people. However here in France, The Weakerthans play a boat for about 150. And, as it turned out, almost everyone there was Canadian.
It was a great concert, lots of fun, and they played all of my favorite songs. Wally took some photos and posted one on his blog here.
After the show I jumped back on the metro for home, and was into bed by 12:30. It wasn’t so late, but after the exciting weekend I was exhausted on Monday morning. I might be getting too old for these packed Parisian weekends.
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