Dear Kitty,
I went to the gym today. Julia told me about one that does late-night sessions during the week and, considering that everywhere else in Paris is extortionate, I decided to give it a go. It's actually quite nice - the people are friendly and don't mind if you make mistakes when you're speaking to them. There's a gym, a 'salle de musculation' (weights room), pool and sauna. The gym plays really old pop music (well, 2005-ish), and they play very loud classical music at the pool, which is great. The sauna's downstairs, and I came over all English when I went in and saw all the naked French women - so I dithered around and looked awkward before slipping into the sauna and hoping that nobody would look at me. They didn't.
The guy who does all the cabins is really cute, and speaks fluent English - which I found out after I realised I couldn't say 'how does this work?' in French (oh, now I can. Typique). He and I had a nice chat a bit later - he asked what I was doing in Paris, and we talked about learning languages, and then he looked a bit nervous and said 'alors, uh, t'as quel age?'. I LOVE being able to say that I'm 18 - people take you seriously! We would have kept on talking, but a Rude Parisian came along and said 'cabine soixante-douze' and the guy had to follow him, so we smiled and looked a bit awkward and then went our separate ways.
Just after I'd got dressed again, I came out of my cabin and was putting my shoes on when a guy came over and started to put his shoes on. I smiled at him, and he smiled back (evidence that he was foreign no. 1), and then he sat down and said 'ah, c'est bon qu'ils jouent de la musique classique!'. I sat down as well and said, 'ah, oui - en Angleterre il y a que la musique pop, et c'est bon d'avoir la musique classique quand on fait du sport - c'est moins stressant!' He immediately noticed my accent and said 'Allemand?' (evidence no. 2), and I said 'non, suis Anglaise'. He grinned at this, and said 'no way! I'm American!'. Turns out he was a classical pianist called David and that Pontoise is his favourite pool. He walked me to my metro, which was very kind of him, and we talked about classical music and England for a while. We did the French double-kiss thing when we said goodbye, and he said that he hoped to see me at the pool again.
Tonight was the first time anyone's ever actually said to me 'do you come here often?'.
Yours,
Chessie (18)
I went to the gym today. Julia told me about one that does late-night sessions during the week and, considering that everywhere else in Paris is extortionate, I decided to give it a go. It's actually quite nice - the people are friendly and don't mind if you make mistakes when you're speaking to them. There's a gym, a 'salle de musculation' (weights room), pool and sauna. The gym plays really old pop music (well, 2005-ish), and they play very loud classical music at the pool, which is great. The sauna's downstairs, and I came over all English when I went in and saw all the naked French women - so I dithered around and looked awkward before slipping into the sauna and hoping that nobody would look at me. They didn't.
The guy who does all the cabins is really cute, and speaks fluent English - which I found out after I realised I couldn't say 'how does this work?' in French (oh, now I can. Typique). He and I had a nice chat a bit later - he asked what I was doing in Paris, and we talked about learning languages, and then he looked a bit nervous and said 'alors, uh, t'as quel age?'. I LOVE being able to say that I'm 18 - people take you seriously! We would have kept on talking, but a Rude Parisian came along and said 'cabine soixante-douze' and the guy had to follow him, so we smiled and looked a bit awkward and then went our separate ways.
Just after I'd got dressed again, I came out of my cabin and was putting my shoes on when a guy came over and started to put his shoes on. I smiled at him, and he smiled back (evidence that he was foreign no. 1), and then he sat down and said 'ah, c'est bon qu'ils jouent de la musique classique!'. I sat down as well and said, 'ah, oui - en Angleterre il y a que la musique pop, et c'est bon d'avoir la musique classique quand on fait du sport - c'est moins stressant!' He immediately noticed my accent and said 'Allemand?' (evidence no. 2), and I said 'non, suis Anglaise'. He grinned at this, and said 'no way! I'm American!'. Turns out he was a classical pianist called David and that Pontoise is his favourite pool. He walked me to my metro, which was very kind of him, and we talked about classical music and England for a while. We did the French double-kiss thing when we said goodbye, and he said that he hoped to see me at the pool again.
Tonight was the first time anyone's ever actually said to me 'do you come here often?'.
Yours,
Chessie (18)
Replies