Letters To Stina

Dear Stina,

Today the sunset made everything beautifully pink, as though I were looking through the world with rose-coloured glasses. Only the literal kind, though, not the metaphorical one, because I’m quite aware that I’m a student on a student budget in a city that’s frayed at the edges.  I would make all the captions to the pictures lyrics from La Vie en Rose, but I’m hardly in love with anybody so I don’t think it would be terribly fitting.

The adventuring continues. So does Orientation Week, but that’s not particularly interesting. I’ve met some thoroughly decent people. There are a couple of Americans, which means that there’s someone to commiserate with about the lack of ovens and the prices at least.

When I was wandering around, I came across a truck blaring the type of music that one would generally headbang to, not the kind one would expect to find on the edge of a dock behind an abandoned airplane hangar.

      
Said hangar; side views

I decided to walk around the hangar first, since I didn’t want to sneak up on anyone from behind and scare him or her. Startled people are rarely friendly, and it’s best to approach things you’re unsure about head-on, anyway. So I walked around the airplane hangar, and when I had done almost the full circle, I came across three people in a boat, drinking beer, cooking sausages on a burner, and rocking out to the truck music as though it were the most normal thing in the world. They nodded at me and said “Bonsoir” before continuing with the sausages. Here’s the funny thing about the French: They’re not terribly friendly upon initial contact, but they are extremely polite. If you do make eye contact they say bonjour or bonsoir depending on the time of day before moving on. Or if you happen to walk across their secret boat gathering.

Flowers make everything supes attracs

Somehow I don’t think this door gets used very often…

…Nor this bathroom, for that matter. 

I think I live on the very edge of the city, though I like it much better than being stacked on top of people. The town is very cramped, with little alleys and curving and twisting around every which way and people scowling at you on the corners. I do not think the French smile for the general public.

Do you remember the passage in I Capture the Castle where Cassandra tries to picture America as Neil sees it, then she opens her eyes and has the feeling that everything in England from the sky to the hedges is pressing in on her? It’s exactly like that. It’s harder to build next to the docks, I guess, so I can walk around and feel like I can breathe. Breathe, and look at things falling apart.  Falling and sliding and crumbling apart.

Look, it’s the Eiffel Tower!

Much Love,
L. de Caps