Yesterday was a bit of a blowout. It was so busy, and at times, quite frustrating. Being in a country where the dominant language is one you don’t speak is immensely tiring, and even simple crap, like not realizing you have to explicitly buy each grocery bag can add up to larger frustrations. So, this morning, we took it easy, and slept in.

Went to the Pompidou, where unfortunately, they’ve only got one floor of exhibits open to the public (the second main floor is under reconstruction for the better part of the year, as I understand). Still, the exhibits they had were one that was about motion, and the other was a guy named Hans Bellmer. The first exhibit was “The Movement of Images” – at first, I thought it was pretty much the same video-art schlock I’ve seen before, in a class I took at MIT. The first thing that really was interesting (ie: not a guy walking backwards around a tape square) was a video of car assembly, set to a nice syncopated beat. In a minute, they assemble a car, and all of their actions are tied to the rhythm. Very cool, and reminded me of a VW ad they had a year or three ago with a similar, but more organic-feeling concept. It’d have actually been nice to have seen the two juxtaposed.

There were a few other interesting pieces – some video, some sculpture, some painting. But the one that really entertained was a guy named John Wood, and another artist – they did a series of short videos, one of which was called “Board,” which was so reminiscent of Warioware, it was just uncanny. There’d be some sort of establishing shot, that would hold for a few moments, and often, a human would enter the scene, and instigate some sort of action. Often, they were simply humorous, but some of the time, the thing that would happen would really severely contrast with what you’d *expected* to happen, evoking a sense of surprise, or humor, that was really unique to that particular display. Ei-Nyung and I watched the entire series of pieces, which probably ran 15-20 minutes. Great stuff – funny, challenging, unexpected, and interesting.

The Hans Bellmer exhibit was odd. It was mostly a series of sketches, that looked like they’d be pretty at home in a deranged high-schooler’s notebook. Very sexual, very odd – imagine a sketch of the Arc de Triomph turning into a giant deformed penis, penetrating the weird four-legged mannequins from Silent Hill 2, and you’re pretty much there. Of course, the guy had the normal “traditional” technique, so it was clear he *could* draw pretty much anything he wanted, he just chose to draw brick walls with high heels cut out of them. It was interesting, no doubt, but I’m not sure I really “got” it, if there was anything there to get, other than that this guy really liked eyeballs that looked out of vaginas.

*shrugs*

In between exhibits, we jogged out to get some “greek pitas” – basically gyros squeezed in a panini press, some fries, some pastries, and a giant bottle of water. Ate that in the courtyard of the Pompidou, watching some kids firedance to loud music. There was also a guy with that thing that you do with two sticks, some string, and a top-looking thing – he was really good. The firedancers were merely ok. Some cops came by, and apparently ticketed the guy playing the music & the firedancers – something to do with the DJ’s dog, apparently.

After eating, we walked to the far side of the courtyard, and watched a guy put on a play with three non-French-speaking members of the audience. Standard street art humor stuff, but very well done. Gave the guy a couple e’s – he raked in a huge umbrella full of cashola. Still, well deserved. Funny guy.

After the Pompidou, it looked like we were pretty wiped. But after a few minutes of sitting around, we realized we still had all sorts of stuff to do. Halfway through our time hear (more than that, actually), and we hadn’t gone to the Arc de Triomph, the Eiffel Tower, or the freakin’ Louvre. It was an hour or so before sunset, though, so we figured it’d be pretty easy to knock down the Eiffel Tower, since there isn’t much surrounding it that we’re super-excited about.

So, off we went, via Paris’ woefully convoluted Metro system. Man, given that Paris is smaller than London, I’d have thought that they’d have some sort of coherent, easy-to-navigate layout, but jiminy christmas, the Metro’s a pain in the ass. Anyway, we end up at the Tower, and head up to the second level as the sun sets. Quite an impressive view – lots of pictures, though they’re all undoubtedly the same pictures everyone takes from that place. The blinking lights are actually a lot more impressive from the tower itself, and a lot less ridiculously gaudy than it does from far away. Still, looking through the history of the Eiffel Tower shows a long history of various novel lighting schemes, so hopefully, this one will eventually pass.

We walked down the stairs from the second level to the first, where we read some of the placards and looked at the various displays of the history of the tower, and such. Watched a movie about how they repaint the thing, and marvelled at the ridiculous bravery/fearlessness/idiocy of the painters in action. Once night had thoroughly fallen, we wandered down to the plaza in front of the tower, took a picture, and headed off to find some food, when we realized that, holy crap, it’s 11pm. So, off to the first place that’s lit up. Ei-Nyung got a club sandwich, and I got a Confit du Canard, which was not quite what I was expecting, but absolutely delicious. What I was expecting, in retrospect, was a cassoulet. Oops. I’ll have to have one of those somewhere before I leave.

Again, on to the metro, and back to the apartment, to let the blood drain out of my feet.

Fun! Less stressful, more entertaining, today. Tomorrow morning, the Louvre, in the afternoon, perhaps the Arc. We’ll see.