It’s true. Whether I’ve had an amazing weekend, a boring one or slept through it all, I generally spend Sunday regretting the various things that I did not do over the weekend and wishing Monday would never arrive.
That’s pretty much how I felt yesterday. Luckily, the weekend was more toward the side of really amazing, and I was only regretting that I had not done enough homework – a meager and weightless complaint in the City of Light.
So most of the weekend was comprised of unabashed vegging out in front of a movie screen thanks to the European Film Festival at the MK2 Bibliothèque Cinéma just à côté de [next to] the Bibliothèque Nationale. The festival consisted of a bunch of low-budget/independent fictional films and documentaries from throughout Europe. The added bonus was that the whole thing was free for students! I even got a neat-o tote bag with promotional material for posterity.
Over the weekend I saw five films from France, Estonia, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and France again. The majority were depressing including topics of: AIDS, high school violence, diminishing civil liberties and how wacked out and scary Russia is. The one mildly happy film was a documentary about a Dutch guy who explores the world of Flickr – this one reminded me of a This American Life episode set to slides of stunning photography.
They were all pretty good and for free 99, I wouldn’t complain anyway.
We also made friends with a random, artsy-looking Chinese guy at the films. When our last film of the night was cancelled on Saturday, we ended up hanging out with him on the Pont des Arts over the Seine. It was an interesting night.
Sunday I was movied out and actually tried to get some homework done. Although I didn’t really succeed, I did finish reading The Tempest which was a personal goal and will certainly help me in my exposé [presentation] on Aimé Césaire’s propre [own] adaptation of the play for my France-Afrique class (which has soudainement [suddenly] been cancelled until Thanksgiving because the professor had to head back home – to Congo? – for family reasons).
Before the sun had fully set Sunday night, I did venture outside at the encouragement of Rebecca to balader [stroll] the Boulevard Haussman where the grands magasins [big department stores] have set up beautiful and intricate displays in their vitrines [storefront windows] for Christmas. The children were numerous, but so were the lights and joyful sights. It was all very beautiful and put me perfectly in the holiday spirit…even if I was regretting my lack of studiousness as I enjoyed.
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