Written at 1150 pm, Feb 26, 2003 (Paris time)

Its almost midnight and I’m still very much awake. Its not because I cant sleep. That isn’t me after all. I love sleep. The minute I lie down I can doze off almost immediately…well most of the time, that is.

But tonight I choose to not sleep yet. I’m trying a little experiment. See, since I got here, I’ve never had a good night’s sleep. I always wake up some time in the middle of the night. Okay, I wake up at an ungodly hour. Think 3 am, 4 am, 5 am. And that just isn’t the kind of restful sleep that I need or want.

Someone once told me that not being able to sleep well (either getting too much or getting too little) means that something’s wrong. Something’s up.

Honestly I don’t know what could be bothering me. I don’t know of anything new that bothers me. I just have the usual things that I think of, the usual questions that I have. Nothing new. Nothing to have wrong sleep patterns over.

So I just sit here at my little desk in my little rented studio (which I’m not paying for by the way) and type away at my borrowed laptop. I have a football game on TV, but I’m not really watching. I have a book right beside me, but I’m not really reading.

I’m typing but not really writing.
I’m bothered but not really.
I am….or am I really?

Lets talk about food in Paris.

I noticed that the French aren’t particularly fond of heavy food. The daily Parisian fare wont let you walk away from a restaurant with one hand supporting your back and the other rubbing your oh-so-stuffed stomach. Here’s what they eat.

1. Baguette. A French staple. In Manila, we call it (what else?) French bread. Unlike our local bread though, baguettes aren’t necessarily that long.
Think Subway’s one foot sandwich. That’s typical baguette size. What remains the same is the fact that they’re pretty hard to eat. Expect crumbs,
expect plenty of jaw exercise….

2. Salads. Green, leafy and filled really juicy tomatoes. Yum. Nuff said.

3. Cheese. I thought Netherlands was THE cheese capital of the world (and maybe it is?) but I see more cheese here. (Or maybe its because I spent just a day in
Amsterdam.) I've tried fondue already!! Oh no, that was Raclette...the difference is, instead of having melted cheese in a pot, they give you the cheese and this small
"stove" with a flat bottom "pan" where you melt your cheese. Once melted, you tip the pan and all that creamy cheese unto your plate of cold cuts, baked potato, etc...

4. Wine. Red, white and rose. Rose is that interesting concoction which is a mix of both. The best of both worlds…needless to say, I still haven’t increased my alcohol
tolerance, but that doesn’t stop me from having my wine glass at dinner.

5. Tarts, Flan and oodles of strawberry dessert. Their flans taste like egg pie so I haven’t really had too much of that. The tarts? I have yet to try them…
but the strawberry dessert…oooohhh…my first office day lunch included that yummy, juicy, lovely glass of that sumptuous red fruit topped with whipped cream
and with strawberry icing (I don’t know what its called) at the bottom. So you think you’ll lose weight with just sandwiches and salads? The desserts will
make sure you have enough fat and sugar to make you gain more than a pound.

6. Café. And I don’t mean Frapuccino’s or Javanillas. I mean strong, eye-opening Espresso shots. In little cups, no less. Yes, they have Café Au Lait
(which has milk) but damn! Those espresso shots aren’t as bitter as you think they would be…you wouldn’t mind having double or triple shots.

Today while going around Paris, I bought a Poetry book, “Staying Alive – Real Poems for Unreal Times”. It was really not my intention to buy a book, I was just there in the store to accompany my friends who were looking for something English to read. What tourist after all would think of buying a book while in Paris? This is Paris! This is Europe! This is not the place where you spend the night reading a book. But I made the mistake of looking for the poetry section, made the mistake of going through the titles, made the mistake of leafing through the pages….Hence, I stayed behind in the bookstore and half an hour later, came out with a new book in hand. Worth 20 Euros. Worth two days lunch and dinner. But hell, it’s a poetry book…and for that I can sacrifice other purchases I may have had in mind.

What is it about poetry that makes it so unresistable, at least for me personally? I don’t really know. Its like that classic question that people would ask, especially those you’re getting to know for the first time, “What kind of music do you like?”. To this question, I have my generic, straight to the point and somewhat unexciting answer…”Various kinds, but I lean towards Rock/Blues/Band music.” And then there’s the other answer which I rarely give out, only to those I wouldn’t mind talking to at least, since it requires more talk and longer conversation…”I don’t have a particular preference. I like songs that have soul. Songs with a beat that matches its words.” Songs with soul. I don’t really know the best way to explain it, but that’s the best I can do.

The same thing goes with poetry. I don’t prefer any particular, any particular period or any particular writer. The poems I like best are the poems that speak to me. Whether they talk of an emotion I’ve had, an experience I’ve had or something I can emphatize with determines the extent of just how much the poem “speaks to me”.

I’ve had my book with me for only a few hours, and already something is worth quoting. At the first few pages are some thoughts on poetry by poets themselves. Here’s one which can begin to explain this fixation I have:

“Poetry is that which arrives at the intellect by way of the heart.”
- R.S. Thomas