Farewell to Paris... for now

Am well into the first week of the rest of my life. The last weekend in Paris was a whirlwind of goodbyes and packing. Having people around for afternoon tea on Saturday was great, at one point we had 11 people all crammed into the apartment. It was very efficient, not only did I get to say goodbye to a bunch of people at once, but I also got rid of a bunch of stuff.

Q, baby Winston, Karen and Alina.

 Gosia and Josh.

 Me with Nathalie. Sorry to everyone else, I got distracted and forgot to take more photos. When you consider that it took me four hours to make people coffee...Incidentally, if I ever offer you coffee, just say ni, it's quicker!

But I did get the occasional break. Monday we had a special trip to... the dentist. I held baby Winston while Karen got her teeth drilled. To celebrate it being over, we stopped in to the Hermes store and had chocolate cake. The store is a former swimming pool in art deco style, you can still see the original tiles and gilded columns. The teas cost at least 10 euros each - no I'm not joking. So we skipped the tea and split a cake between us, eating it veery slooowly to make it last.  

Packing - from this...

 to this...

On Tuesday, the movers were due to come any time between 7am and 7pm. I got up at 6am to make one last coffee before I packed it into the last box. This may have been self-defeating. At any rate, the movers didn't come until... 5pm. I was pacing the floor by this stage, And when the driver realised that it was on the 3rd floor, no lift, well he was not a happy man. But we managed to get them out the door. And oh the relief!

Tuesday night Janey, Nathalie and I managed to fit in one more restaurant, this time Thai down in the 15th.

I've been planning this move for about the last year. In fact I nearly bought a one-way ticket for the World Cup. But no matter how long I've been planning it, there's no way to know what it was going to feel like to have those "lasts". The last 80 restos. The last walk back to my apartment from the metro. The last time I wake up in my apartment. You never know what it's going to feel like until it's actually happening. And it felt... strange. Like jetlag without the long flight first. Like an out-of-body experience. You see yourself in the moment but it's hard to realise it.

On Wednesday I was up bright and early again, to tidy up the last loose ends of the apartment and give back the keys before lunchtime. One last load of laundry - run to the post office while it is drying - return the modem - clean the fridge. I was running around so much, there was hardly a moment to stop and reflect. But as I walked out the door, I turned and said thank you to my last Paris apartment.

By some great chance my friends from up north were in Paris for the day so I had someone to have lunch with. My train was originally at 3.13pm, but Eurostar emailed me to let me know it would be delayed, so I had time to stay for coffee. When I got to the station, they announced that the Olympic torch would be passing through the Chunnel ahead of the train. Ok, I can live with that.

 (Photo from five years ago, my first trip to London after I moved to Paris. The haircut has changed a lot since then but has come more or less full circle...)

So I left Paris on a bit of a high note, but of course it was only my first attempt, a dry-eye run, if you like. I'll be passing back through Paris 3 or 4 times before I finally fly out on September 14. Of course now I don't live there anymore, so I'll just be back as a tourist, crashing on pull-out sofas. And I've said most of my goodbyes already - goodbye to my job, my apartment, and most of my friends.

London is a different entry, the first step in my long journey home. I feel like I'm taking the scenic route back to New Zealand, after years of living at Paris pace, I'm taking a few months to slow down and chill out, and have some great experiences along the way. I woke up today, and before I was really awake, I had a moment of missing the park near my office. A very small, narrow memory of Paris filtering through the thrill of this new adventure. I'm sure there will be many more moments like that. I don't think you ever really say goodbye to Paris... just au revoir. 

More  photos.

Leaving Las Vegas

Elvis has left the building.**

As of 6pm today (well 6.45 by the time I finished clearing my cupboard), I no longer work for the OECD.
Wow.

Walking home from the metro tonight in the teeming rain, reflecting on my last day. I know a few people are probably wondering, what does it feel like to finish work at the OECD? After all, this was the first tangible round of goodbyes, to people I have seen week in, week out for years. After 3.7 years, it feels like the end of an era, but also the start of something.

The farewells started last week on a team retreat, and then continued with various coffees, lunches, and my final trip to the pool with my swimming buddy.

 I didn't know at all how my last day was going to feel, or how it would pan out. I had a list a mile long of things I wanted to tidy up and get squared away, and I have been pretty fixated on crossing things off this list for a few weeks now. But deep down I knew my last day wouldn't, couldn't be about that. I launched a new series of papers and sent out my final newsletter, so those were two big things that I could be justifiably proud of. And then I felt this wash of lightness, of release. After all, I only had a few hours left in the building. What was more important, filing every last scrap of paper or having a proper leave-taking?

So I went to lunch - for two hours. I didn't mean to. I had emailed the team the week before to say anyone who wants to join me for a sandwich in the park is welcome. But then summer has signally failed to arrive (ok weather gods, what's up this year - please!) and so I suggested the canteen. It's close, quick, relatively cheap, and coming from a culture with no institutional school lunches, but growing up on American sitcoms, I get a kick out of lining up with my tray.

But the team were having none of it, and dragged me out to a bakery / brasserie on posh Avenue Victor Hugo. Lots of big glass windows and light, surrounded by patisseries (millefeuille au cafe thank you very much!). And then that was when it hit me. How very very lucky I am, and have been, to work with such fantastic people. I think I have lost sight of that in the day to day grind, but the people at the OECD are some of the most talented, dedicated and warm human beings you hope to could come across.  The collegiality, the helpfulness, with no expectation of a quid pro quo - I have come across this before (especially at NZTE, where I am still in touch with a large number of kindred spirits) but what is stunning is how it is just endemic in such a huge organisation, despite the staggering workloads and for some, the uncertainty of employment in a project-based organisation. And sure, you meet some people along the way who haven't learned to play nicely with others, but you get that everywhere - and that's not what today was about.

Back at my desk I started writing a farewell email. There were so many people I wanted to thank, for their professionalism, but also their sheer warmth, which makes all the difference. I couldn't help include the proverb that is almost compulsory in any farewell email written by a Kiwi:

He aha te mea nui o te ao

What is the most important thing in the world?

He tangata, he tangata, he tangata

It is the people, it is the people, it is the people

And thinking partly about the high-stress situations we find ourselves in sometimes, me included, I added: Be kind to oneanother.

Well, I sent this out and kept clearing up my personal network folders. And then the emails started coming in, one after the other, faster than I could answer. People rang me to say goodbye. My team came in as they left for the weekend. The French "kiss on both cheeks" turned into proper Kiwi hugs. And the last two hours just turned into this wonderful celebration of all the fantastic people I have worked with over the last few years. I felt slightly bad that I didn't organise a larger farewell, but I am not sure I could have handled such an outpouring of emotion in one room. At one point I put down the phone and nearly cried "I take it back! I'm staying!!".

6pm came and went, and I was starting to feel reckless. I was meeting friends for dinner so I didn't have the luxury of time. Out went the years of archived notebooks, scribbles that only I could understand, draft reports that were finalised long ago. File, file, file, delete went the emails. Was the essential passed on? Yep. Would the world stop if I missed one thing? Nope. Luckily I was due to meet someone at the metro, so beyond a certain point I just had to go. I cleared the last few snacks and herbal tea bags out of my desk, gave up my badge, picked up the backpack with my flippers and sports towel, and walked out the door. And as I walked the short distance from the office to the metro, I ate my last madelaine.


So the short answer is that I feel happy and sad at the same time. Happy, because of the enormous luck I have had to meet and work with such great people. Sad that this is the moment I have to leave them all behind. But I know that the right thing for me is heading back to New Zealand. Going home feels like coming full circle and starting new adventures all at the same time.

And I know that I'll find a job that I will love almost as much back in New Zealand, managing web content in the public sector, with more incredible people. Because I'm lucky that way.

** not a reference to the horribly depressing movie with Nicholas Cage, but just the terribly catchy Sheryl Crow song, which always comes to mind at big life moments like these.

Kiwi As

A few weeks ago I set out to explore the Belleville neighbourhood (yes, as in Triplets of). It's not far from my place, but is further away from the centre of town so I don't go in that direction often. I knew there was a park, and a big immigrant community, particularly Chinese, but not much else.

Belleville metro is at the crossroads of four arrondissements, the 10th, 11th, 19th and 20th. In fact there's a building nearby with "Aux Quatre Arrondissements" carved in the stone across the front. It's the sort of area with a very active street life, people just hanging around for no apparent reason, and everyone seeming to co-exist reasonably peacefully.


(Some other triplets...)

The main drag, rue de Belleville, is lined with Asian restaurants - mostly Chinese, but some Thai and Japanese. But there are also little trendy cafes and a "fine products" deli, signs of encroaching gentrification.
I turned down a side street, and then another, and found myself at the bottom of Belleville park. It is unlike most other Parisian parks in that it spills down a hillside, and so has enticing pathways and staircases to climb, some of them overhung with cooling greenery.
 

It's a fair climb to the top by Paris standards, although nothing for any practiced Wellingtonian. But no matter how great the effort involved, it is totally worth it:

 

And if you're hot and bothered when you get up there, there's a great little cafe across the road: 

 There is also a community garden, with what may be grape vines (please bear in mind I am horticulturally ignorant).

The park is full of locals on a nice day, just hanging out and enjoying the sunshine. I did the same for a couple of hours. Then I decided to cut down a side street to take a different route home - and stopped dead in my tracks when I saw this place:

Yes you read it right, Kiwizine. Say it out loud... geddit?? Ah-hah. Turns out it's a collective run by a young New Zealand chef and his French wife. They started it with another couple who have since moved back to New Zealand. They are only open on Friday and Saturday nights, and they have one set price menu for 17.50, plus drinks. They do "cuisine du monde" and you eat whatever they feel like making. How extraordinary to stumble across this in Paris.

I knew I had to come here with a fellow Kiwi, so a couple of weeks later I rounded up the gang on a Saturday night and we came here for dinner. I called ahead to check the menu and luckily everyone could eat it. Tomato - mozzarella salad to start, then rack of lamb with grilled aubergine and finely diced vegetables, and strawberry pannacotta. Delicious.

Once we had eaten, we were still wide awake and it was a beautiful summer's evening, so we went up the top of the park for a view over the city by night.

L-R: Melissa, me, Josh, Gosia, Alina (photo taken by Dorian)

We came, we saw - and then we went across the road to the little cafe I mentioned earlier and found an empty table with a scrabble board sitting on it. I couldn't resist and forced everyone to play a game with me. Scrabble for six still takes a while so we were there until midnight. The cafe was buzzy and full of young locals having a great old time, half of them playing various other board games. I will freely admit that this may not be the glamorous Paris lifestyle you all think I lead, but it was the best night I've had in ages.

Meredith was in town visiting this weekend, and on a whim I took her to discover Kiwizine. They had seafood tacos (odd, bit it kind of worked), mackerel in a sweet and sour Malaysian-style sauce, with a VERY kiwi-style potato salad, and creme caramel. It was all delicious, and the main course was outstanding. We met Claire, the wife, and Jonno the chef came out from the kitchen to say hi. He's from Hamilton and after 9 years in France, his accent is still profoundly "cheers bro". He had just spent a month in Asia, which explains why I hadn't met him the first time, and also explains the Malaysian-style fish. Apparently the restaurant has been open for four years, and they live right around the corner from my current apartment. I'm leaving town in less than three weeks! Life is just not fair sometimes... but at least I have made this amazing discovery.

If you ever get the chance, I strongly urge you to go to Kiwizine. It's unique.