Chinatown

Chinatown

The faster you move, the slower time passes. Now you're probably asking yourself: Why is a discovery by a brilliant mind like Einstein being quoted in blog by a guy who still doesn't fully understand why the apple fell on Newton’s head?

The reason is simple: I believe it to be true. Since the semester is over and I'm moving even slower than I already did before, time is just flying by. February is already half over. This means I only have a few more weeks left here which really is a shame since there is still so much to do and discover.

A few days back I went to Belleville – the Chinese district of Paris. I had only heard about it after asking an Asian friend where he lived. The answer: “Belleville – like the rest of us”.

The centre of this little enclave is a long street scaling a steep hill towards the highest point of Paris. The pavements are cobbled with little merchants. I'm not saying little because they're Asian, but because most of them only have one styrofoam box that they use as a table, on top of which they mostly place odd assortments such as 4 bananas, 15 lighters, 2 Pairs of socks and a fish. And this is not an exaggeration! All around me there were hardly any signs or conversations that I understood. Even ordering food by pointing at things proved rather difficult since I really couldn't tell what all these weird things were. I still don't know what I had, but it tasted better than it smelled.

Arriving at the top of the hill I felt suddenly out of breath. Physics again – well played Mr. Newton. Although a terrible biological constitution due to a lack of training definitely did play its part. Apparently the view from up there is a great one. Should have thought of the fog before. The so called Panorama reminded one again of Bejing in the smog. Definitely not worth all the hard work.

Even though I'm leaving pretty soon, my French is definitely not where I thought it would be by now.

The reason for that? Hard to say!

Might be the fact that, contrary to popular belief, Italian does not turn into French if you just raise your pinky while drinking. It might be a certain degree of frustration at the ludicrous velocity at which the Parisians speak, maybe it’s just lazyness on my part. Or perhaps it could simply be the overestimation of one's own capabilities mixed with a certain degree of narcissism. Pick one! I blame the Parisians!

Greetings from the narcissist physicist