Charlotte.

Charlotte said we were going to the squat to meet some of her friends. Where I came from, a squat was a dark, abandoned building full of rats and garbage and junkies, with boards over the windows. In Grenoble, a squat was a crappy house in a bad neighborhood, but it had running water, electricity, and a working telephone. I am still not sure how that worked, something to do with the government taking care of the poor. Weird, right?

We went to the squat for dinner a couple times during my stay. Everyone who lived there was very friendly, but none could really speak to me. I think I was some kind of novelty. As we all sat around the kitchen table, eating, drinking wine, everyone but me smoking, I was forced to listen listen listen to their French, and magically, a little of it began to make sense. They would of course not slow down for me, unless asked to repetez. I tried to participate — my French was poor but I was getting by alright. It was far easier for me to read it than anything else. Actually speaking it was a challenge, and most difficile was to understand it when spoken. It was nice to feel like had I stayed another couple months, a little light bulb might have turned on at some point.

One of the boys, sitting near me, drew a picture during one of the dinners and gave it to me. He explained that the petite sphere “c’est vous“, pointing at me with a smile. It was an incredibly sweet little gesture, his effort to communicate with me through symbols. I saved the picture in my journal.

I sometimes still feel this way, that I do not fit in, that I am trying to understand but it’s going over my head. It’s a lonely feeling. But I am a lot more confident than I once was. I know that if I went to France today, and found myself at another dinner party, I wouldn’t just sit quietly and try to disappear.

Near the end of my trip to France, I decided to take a day trip to Avignon. I’m not sure why, maybe because it was on the train line from Grenoble and I had enough money for the ticket. I brought ten francs with me — about three dollars. I am still amazed that I traveled around Europe back then as dirt poor as I was. I was hungry all the time, though, and foolishly spent my money on coffee, usually. I also learned that in Avignon, it cost two francs to use the toilet. So I had eight francs.

It was a hot day, and I sat in the square of the Palais du Papes, too broke to actually get into the palace and see what was inside. So I walked around the city, over the little bridges, up and down alleys like canyons, five yards wide. I took a few pictures. Then I rode the slow local train back to Grenoble, hoping the batteries in my cassette player wouldn’t die on the way. Probably listening to Supergrass.

A couple of days later, I returned to Paris, where there was a five-hour layover before my train to London. There was no place to store my huge backpack, which by this point was hurting my shoulders, so I had no choice but to haul it around with me as I wandered the wide boulevards, in the rain. I bought a bottle of bordeaux in a supermarche, then I found a place to sit and write, in an ugly little park on la Rue de LaFayette.

I met Charlotte when I was 22, when she was visiting Berkeley and dating a guy I knew. She was a street performer who spit fire for francs, and in America, dollars. This involved putting some kind of protective agent into her mouth, followed by a flammable liquid, which she then spit out at her torch, producing a fireball. We became friends, and she invited me to visit her someday. The following year, I did.

She lived in the town of Grenoble, situated in the French Alps near Provence. I took the high-speed train there from Paris, meeting her at the station an hour after my arrival. Once there, we were picked up by an English band she knew that was playing in town. I was quite relieved to speak my language again. We were taken to her friend’s flat, then after a short rest, went to the club to help the band load their equipment. At the rear of the club, there was a chamber that led into an old dungeon. When I say old, I mean, medieval. Or, so we were told. The ceilings certainly were low enough.

I brought my little 35mm camera with me to Europe and thought it would be cool to take black and white photos. I regret that now, but some of them did turn out well. Charlotte took that picture of me in the kitchen of her small flat in the middle of the city. I stayed with her there for the week, where she showed me how to make espresso on the stove, adding sweet shelf-stable milk to it when it was done. She also made a pot of white rice one day for lunch and poured yellow mustard into it, which at first horrified me, then I discovered it wasn’t so bad. What was bad was something called “hearts of palm” from a can. Have never eaten it again since.

As I wrote in my journal, I was almost always dirty, sleepy, and hungry. I had very little money, and tried to be frugal with it. I also tried to practice my French, but I was so naturally shy that trying to be extroverted in another language was almost impossible. I did still manage to enter the boulangerie in the morning and say very softly “une baguette s’il vous plait” and hand over my francs. Then I would take my bread back to Charlotte’s and have it with butter and jam. Yes, it was the best baguette I had ever eaten.

After a week, we were taken into the country to stay with Charlotte’s family, who lived in a 19th century farmhouse. None of them spoke much English at all. They bred golden Labrador retrievers, so the house was filled with dogs. I slept in an antique sleigh bed in a tiny, spooky upstairs room. In the morning, I got up and threw open the windows to reveal this vista.

That picture doesn’t do it much justice. It was like something from a fairy tale. I look so fondly back upon my first trip to France, forgetting the poverty and taste of danger, and remembering the adventure and the people I met. Learning to kiss everyone twice upon introduction. I rather liked that custom.