by way of apology

Right so it really really annoys me when someone ( say an ex or an old school friend ) comes to a city (london for example) and says

oh my gawd... London is, and London is, and I don't like it
because I find it soooo, I mean its just very, and i could never, its just not
my kind of, its so, you know, i don't know, what i'm trying to say is, its just-

even though, they've been there a total of two, maximum three days. have certainly never lived there. and in their short visit met hung out with, no one who lived there. but...

still happily made a myriad of assumptions just from walking twenty minutes around their west end hotel, maybe might have ventured down a few blocks of brick lane, or around hoxton square for a drink or two, only so they could complain the night life isn't sooo cool, but the tube is kind of straightforward to use, i mean it was sooooo easy for them to get around.

they tell me all this, hurl forth all these rapidly made, ill informed opinions, based on practically nothing, other than ideas they had about the city that they brought with them, the minimal wandering they've done,basically just to back it up. and i listen and listen and get more and more wound up until i'm like

SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!!!!!!! you have NO idea what you're talking about! Cities are not so easily revealed. You MIGHT get an idea if you LIVED here for a few months, but just an idea!!
! and maybe not even then. cities have all kinds of sides. sooooo i recognize that...

actually...

I still haven't seen Paris.

for what it is.

for what it could be.

for what i could like about it.

and i probably can't...

unless i live here, learn the language, meet people, sink in, and and and.

I've probably been looking for the wrong things. i've probably had the wrong barometer for making comparisons. (I mean nightlife i have covered in Berlin, why look for it here?)
i probably shouldn't have been comparing in the first place.

Every city should be seen for its own particular charms, in its own context. Maybe its just that with paris. Paris.. seemingly THE european city, the only city that new york (the most arrogant of all cities) fears. I expect more .

Last night I was surprised. I saw a side of Paris i'd never seen before. Warmer, more relaxed, less glossy. Girls in Doc martens. A barman who actually asked where i was from with a smile, rather than glaring at hearing my accent. (and when i stuttered back L'angleterre, he seemed interested, but maybe he was just chatting me up?)

so hey, maybe its not quite my city. but there is more i'd like to scratch the surface of. i'm can't see myself living here (hmmm also said that about berlin once...) but as far as return trips next year go, i'm definitely not writing it off.