Clara et Moi

I have French lessons every Saturday at the FIAF in New York. Our class began in September with about 12 people and the number has since gone down to four. At our last class, only three people showed up, including our instructor, the lovely M. Belneau. I do not know why this is. The class is quite excellent and is on a weekend. M. Beleanu is highly likable. Anyway, I personally find the class thoroughly enjoyable. At the very least, it gives me an excuse to talk like a kid again: i.e.: I want an apple. I see a movie. I like monkey. And the whole gender business just cracks me up.

Anyway, I digress. This post is supposed to be about a film/movie. At the afore-mentioned French class, our teach, M. Belneau, decided to show us a film, in French. I think that's because there were only two pupils who bothered to show up, and she really didn't feel motivated enough to give a full lesson. Of course she didn't actually say that. The film, Clara et Moi, is a bittersweet story about a sensitive but selfish young man who meets (on the Paris metro, how cute) and falls for a brainy and breezy Parisian girl and only to find out that she's HIV positive. So he dumps her. And... Well, let's just say I loved it before I spoil the plot. Of course I'm partial to films of this genre, so perhaps you want to take my review with a grain of salt.

Overall, I'd give the film a 7 out of 10. Even if you are not into this type of films, you might want to watch it just for the scenes of Paris, espeially of Montparnasse. Quite a few scenes were actually filmed in Cafe Select (near Gare Montparnasse) where my "partner" (pardon me, but this is the official INSEAD term) and I reconciled after a big fight during our latest visit to Paris.

If M. Belneau is reading this post, you should be proud that I almost didn't have to read the subtitles!

Consolidating Blogs

Okay...my indecisiveness has truly come to a head in my so-far extremely unsuccessful effort to build a blog.
I know..Blog is soooo 2004. I am, late is a a major understatement here, for the party. Looks like some people have migrated to Twitter while some have "retired" from blogging and gone back to mass emailing.

But being late is indeed the story of my life. So it should hardly surprise anyone that I've just started to develop this urge to write a blog. First of all, I need to choose a platform. I have, as we speak, 4 different blogs on 3 different websites. That's quite something for someone who've only been seriously considering blogging for a few weeks. I think I've finally settled on blogger.

What would I write? 2008 has been a year of change, not to upstage the President-Elect here, but it's been a momentous year for me. I've got married, covered the Olympics (a long-time dream of mine), and now quitting my job to study in France. I know pinning one's hope on a one-year MBA program (in Europe no less, sniffs some of my US-centric friends) is equal to binge-buying mortgage-backed securities, but I cannot help but wish 2009 to be... what else... more momentous. (This word is momentarily stuck in my head)

In China, they say thirty is the year of Establishment. Perhaps it's a bit of dreading the inevitable Big Three, along with increasing ennui at the current job, that ultimately led to this sudden urge to change.

That's pretty much why I want to start this blog: to document my year away from the real world and my earnest efforts to hopefully live "the year of establishment" to the fullest.