Metro, un peu (*a bit about underground)

The crowd in the metro today. Traffic light was broken and that has stopped the trains. This is not my photo, have taken it from news websites, where there were no authors. Sorry, the author :)

That happened only on the Orange Line (see the map). I was living there once when staying with cats before. If interested - just in case - now I live on the Purple Line (again, enjoy the map), and to be honest, being on the south-east of Moscow, my station - Kyuzmynky - looks the same almost always. The Purple line is famous for that, almost a hell in the sense of a crowd. And I work - if that is still interesting - where the Orange line meets the Green line in the centre of the circle. And here where you can see the Kremlin from my window.

By the way, circle/radial system of underground is not the best in the sense of changing the train when you go from - for example - from south-west to south-east, but it is like this here, in Moscow. And for example the Paris idea of metro (and for sure I like examples about France) gives more options for changing the lines.

That was only the way to say hello to you. I love Moscow. I love Paris.
Quite clear, rather sunny, pretty snowy day in Moscow with minus 15C or close. See you later.

Emmanuel Carrere, Romain Gary, moving out, conference also out

Survived after the conference… The bags were quite successful, all gone, all colors were in high demand, and now participants are – hopefully – fully enjoying The Quotations :)

After Monday as a compensation day – I still want to sleep. Tuesday was okay: job and after it – even visited the meeting with French writers. Had to visit the French Cultural Center anyway – to return My Debts :), several DVDs collected within a couple of weeks.

So there was Emmanuel Carrere yesterday presented by Olivier Rolin (he is the editor of this program). Emmanuel Carrere, the one who wrote “La Moustache” (The Moustache) and “L`Adversaire” (The Adversary) as books which later became movies, which both are presented in my boxes (I just moved out!), which I yet never watched. So that was a good surprise yesterday to find out that he is the actual author. And now I have a better motivation to watch and read all that exciting stuff I had on my shelves and now have in boxes which were so heavy to carry! (the moving out process was organized in quite extreme circumstances and held in record-breaking period of several hours, all thanks to our inadequate landlady, god bless her(c).

But back to literature! The series is called “Aimer la literature” (Love literature), organized by the French Center and perhaps the Embassy. The meetings are about reading and commenting. Modern authors – exclusively French for obvious reasons – read extracts from books of their predecessors. Yesterday it was Mr.Carrere reading Romain Gary (“Promise at Dawn”). It was a good meeting, with some laughs and some thoughts, in a big cold conference hall of the library, with quite a lot of participants. Cold – it is cold in Moscow now, and so is in some public buildings (and in my new home, but not speaking about that!).

Back to the writers. Romain Gary is still the only French author who won the Prix Goncourt twice (once under his other pseudonym, Emile Ajar). In reality both of those names are pseudonyms, because in fact he was Russian, with quite a mysterious family story but with a very remarkable mother, whom the book read yesterday is devoted to. Not long time ago, like two or three months ago, the friend of mine mentioned this book and offered it to read. Unexpected acquaintance. As Emmanuel Carrere told yesterday, he also met this book only recently, followed a friend`s advice and was very moved so decided to read it in Moscow. Now it would be good for you to know that this book is well worth reading, to say the least.

Romain Gary was born in Vilnius (Lithuania) and grew up in Nice (France), and knowing these two cities a bit I like to imagine his story. His mother was an actress and quite an independent woman in her epoch, so she raised him alone. In spite of all life dramas she was always fascinated by France, so when Romain was still a boy they moved to France. Through Poland, in a goods wagon I presume, through illness and lack of food. She continued to love France even when in Nice, working hard and continuing to tell wonderful stories about France, their new country. She made her son a French person and a French citizen. He also became a courageous pilot during the war, a journalist, a Consul General of France in Los Angeles… And a so French writer.

As for Emmanuel Carrere, just checked Wikipedia
– it is his birthday today! :)

And as for me, we also have Internet back in our new home. So… all is rather well, I would say.