So I Like This Boy...Fa La La La La La La La La

Something NewOkay sorry for being a little late with my book, but I am reading Black Girl in Paris by Shay Youngblood and yes, I highly recommend it. It’s about an aspiring writer, Eden, who travels to Paris in 1986 inspired by her Aunt Victorine’s stories of the freedom that blacks, such as Josephine Baker and Langston Hughes experienced in the 1920s. She feels that the prejudices of the South have denied her the opportunity to become a writer by following in their famous footsteps she can achieve her dream. She arrives with $200 in hand finds a cheap room in the Latin Quarter and takes low-paying jobs to follow the path of her literary heroes. Her main focus is to acquire a meeting with James Baldwin himself, as she hears rumors that he is in the city. Along the way, she meets interesting characters and has an affair with a white jazz musician. She slowly finds out that Paris is not what she expects it to be In fact, the book depicts it as quite dangerous with terrorist bombings, police beating students, and increasing racial prejudice.
So, this book is basically me. I’m from the South and people often ask me why I came all the way up here. It was to escape the South…I feel that I was taught the mentality that this is the way life is supposed to be, but I felt that its not, that there has to be more. There will always be prejudice wherever you go, slowly and surely I learned that. But I know that there are also people who are willing to look past those boundaries and see the heart. I was also raised on those stories that in the North people are not prejudice and the stories of Black Paris, which is I came up here and this story just fits me in that way. I actually did a project on Black Paris a couple of weeks ago and found out that racial tensions are at a high in the city. It began when African-Americans were assisting students with the May 68 movements because they felt it was similar to the civil rights struggle. Now, it’s not really racial tensions, its more of nationality…Americans especially.
So, to l’amour. This book really has this theme of love and sexuality. For the past couple of weeks, I have been surrounded by this theme of love to the point where it is almost annoying…almost: in the movies I watch, in discussions at work, even at BIBLE STUDY!!! It just got me thinking about my own love life. I don’t date, BUT I really like this guy, BUT I didn’t think he would go for a black girl, SO…there is an element of fear there of taking a big chance AND he’s graduating this semester…SO do I go for it or not?  This also had me thinking about when I go to Paris. Jill advised me to get a French boyfriend…supposedly they’re great;) I keep reading that French boys like women of color because they consider them exotic;) In fact, I met this black girl the other day and told her I was going to Paris. The first thing she said was “Girl you better have fun over there…you know those European boys love black women. Ooh la la…To date or not to date? That is the question. All I know is that I plan not to plan, to simply have fun and whatever happens happens. Nevertheless, the book has me thinking on my Parisian experience, the traditional sites I will encounter, as well as the people and who knows maybe even love. Ah, Paris…The City of Lights (and love) awaits….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j30aP2sg2ms
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rm1JWiXHeZM