Every Stygian stench of the rainbow

Just a quick note to say I'm in Paris. Getting off Thalys at that post-apocalyptic stinkhole, the Gare de Nord, made me hate the French for mocking the intelligence of Belgians, who at least have public transportation that doesn't smell like incontinent corpses.

Stormed to the filthy metro station and had an internal debate over which underground line here is sketchiest. I think it's probably the magenta line, though the navy blue line and the provençal orange line are also both unsettling in terms of violence. The forest green line is fine, but there are too many shitty buskers on it due to the Montmartre stops and security being intimidated by the Marx Dormoy crowd. And the space age Tyrian purple line goes through Madeleine, which smells like stewed shit. It ties with the magenta line for nasal offensiveness.

When it comes to the RER, the lapus lazuli line wins the stench, violence and sketch factor hands down. That's magnifique because as it goes to the aeroports and a couple of the train stations, it's how most unsuspecting tourists are introduced to the city. The seemingly inoffensive beige line, however, is the only public tranport line here where I've seen purse snatchers or muggers in action. Besides the magenta line, of course, which only sort of counts as the victim was a bellowing American who was silly enough to keep his cash in his sock, where it made a big cash-shaped lump.

Also, the magenta line has the benefit of being the one that takes me to Carmen's house in the south, where I'm very happy to be, not having seen her for a year, how ridiculous. This is where I realized I was obliged to move back to Europe after I'd finished my thesis. Because of people like her and the human beauty of this continent - even though bits of its public transport smell like a sweaty giant's ass crack - this is where I realize now that that's so fucking awesome I could weep.