I am heading to Bulgaria in the morning and will be there until December 25 (it was cheaper to travel on Christmas Day). There are lots more Poland stories to tell, and some Paris stories since my return from Poland. I hope to be able to catch up when I get back.

In the meanwhile, here is a Paris story. I went to the craziest event at the Sorbonne on Saturday. It was a professor's "habilitation" to become a "directeur d'etudes," which I understood as akin to being promoted from Associate Professor to Full Professor. A jury of six professors spent five hours publicly responding to his scholarly portfolio and then left the room to vote. Since all six of them had told him how great he was, it wasn't very suspenseful. But there was lots of pomp and circumstance.

While chatting with some people afterward I used my phrase that every French person seems to love: "On ne fait pas comme ca aux Etats-Unis." (We don't do this in the United States.) I'm no't sure if they appreciate the lesson in cultural exchange, or if they read me as a wide-eyed "We're not in Kansas anymore " type.

The thing that amused me the most was that in the Ascoli Library at the Sorbonne, above all the shelves of books, the words "Ne Pas Fumer" (No Smoking) are painted on the wall in a very neatly stenciled font that is vaguely suggestive of the 1970s. So when I got bored with professors telling this guy why he's so great, but that he should use more iconographic evidence, I kept looking up at the "Ne Pas Fumer" sign, because I just found it hilarious.