Some Paris Sights

PARIS NOTES 2008 - 2009 #2

Paris definitely has different customs from the US.

I was sitting in a Salon de Thé on Blvd. Malesherbes slowly sipping my café crème

and picking at a pastry when I noticed a young, late twenties couple sitting at a table directly in my field of view. They both were quite attractive and were stylishly dressed. The man, with his dark completion and unshaven look, was totally dressed in black, including his black sports coat. The woman wore tight fitting jeans, black blouse, and a light jacket with a colorful blue scarf. Throughout their lunch they leaned in and talked to each other with their faces only inches apart. Occasionally, I could hear gentle laughter. When they finished eating he reached over, grabbed her scarf in both hands, and pulled her face close to him until their lips were softly touching – and held her there for a prolonged kiss. Just as they were about to get up she grabbed him by his coat lapels and pulled him to her and repeated the lips just touching exercise.

Last week we kicked into full tourist mode when Leslie, a friend of Wendy’s from her dancing past, spent six days with us. We took it all in (or almost all) – the Arc de Triomphe and busy Champs Élysées, the Musée D’Orsay with its impressive hoard of Impressionist paintings and more, the Musée L’Orangerie with its wrapped-around-the-wall paintings of Monet’s water lilies, a corner of the Louvre (limited by the combination of leg and eyeball fatigue), Notre Dame, Le Tour Eiffel now lit up at night with soft, blue lights and for 5 minutes each hour by twinkling white lights, a contemporary art exhibition at Place de la Bastille, the colorful,inside-out designed Pompidou Center with its modern art collection and its fantastic view of the city from the top floor, and many, many points in between.

She had never been to Paris and, with her background as an artist, was totally taken with the city. It was fun to share her excitement.

The weather wasn’t at its best but that did not dampen her enthusiasm in the least. That, coupled with tired feet, just meant we spent more time sipping café crème or tea or thick, dark hot chocolate in interesting cafés.

Yummy Dark Hot Chocolate!

A few Sunday’s ago we had lunch with Frédèric and Véronique at their apartment. This is a young couple we met on the train on our last trip to France. They both are interesting and speak good English. We had a wonderful luncheon accompanied with great conversation. A delicious Quiche Lorraine, salad, two desserts (one of which we brought), apps, and my first experience with escargot that I enjoyed (lots of garlic and butter did the trick). All of this was accompanied by several types of good wine. A very filling and enjoyable time.


Some other scenes since our last note:

• Listening to four violins and a cello in the beautiful Chapel Ste Chapelle. The lead violinist was outstanding and very moving. This is an impressive site for a concert both visually and acoustically, the only thing missing being the sunshine beaming through the site’s spectacular stained glass windows (it was after dark). (See our previous blog entry with 2 YouTube videos of this.)

• After a satisfying dinner at the nearby Villa Péreire biting into a chocolate moelleux, a crusty, circular individual chocolate cake with the inside filled with hot, melting dark, dark chocolate which was served on a white plate with strings of a raspberry sauce reduction arranged around the plate.

• Being totally exhausted after staying up until the wee hours of the morning watching the election returns – and going to bed totally satisfied – and having trouble keeping my eyelids open the next day. Note: Paris is 6 hours ahead of Vermont.

• Realizing that one can spend a lot of time standing in lines if one chooses to. I’ve bagged it several times recently – like the long line at the Musée D’Orsay’s special showing of their portion of the “Picasso and the Masters” exhibitions going on in the city or the long line at the nearby FNAC to get tickets to the Ste Chapelle concert (and going back a third time when the lines were shorter) or trying to get into a movie at the wrong time or avoiding the lines at Monoprix (the local grocery store) on a late Friday night where the lines cue because it is closed on Sunday or trying to get something to eat at the nearby boulangerie/patisserie at prime lunchtime hours or skipping the line waiting to climb the Arc de Triomphe when we were there. This turns out to not be a big thing since you can avoid the lines if you pick your times right.

• Enjoying the special exhibitions at the nearby Musée Jacquemart-André (Van Dyck) and the Musée de Luxembourg (“From Miro to Warhol”). Nice mix of the old and the new between to two sites.

Another “Paris is different” scene:

After leaving the Musée de Luxembourg we stopped for a café crème at the nearby Brasserie Au Vieux Colombier on the busy shopping street, Rue de Rennes. Seated behind me, and in Wendy’s line of view, was a very disparate French couple. The man appeared to be in his late 60’s, was bald, and was wearing a light colored hounds-tooth-check sports jacket. Very professorial looking. His companion was under 30 with long brown hair, wore minimal makeup, and was dressed in a tight, aubergine knit dress that dropped down to almost meet her boots coming up. The only thing we could hear from their focused conversation was her high pitched, coquettish laughter and, occasionally, his deeper chuckles. She was very flirtatious, frequently reaching across the table with both hands and slowly stroking his shoulders and arms and face.

After leaving we walked over to Rue Princesse near Cathedral Ste. Sulpice (a neat area to walk around) to hear a reading by the author David Sedaris at The Village Voice, an English bookstore. We missed him when he was in Burlington earlier this past summer. Despite getting there 45 minutes early the place was packed so we took the bus back to our apartment. C’est la vie.

A bientôt,

Dan and Wendy

11/07/08