Paris
I am 47 years old, and I had never been to Europe, or even
out of the continental United States, at all.
I’d always wanted to go to France, and to Italy, to the motherlands—I am
half French, half Italian, so I’d wanted to start with the lands of my heritage
first. This year, I began my world traveling
by going to France with my partner, Martin.
We flew to Dublin, then connected to our flight to
Paris. We landed and went to baggage
claim for our luggage. There was a
gentleman with a tray passing out croissants to the waiting passengers. Really??
Yes, really!! How civilized!
We got our luggage and our bearings and found the train line we had to
take to our hotel. We changed trains at
Gare Du Nord, got off at Richard-Lenoir.
Then, following the GPS, we walked to our hotel. It was in the 11th Arrondissement
(district), quite a ways from the famous, tourist-y areas of Paris. It was, in a few words, a regular
neighborhood.
After showering off our travelers' grime, we went out to explore the
neighborhood. I kept staring at the
buildings, which looked just like every picture I had ever seen of Paris. There were markets, several cafés and
patisseries (bakeries). We had lunch at
Café Merlin—poulet avec frites (chicken with fries), and greens. We had wine with lunch, like you do, a glass
of Sancerre and a glass of Sauvignon Blanc.
Crème brûlée for me and a dessert sampler for Martin. So excellent!
I attempted to speak French with our server, albeit
awkwardly, on my end. I have learned
French since I was a kid, but the last time was as a senior in high
school—thirty years ago! I should have
reviewed it the last few weeks or months before we went, but alas, I did
not. So I stumbled through, but at least
I attempted it. And with simple words, I
did it. Next time, I will review the words I don’t
remember and the parts of speech, like past, future, past perfect and future
perfect tenses, and increase my vocabulary count.
We went back to the room and rested a bit, then ventured out
again in the rain, and in the dark, and took the subway, “going anywhere”. We
emerged at Cité, near the Bastille, Notre Dame and the Seine River. We walked and imbibed the city, under
lights. The gorgeous buildings were lit
from below. On the way back, we had an
“Amélie” moment (if you haven't seen the movie, go! See it now!) and did the photobooth in the Métro station. I adore photobooths, and every time we see
one, we have our pictures taken, making weird, adorable faces.
The next day, we went out with our minds on a mission, and a mission on our minds: Blé Sucré, a
patisserie. We are devotees of Phil
Rosenthal’s show, “I’ll Have What Phil’s Having”, wherein he travels and
features the best food in select cities all over the world. He claimed that Blé Sucré had the best
croissants in Paris. Blé Sucré backed
that claim up. We had plain croissants
and café crème (coffee with frothed, steamed milk), and ate in the park across
the street. Sheer bliss!! They flaked when you bit into them, and were
airy and butter-flavored.
Perfection!! And the café
crème!! It’s a deep, dark coffee with steamed
milk. The best coffee I have ever had in
my life. I have no idea how to recreate
it—I’ve been trying. It’s with the zeal
of an alchemist that I am trying…The closest thing I have found is a flat white
at Starbucks, but for home, we might have to get an espresso machine. Aw damn…
Afterwards, we went to a cemetery, the Père-Lachaise, that
was near our hotel, and also which, coincidentally, a friend of ours had
recommended to us when he was there the week before. We saw small mausoleums and beautiful headstones. I even looked inside one of the mausoleums
and found a statue of the woman who was buried there, inside! I looked for both of our family names, but
didn’t see them ("Martin" was all over the place in France). It was hard to find our
way, so I found a map online, and it showed that both Frédèric Chopin, the
composer, and Jacques Louis David, the painter, were buried there. The quest was on! We went round and round looking for Chopin,
and finally found him—we had gone by him, but had looked in the opposite
direction! We left rose petals on his
grave. Then we looked for, and had an
easier time finding, David’s grave. I
knew I was going to be seeing some of David’s paintings in the Louvre the next
day, so it was good to visit him. I
later found out from an instructor of mine who had gone there that Jim Morrison
is also buried there—I would have LOVED to have seen his grave!! And now, I am looking at the map I had found
online and seeing the famous people I ALSO would have loved to have found: Balzac,
Honoré Daumier, Ingres, Molière, Edith Piaf, Marcel Proust, Georges Seurat,
Gertrude Stein, Oscar Wilde, Richard Wright.
Gah!!
We stopped at a local market on the way back to the hotel
room and got some wine. We sat out on
the balcony of our room and enjoyed some wine, a baguette that we bought and
carried with us, like we saw the French do, and people-watching. We got to rest a bit, which was lovely. And necessary. Introvert… (raises hand)
We walked to a café called Les Cents Kilos (the 100 kilos)
for dinner. I had a burger and frites,
which had a delicate onion flavor, and Martin had penne with gorgonzola crème
sauce and pastrami. The penne was also
amazing—such a blend of flavors!! Martin
thought he could recreate it at home (and he did! Successfully! Also, again over a campfire and
a propane stove—the man is amazing!!).
We thoroughly savored our meals--there was not a mediocre or bad meal to be had.
After dinner, we took the train to see the Eiffel
Tower. We just saw it from the outside,
not going up inside it. We talked about
it, but the drive wasn’t strong enough in either of us to actually do it, so we
didn’t, and we took sweet pictures with the moon behind it. I also got a fabulous picture of a lesbian couple
making a heart with their hands in front of it! Then we took a walk up Avenue Kléber and
reached L’Arc de Triomphe. Again, we
didn’t go up in it, but took lots of pictures of the outside. It was nighttime, so it was illuminated. We came across the Champs-Elysées, the
famous boulevard. Unfortunately it has
become a retail nightmare, garishly full of shops, like you see in
America. We stopped and got some ice
cream, and then we came across a surprise—an outdoor hookah bar, sponsored by
The Marriott. We went in—we were the
only white people, and I was one of two women.
Mostly it was people of Middle Eastern descent, whose culture hookah is
part of. The hookah smoked really
beautifully, smooth mint. We also had
gin-tonics to go along with it. And we
talked deeply and satisfactorily. Such a
sweet night…
The next day, we hit the Louvre. This was the Big One! I’d made a list of what I wanted to see, so
we could go directly there instead of wasting time, wandering. On my list of must-sees: The Mona Lisa, the
Venus DeMilo, the Winged Victory (the Nike) of Samothrace, Jacques Louis David,
Johannes Vermeer, Egyptian antiquities. We followed the vital map, and the signs on
the walls, and found each of the things on the list (except Vermeer--he was on tour at that moment)…and sometimes I found
unexpected surprises like Elisabeth Vigée LeBrun, whom I adore, one of the few women artists
to make it into the chronicles of art history. It was a self-portrait with her daughter, not the famous one of her painting, but I recognized her face and her style right away. At times, I got a little verklempt.
I saw famous paintings I’d only
seen in books before, like the "Mona Lisa", “La Grande Odalisque” by Ingres, “Oath of the
Horatii” by David, pieces of history like The Egyptian Book of the Dead…Things
that famous hands had touched, made, invented, midwife’d…things that I’d
learned of when I was young. And here
they were, after all these long years, and here am I, witnessing their
existence, instead of reading about it…It was emotional for me, but a happy emotional, like crying at someone's wedding.
Afterwards, we walked to Restaurant Cinq-Mars, to have
dinner, but when we asked for a table for two, they said they needed
reservations, so we made them for the next night and said that Cinq-Mars was my
family name on my mother’s side. The
hostess was happy to hear that and was pleased that we’d be coming back. We had dinner around the corner at Les
Antiquaries, instead: French onion soup, frites and crème brûlée. We enjoyed the hell out of crème brûlée this
trip…You can barely find it in the States, so we binged on it.
The next day was shopping day—getting souvenirs (“What’s the
French word for ‘souvenirs’?”) for loved ones.
We ended up walking through the city, seeing wonders along the way—some
art galleries, a Métro station that looked like a submarine, a gorgeous park, a
mini Cooper, and all of the colored doors in Paris—and then ended up at Notre
Dame Cathedral. Gargoyles, ho!! We took a million pictures trying to get all
of them that we could. Also tried to
scope out where that famous picture of the one with his head in his hand would
be by looking at the building behind it, pulling it up on our phones, and, lo
and behold! the building is still there, with the same windows!!
Dinner, ce soir-là: Restaurant Cinq-Mars…
The hostess remembered us, and smiled so warmly. She brought us complimentary champagne, “for
family”. My heart melted...We had escargots (well, Martin had them—I
would have, but they had pesto on them, and I didn’t want to risk the pine
nut exposure—I DID know how to say “Je suis allergique aux noix”, though!) and
a fromage plate with a basket of French bread.
For the main course, he had filet of cod with mashed potatoes and I had
sausage with mashed potatoes. And once
again, crème brûlée for dessert. It was
the best meal of the trip.
And then the next day, after having breakfast again at Blé
Sucré, we were flying back home, a 30-hour travel day. We
brought back wine and chocolate and gifts.
We brought back experience and observations. We brought back vignettes and stories and
jokes. We brought back memories.
I thought of my mother, two years gone from us now, and how
she would have loved this. When she was
still lucid, she’d wanted to resume speaking French with us (that is our
heritage, and we learned to speak French in school, while she learned it at
home from her parents and extended family), but we were so preoccupied with
figuring out her illness that we never did.
So I spoke French for her, as well as myself. I saw the Seine for her as well, saw the
Louvre for her as well, drank wine in the middle of the afternoon in cafés for
her as well…because she no longer could.
I was her ambassador in flesh.
We took pictures in front of the restaurant, took matches, their
business card (an old B/W photo, with their name, address and phone number
stamped on the back), and chocolates with their name on the
label...souvenirs. I will remember
this.
Beyond that, for myself, I saw for the first time how other
people do things. Again, this was my
first time outside of the United States.
Not to romanticize the French, but I did notice that in the four days I
was there, I didn’t see any foolish behavior in public. No yelling, no impatience, no teenagers
spilling bravado all over the sidewalk.
Nobody gunning motors or squealing brakes. No cat-calling or leering—I felt incredibly safe and not
just because I was with a man. I didn’t
see that behavior towards other women, either.
People seemed to be polite to each other as a matter of course, adults going
about their days. In comparison, Americans
can seem rather adolescent, at times.
And I didn’t anticipate going back to that. And I
realized I didn’t call anyone a fucktard in my head once while I was there—talk
about adolescent behavior (or rather, thoughts)! But the minute I got back, there I went,
again. Of course, I’m old enough to
know that I saw but a snapshot of Paris, and I’m not making a judgement based
on one frame of exposure, but damn, it was different than what I have gotten used
to. And it was pleasant. I loved: taking the Métro, eating at cafés, the high caliber coffee and food, drinking wine in the middle of the day as well as at night, the gorgeous architecture, the statues, the roundabouts, the people driving scooters and motorcycles, people smoking nearby and you NOT smelling like their cigarettes after, hearing little tiny kids speaking French, that you could stay at your table and savor your food as long as you wanted because the server wasn't relying on tips to live on, the Art Nouveau decor and fonts in design and architecture of building interiors and exteriors, that the sidewalks were terraced, that it's a walking city, that it's an art city.
I wish I spoke better French so I could have had
conversations with people, to see how they thought about things. I wanted to philosophize over wine. I wanted to talk politics and tell them, I don't support that cretin. I wanted to tell
them I’m a figure model, to pose for an art class!! I wanted to draw their figure models,
because I’m an artist! And there are
other places I want to see like the Catacombes and Versailles and the Musée d’Orsay, the graves of the people I mentioned above at Père-Lachaise…and
goddamn, back to Blé Sucré for breakfast.
I’m going back one day. There’s
so much more to experience, more souvenirs to acquire.
In my mind.
Vive La France!!
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