Paris Plages and the Shoah Memorial

Today I ventured out by myself to tour the Shoah Memorial. Across the street is an area of the Paris Plages (beaches). That is the only reason they are together in this journal.

First the Plages. Every August the city of Paris fills in part of the Seine's banks with sand and picnic tables, lounge chairs, bean bag chairs, cafe's and a pool. All is free to the public except for the cafe's of course. Still a lovely place to hang out and read a book or just people watch. I will try to upload those photos first.

Then I went to the Shoah Memorial. You walk in and have to go thru security. You then walk into a courtyard with a giant cement monument naming all the camps. The museum itself is pretty standard. Their permanent exhibit is all about Jews in France who were victims of the holocaust. Apparently alot of jews and gentiles went underground forming resistance groups. But as we know not enough. The french have acknowledged that they allowed so many french jews to be transported to camps.

This month they have an exhibit about 3 Hollywood film makers: George Stevens, Samuel Fuller, and John Ford. They photographed the camps when they were liberated by US soldiers. Many of these films were used as evidence at the Nuremberg trials. In the museum i couldn't take much in the way of photos of this exhibit. It was extensive with lots of footage of the liberations of the camps. Grissly footage but an interesting exhibit all the same. The museum will be showing films on the Holocaust for the next few months. I would like to see Shindler's List. I believe the movies will be in their original version with French subtitles.

Enjoy the photos and let us hear your comments.
Sydelle