Joe's Wanders in Paris

Random Paris Scenes, from Joe

I guess we’re actually nearing the end of this trip – only six weeks to go. Back in April I wrote something but couldn't figure out how to post it. So I'm trying again.

It has been quite strange, stressful, sometimes stuff to make me smile a lot, sometimes stuff that makes me want to scream. Jean and François and the team at CNAM have been very nice but can’t help much with the hassles of everyday life. And I feel I’ve spent far too much time working on the U.S. (though that is also the subject of most of my talks) and not enough time learning about France. Including French.
None of that takes away from the fact that walking in Paris is often wonderful. I don’t normally take pictures, because the phone isn’t a great camera and, besides, I often don’t know how to show what the eyes see. The striking part of my work neighborhood is the fact that there are blocks and blocks of wholesale clothing businesses – it just goes on forever, people wheeling boxes around and the signs that say “Vente en gros”. So not retail. And then you wander onto a street that is store after store of costume jewelry; or store after store of handbags. All or mostly wholesale. A picture can’t capture the sequence, the feel of walking through something with an atmosphere. There’s much better stuff on the Web if you want to look at Notre Dame, or if I want to.

But I do find myself every once in a while grabbing the phone for something that seems more of the moment or just amusing for unusual reasons. So I am posting an explanation, and lord knows where the pictures will end up because I do not know how to make them post together and in order. These are things I’ll remember when we get back home.

Perhaps you heard that there were a lot of demonstrations and strikes in Paris this Fall, prompted by the Sarkozy Government’s decision to raise the ages of eligibility for pension benefits. We live on a fairly main drag, Boulevard Arago, and one afternoon the parade past went on for about three hours. I finally got curious and went to have a look, just as it was ending. Just in time for the street sweepers too. I’m not sure whether it reminded me more of Mardi Gras in New Orleans or one of the bits from Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoons (do you remember????). It’s all very organized: they’re at least as accustomed to demos in Paris as the NOLA authorities are to parades:

(3 pictures)

Of course, they can find plenty of other reasons to block streets. A few days later I was walking back from Montparnasse – I forget why – and ran across some sort of Technopop Parade:

(2 pictures)

It does appear that the forces of pop music both are less distinctively French and have heavier equipment than the French Left.

Then there are the things for which I shouldn’t try to make up an explanation – though I have a colleague in the CWRU French department who has written about the actual chimps:

(one picture)

One could, of course, do a whole photo-essay on the Metro.

The month of December was pretty grim, as I think Sydelle posted. Not Cleveland grim, but so humid that even 30 degrees was bone-chilling cold, and they don’t have much of an idea what to do with snow in Paris. Or ice.

(one picture, ferris wheel)

The picture could be called “Neat Stuff in Lousy Weather”. In the background is the pyramid of the Place de la Concorde. But really gray and chilly.

On the other hand, this being Paris, one might not be able to help running across the occasional – or ubiquitous – shop window that seemed to call for the French expression for “window shopping,” which is actually “licking the window”. This is the place which Sydelle visited once to see how macaroons (which don’t resemble what gets called that in the U.S.) and chocolates are made:

(one picture, Gerard Mulot)

The snow was more attractive when Abby’s friend Marcia came to town and Abby’s classmate Callia had a birthday party at the skating rink next to the Hotel de Ville:

(one picture, snowy)

The next picture is from Montparnasse, for my brother:

(picture)

Montparnasse, Cleveland Circle – there’s Pino’s Pizza everywhere!

There’s a lot of nice stuff going on in Paris at holiday time – see Sydelle’s post on lights, and her early January post. This is our local market one eve as I walked by:

(one picture)

Of course the leak into our apartment on Christmas eve was a bit much… and the inability to get help from the building management was aggravating… but the neighbors upstairs and across the hall were extremely helpful, and we’ll always remember the firemen coming to break into our upstairs neighbor’s apartment!

(one picture)
One of the other nice things about Paris is, one runs into things one has read about in books. Not just Hunchback of Notre Dame, Jean Valjean, that kind of stuff. Even Harry Potter! It turns out that Nicolas Flamel – the alchemist who had created a Sorcerer’s Stone in the first Harry Potter book – was a real person, who lived in Paris. His wife really was named Pernelle and, though he was rumored to be an alchemist, he definitely was a generous man who helped the poor. He built a house and destitute Parisians were allowed to live there so long as they said prayers for him and Pernelle. The house still stands, reputedly the oldest home (as opposed to palace) in Paris; and there are streets named after both of them:

(two pictures)

Then again, there are modern references as well. One day I had a meeting in the 18th arrondissement, and decided to start walking and see how far it was. In between was definitely a neighborhood with more immigrants from former French colonies. A certain other President may be more popular, in these neighborhoods, than Sarkozy.

(picture)

But Barack isn’t the first American politician to be popular in France! Another day I was near the Palais de Chaillot, and found this appreciation of one of our Founding Fathers.

(picture)


Now it’s April, and it’s supposed to be rainy (as the movie and song say) but has been dry and warm and the kind of weather that sets some people’s souls singing and leaves others fretful about drought and global warming. It is gorgeous, and walking is very much more attractive than in December. The bad news is, I have tons of work to do. But still, I took a few long walks last week, and will find a way to do so in the weeks to come. Last week Abby had an appointment with a periodontal dentist in connection with her orthodonture. Ugh. But it was a beautiful day and, as she and Sydelle headed back home, I decided to walk a bit before hopping a bus towards my office. I know there are nice things in Cleveland, and we’ll be glad to get home in many ways. But I’ll miss this sight:

(very traditional picture)

Cheers,
Joe