Last Tango in Paris

Today, we arrived in London!  But before I post about that (and since we haven't really had a chance to do anything or take photos here yet), I will bombard you with details of our last day in Paris.

We had tried to go to Sainte Chappelle two days ago, but the lines were so long that we gave up.  So we skipped breakfast the next day in order to get there early, but everyone else must have had the same idea.  After waiting about an hour (Paris Museum holders got no special entry lines), we made it into the cathedral.  The stained glass was amazing, for sure, but it was definitely dampened by having to wait over an hour for basically a 2-room, 10-15 minutes tops visit.

Our next stop was the Georges Pompidou Centre, and as you can guess by the photo above, there were more lines! 

Thankfully, the Paris Museum Pass probably got us in about 2 hours sooner than if we hadn't had the pass, so after 40 minutes, we were inside.

I loved the Georges Pompidou Centre!  Its exterior is avant-garde, with these fun escalators that are attached to the outside of the building.  Inside is a fabulous collection of modern art, pieces from Kandinsky, Rothko, Picasso, Matisse, Chagall, Gaugin, Miro.  Amazing.

We finally got those meringue treats called "merveilleux", too.  They were as light as air and gone in about 4 seconds.  I took a photo of the last one before we ate it, but the photo looks a bit pathetic, so I decided not to post it.

Steve had been wanting to go to La Defense, which is the ultra-modern new downtown, waaayyyy on the western side of Paris.This photo was taken in front of the Grande Arche, which is the modern version of the Arc de Triomphe. 

As you can see, this side of Paris was extremely uncrowded.  I wonder what it's like during a normal business day.

The coolest thing is that you can stand in front of the new Grande Arche and look all the way down to the other end of Paris, where you can see the Arc de Triomphe in the distance.  See it poking up behind Steph's head?

Napoleon and the Sewer

This is Steve again. We have these museum passes that get us into all sorts of interesting places, and two of the options caught my eye:  (1) the Army Museum, which also houses Napoleon's Tomb; and (2) the Paris Sewer Museum (a.k.a, Musée des égoûts de Paris).  It will surprise no one that the women in my family did not feel especially drawn to either of these attractions, particularly the latter one. So I spent a few hours solo in the city.

The Army Museum had wings covering each World War, with an emphasis on France's role. The WWII wing had some interesting information on the German occupation, including this picture of Hitler and two of his sycophants posing in front of the Eiffel Tower. Kind of creepy.

Napoleon's Tomb was in another part of the building under an ornate dome.  The tomb itself is in a sunken circular area that matches the dimensions of the dome above. I think the ladies actually may have been interested to see this, though they deny it.

One of our guidebooks suggested taking a "perfumed handkerchief" on the sewer tour. I disregarded this advice, having no perfume or handkerchiefs available (and being unwilling to look like an idiot besides). I'll admit that the place didn't smell like a field of daisies, but it gave an interesting chronology of how waste water has been handled (or not) throughout the history of Paris. Suffice it to say, the word "cholera" cropped up several times.

Anyhow, stay tuned for further solo adventures in London, where I intend to visit the Wimbledon Museum and attend a soccer match (Fulham vs. Sheffield Wednesday).

Korea Now!

Yes, I know this is a blog about our trip to Europe, but we went to an exhibit at the Museum of Decorative Arts in Paris yesterday, called Korea Now! Apparently, September 2015 through July 2016 is a yearlong celebration of diplomacy between Korea and France.  I had noticed that there were SO MANY Korean tourists here (I could hear them speaking Korean, so I knew for sure--it wasn't just a visual guess), and now I know why.


Korea Now! was my favorite museum exhibition here.  Everything was so beautifully presented and curated.  Clean modern lines with lots of blank spaces in between--that's definitely more of the aesthetic I gravitate toward.

I photographed almost everything because it was all so gorgeous!  Be prepared to feast your eyes.  Here's a smattering of the photos I took.  Grace and Amy, you both particularly would have loved it. 

 Women's traditional hanbok with a modern twist.  There were even some designed by Karl Lagerfeld (but my photo came out blurry).  The way they were presented reminded me of the Alexander McQueen exhibit in NYC.  I could have spent hours and hours looking at them all, but I knew my family members would not appreciate that.

  A hanbok as art, so amazing.

This quirky face spells "ee sang", which is the name of the designer of this "font". 

Children's hanbok with "obangsaek" five-color sleeves.

I loved these curtains that were part of the display.  All white and clean, but the piecework added dimension and interest. I think I might need to make some copies myself for our own house.

 Glasswork inspired by dandelions.

 Interesting glass vases.

 The screen behind Steve and Stephanie is made of paper pulp.

There were even some items in the gift shop from the Korean exhibit, but at these prices, I looked with my eyes, not with my hands.  (Teapot is 220 Euros, or $240 USD.)

For posterity, I want to mention that we also went to the Musee d'Orsay yesterday morning.  I liked the d'Orsay better than the Louvre--it's smaller and more manageable.  Also, personally, I like Impressionist art better than the older art in the Louvre.  This was my favorite painting at d'Orsay, a scene of the Seine River with iconic Paris buildings and bridge.  It was painted by Camille Pissarro, who I thought was a woman but is actually a man.  I didn't take that many photos at the d'Orsay, which I'm sure indicates something.  I think I was pretty museumed out.

French Food

You always hear about how wonderful the food in Paris is, but coming from the SF Bay area, I think we're really spoiled. We have so many choices at home, and the menus are varied and inventive.  Here, even though there's a cafe on every corner, they all serve almost exactly the same items.

Yes, the bread and pastries in Paris are delicious, but being someone who has to watch the carb intake, it's a challenge to find healthier options.  On top of that, all four of us are vegetarians, and it seems that almost everything on the menus, even the salads, have meat in them.

In the above photo, one morning for breakfast, we got this basket of bread and pastries to share.  A lot of the cafes serve these adorable tiny jars of Bonne Maman jam.  Bonne Maman jam always reminds me of my sister-in-law Frieda, because that's what she always buys (and now what I always buy, too).

And zut alor, the prices. Ohh la la!!!  Not only is restaurant food expensive, but the pricing structure is odd. You can get a meaty main course item for about 15 Euros, but then, a regular salad is also 15 Euros.  And a soda or a bottled sparkling water costs 5 Euros, which really adds a chunk to your tab.  (Tap water in Paris does NOT taste good.)

The salad pictured here was called "Top Model" on the menu, I have no idea why, but it was the BEST salad I've had since we've been here.  It actually had some exciting ingredients.  Usually, the salad is nothing but lettuce that hasn't even been torn into bite-sized pieces--talk about not getting much bang for your Euro buck.  This salad has "pamplemousse" (isn't that a surprising word for grapefruit?), which Parisians seem to like on all sorts of things.  The menu also said this salad had "soy beans" but what I got was bean sprouts. 

Along those lines, many of the terms we use in the US are not the same terms used here.  To us, "a la carte" means it's something on the side, but here, it just means it's on the menu.  An "entree" to us means the main course, but here, it means appetizer.

At first, we made the mistake of ordering "a cup of coffee", which here, means a teeny tiny cup of industrial strength espresso.

If we want a cup of coffee like we'd get in the US, my friend Rebecca told us we need to order either a "petite creme" or a "grande creme".

We noticed that some restaurants serve butter with their ubiquitous bread, while some do not.  Adrienne looked it up online and said that only higher end restaurants serve butter.  And even though Adrienne speaks French pretty well, and Steph and I can say the basics, asking for things like butter in French can be exhausting!  (And for our family members, we even find it exhausting to say them in English.  Lisa, are you laughing because you know it's true?) So more often than not, we just do without.

We still haven't gotten those "aux merveilleux" pastries made by Fred.  That's a MUST on our list today!

The Mona Lisa

This is Steve, having been coerced into writing a post about our visit to the Louvre. Like most everyone else, one of the first things we did was go to see the Mona Lisa.

 And I was struck by how the piece is treated more than the painting itself. It is on its own wall behind a glass cover, and there is a barrier that keeps everyone about 20 feet away (not to mention a pair of attendants sitting on either side). With every other painting, you can more or less get as close as you want - you could even touch most pieces if you were willing to risk arrest.

Also, I noticed that the first thing many people did was turn around to take a selfie with the Mona Lisa behind them rather than look at the painting itself. So I slipped off to the side to take a picture of the people taking pictures.

Lines at the Louvre

Yesterday morning, we woke up before the crack of dawn so we could tackle the Louvre. The sun didn't rise until 8:45am in Paris, so that's not really all that early, but for jet-lagged travellers like us, waking up at 7am wasn't much fun.

 Even though we got there just as it was opening at 9am, the line was already snaking around the entire courtyard. We waited for maybe 30 minutes before getting inside.
 

The crowds in front of the Mona Lisa were probably not as bad as they would be later in the day.  Still, it was far from ideal.  Steve is going to write a post about this later on, so you'll hear more on this subject shortly.

Adrienne wanted to see the Islamic art wing because she said Islamic art is disappearing daily, due to all the violence in the middle East.  Not too many people were in this part of the museum.  We barely saw anyone else over there, which is kind of a shame.

I sat on a bench for a little while to rest my poor blistered feet (the Louvre is IMMENSE), and I was glad to notice that even the Louvre uses energy saving fluorescent bulbs in their light fixtures.  Good for them!

Top of the Tower

Last night, we went to the very top of the Eiffel Tower.  I had purchased tickets online months and months ago, picking the date and time very carefully.  According to their website, this particular Sunday night was predicted to be less crowded than other nights that week.  I even researched what time the sun would set that night in Paris and purchased the tickets for 4:30pm, which would get us to the top of the tower just as the sun was setting.  How smart is that!

But despite all my best-laid plans, our Eiffel Tower excursion was a bit of a flop. The crowds there were still enormous, and even with pre-purchased tickets, there were long waits, to get onto the Tower, then to take the elevator to the second level, and an even longer wait for the elevator to the top.

The girls felt that it was not worth waiting for the elevator to the top, since the second level is already plenty high. But I had already paid to go to the top, and Steve felt that since we were there, we should take the opportunity.  After all, who knows if we'll ever have this opportunity again?The sun was setting as we made it to the top of the Tower.

All the lights of Paris came on, and the Tower itself displayed a magical shimmering light show.

However, I have to agree that the girls were right.  Yes, the Tower is gorgeous, but you can't see it when you're actually on it.  It's actually much more enjoyable from the ground, and not so windy and cold from there either. Next time, we'll know better.

From Rockville to Paris, Meeting My Longtime Friend

Yesterday, we met up with my very best friend from high school, Rebecca, and her French husband Guillaume.  Rebecca and I met in junior high school when she was 13 and I was 14, living in good ol' Rockville, Maryland. Although our interactions have been spotty over the past 3+ decades, we did reconnect recently when Rebecca was visiting Berkeley a few months ago.  We agreed upon this rendezvous in Paris then, and thankfully, it came to fruition!

Rebecca and Guillaume live in Le Havre, on the coast of Normandy, about 3 hours from Paris.  They lived in Paris several years ago and said we have to try the falafel from a famous restaurant not far from our apartment in Le Marais district. 

The line outside L'As du Fallafal was unending, twining for blocks down the street!  To be seated in the restaurant, the wait was over 1 hour.  Even the takeout line was a 20 minute wait, which was what we opted to do.  Meanwhile, not even one block away, there was another falafel restaurant with nary a customer!  The workers there tried to lure people into their establishment, but all the savvy diners seemed to know that L'as is where it's at.

The falafel was very good, but maybe we'll have to go back to the unpopular falafel place to get a fair comparison of the two.  It's sort of incomprehensible to me that falafel could be all THAT different in quality.

We found a little enclosed garden courtyard to eat our lunch and get acquainted with family members.

Then we walked over to Place des Vosges, best known for being where Victor Hugo lived when he wrote Les Miserables.  We parted ways after much too short a time, but it was great to see them.  Guillaume is a painter, so he had a lot in common with Adrienne.  They shared website links and have already viewed each other's work.

Earlier in the day, we also stopped at Hotel de Ville, where they had a large exhibit of colorful glass animals.

There is a sign on the platform in front of each animal, which when translated, says, "You may climb on the platform for taking photos with me, but do not climb on top of me or you will break me!"

This Allée is for the Birds

We went down a small street near the Louvre yesterday and found a market just for birds and bird stuff.  I saw a man walking away with filled bird cages in each hand, which presumably, he had just purchased.  This must be the place for Parisians who want birds. 

I guess you get the idea.