Goodbye to Paris

Thursday, July 31

Our limo arrived coming at 9:20 AM, right on time. The driver was great, helping with bags right up to the entrance to security. He also provided great conversation and some insight to living in Paris. Unfortunately, the nice part ended there. getting bags checked was long and arduous (partly due to our flirting with weight restrictions, partly to understaffing). The terminal was very hot and crowded. The staff was indifferent. The bus to the gate was hot and crowded and they left us stewing on it for a long time.

Our plane left Charles de Gaulle for London at 12:20, then left London at 1:50 for SFO, arriving at 4:40 PM where our daughter picked us up. The flight itself was better than the airport experience; British Airways seems to be one of the better carriers as far as the flight itself is concerned).

One back in the Bay Area after a LONG flight, we ended up at Cathleen's house in San Jose. We were asked what kind of food we wanted to go out for and we immediately responded MEXICAN. It's been a long time.

Our four month trip to Europe was great. But it's also wonderful to be back home.

Of course, home is Gualala. We have stacks of accumulated mail and other details waiting for us, but it'll be nice to be back there.

Some Commentary on Paris

Some commentary on Paris

Speed of life. This is a real contrast. You see people rushing around madly and then they stop and enjoy a coffee and croissant or a glass of wine at a sidewalk cafe. Overall, they seem to enjoy life.

Drinks. Tea is more expensive than coffee. Cups of coffee are VERY small, although some cafes will serve Cafe Americain in larger cups. There is no such thing as the bottomless cup, you pay for each serving. Wine is also served in small glasses (often 12 cl). Beer is much more expensive than wine and is sold in 8 oz. bottles or 25 cl on tap (the 50 cl glasses cost as much as 8 Euro). It's easy to run up a big bar bill in a short time. Street theater is great from the cafes on the major streets so the higher price of the drinks is like an admission fee.










Food. At the first, we weren't impressed. But we were eating at places on the main streets which tend to be frequented by tourists. Once we discovered the places on the side streets, it got better. One block off St. Antoine and St. Paul on rue Caron is a square with eight restaurants; and the side streets off that have several more. This is typical. The Marais is the place to go for food. The tables tend to be small and the restaurants are crowded. The noise level in generally high. Most places have outside tables on the sidewalk, but often just a few as space is at a premium. Service can be a bit slow at crowded times as the waiters are really hustling. At first it seemed to take forever to get the check until we learned that the French consider it rude to just put the bill on the table (like they're trying to hustle you out); you have to ask (l'addition, sil vous plais).

Free. The American concept of "free" has not taken hold here. Nothing is free, there's a charge for everything. They don't do loss leaders or things like the "bottomless cup". Of course, as previously mentioned, everything is expensive, sometimes due to being in a large city and some to the poor value of the dollar.

Sales. It's July and just about every store has a SALE (SOLDES) sign out. They try to sell out before going on vacation in August and stocking their Fall and Winter items.

Women. It is said that Parisian women are beautiful and that seems to be true. In general they seem to be slimmer than British and US women are. And they generally dress with style. They carry an aura about themselves that says "I'm sexy and desireable, so eat your heart out!". Sitting in a sidewalk cafe and watching them is a definite pleasure.

Traffic. Parisian drivers are very aggressive but you can see a definite pattern in the traffic; once you acclimate to it you can see that it's a working system. The traffic moves very rapdily on the boulevards and it is very noisy, but the people in the sidewalk cafes just ignore all that. There are scooters everywhere and they are parked at what seems like random, but there's probably some kind of system that we don't see. Add to this the bicycles and it's a great mix that somehow all comes together and works. Because of all the traffic, Paris is generally pretty noisy; we've never heard so many sirens anywhere else. Cars tend to be smaller than in the US because of gas mileage (gas is around $10/gal) and space considerations; scooters are popular for the same reasons. The SmartCar (picture here) has become very popular in western Europe. Manufactured by Mercedes and designed in collaboration with Swatch, it is small, economical, and cool looking. Just right for this environment.

Cleanliness. Over the years, I've heard from friends who visited Paris (and other European cities) about how dirty they are. Our experience here is that, while there are still dog droppings and trash around, they are making a strong effort to clean up. Smoking, while still common, is under serious attack. Trash recepticals are everywhere and there are a lot of free (gratuit--hey, there's something that's free!) public toilets. You also see a lot of street cleaners around, however it is odd to see a one of them flipping a cigarette butt into the street after he just cleaned it. Also there is graffiti everywhere and that makes things look messy.

General: Speaking English has not been a problem in Paris; you can usually make yourself understood. Tourists abound this time of year, so try to travel here in late spring or early autumn. There is free internet available all over Paris, usually in parks; just find one and use your browser, then click on the search for other sites.

Paris is a wonderful city and everyone shoud visit at some time in their life; maybe twice, once when young and again when you're older. But we would recommend that you wait until the dollar improves significantly against the Euro; it's prohibitively expensive right now.

Last Day in Paris

Wednesday, July 30

On our last day in Paris, we loafed. Most of the morning we spend reading in the studio. Then it took way too much time to get online to reserve our airplane seats. We had lunch at Cafe March on Place Marche St. Catherine (the square on rue Caron we previously mentioned). On a hot day, a bowl of gazpacho hits the spot.

In central Paris, most of the buildings have shops on the ground floor and apartments above. Many were at one time city houses which were subdivided. The building walls allow for a narrow sidewalk and have very unimaginative but large doors leading inside to a courtyard and the entrances to the individual units. Seeing Paris from the air shows how this system looks. Italy is very similar. On rue St. Paul, they have turned the ground floor of the interior courts of the buildings on an entire large block into shops accessible from the court, Villages St. Paul. These shops are mostly design studios and decorator items with a few cafes. Today, most were closed. We suspect the owners were either getting a jump on the annual holiday season (starts August 1) or they left early on Bastille Day (July 14) as many do.

Claire was tired and stayed in for dinner. Bill went down the street and had a burger at a Scottish pub, The Auld Alliance at 80 rue Francois Miron, just off Rue Rivoli. Great Scottish ale (Caledonia 80, really smooth and only 3.4%, better than any continental lager) and good conversations with other English speakers (American, Australian and Scots).