Thanksgiving in Paris & more trip report

The Ribera show was marvelous, once you adjust your head to the critical style and habits of French art historians. I was so pleased to be able to get to see it with only a few minutes time in queue. But I noticed that it was also monumental -- going on and on. I worried whether I was showing signs of age, not able to maintain concentration as long as I would like? I also noticed that social distancing conventions were unfamiliar to me; women especially were getting into my space as I suite-ed my visite. It didn't occur to me that I had been in transit since the previous morning and perhaps running low on energy.

The permanent collection at the Petite Palais is full of treasures, and the building itself is a gem, too. I was enlivened by coming across a couple of large portraits by Carolus-Duran, who was the mentor of John Singer-Sargent (my fave). They helped me understand even more about Sargent's influences and evolution.

Across the street at the Grand Palais there was an opening party happening that night for another expo/fundraiser that was invitation only. So, I used the VIP entrance instead of the rope line, and did my don't-understand-French routine. As long as I didn't have anything dangerous in my RS Civita bag they just let me continue in. I had about 15 minutes inside to take pictures of the building (reminiscent of Kew and other Victorian era world's expos) before someone who spoke some English helpfully explained to me that the evening required an invitation so you have to ask the man at the podium to show your name on his list. Thanks so much for your help! My art-appreciation muscles were exhausted for the day anyway, so I walked over to the stand and kept on walking back out the front grand stairs.

I had an hour to kill until my changed-to-dinner reservation so i wandered around the Parc Monceau in the early-arriving darkness, and once again the notion dawned on me that I'm on vacation, so I bought a dessert crepe from the stand next to the manege, which was busy with young families enjoying Saturday evening. The crepe was a little work of art in itself -- the woman behind the griddle could see I was not local, and she seemed to let her inspiration guide her as she added a few accoutrements to my sweet crepe. It looked good enough to eat!

I wandered up and down the rue Levis, which is relatively upscale as market streets go in Paris. Fruit. Veg. Patisseries. Chickens roti-ing behind glass with potatoes catching the drippings. Gorgeous. Heart-warming. I also really like walking in the street whenever I get the chance.

At Le P'tit Canon they put me in the window since I had a reservation, and there was a solo diner next to me who was a rough match to myself. He was having the first of two after-dinner armagnacs. Clearly they all knew one another. The staff were all hot guys, and I realized that all the recommendations I'd seen had been from women. I reconsidered the name and thought, Oh -- it's like a French Hooters for women! As usual in France, the place goes from nearly empty to full in the space of half an hour around 7:30pm. I was trying to gab with the beaus by asking about the menu etc., and the starter of the day was a Lyonnais sausage dish -- what makes it Lyonnais? I asked. They didn't know enough English to explain, but the armagnac drinker beside me gave a nod at the ardoise and raised his eyebrows a bit "C'est bonne" OK, then, I'll start with that. What's the difference between a filet, an entrecote, and a bavette? Again their English not up to an explanation. I'm going to have the cassoulet though, because it's my first dinner in Paris since before the pandemic.

And of course Beaujolais nouveau to drink, since the annual release had just happened the previous Thursday.
(cont'd...)

It was a convivial and chaleuroux repas but

a few big spoonfuls into the tasty cassoulet my battery started flashing red.

I was out of energy. I told the guys that I'm enjoying myself but I've been going for two days straight,
and would it be a faux pas for me to get this wrapped up to go?
They found a suitable carryout container and got me on my way.

Back at the fancy hotel, they had turned down the bed, left me some chocolate and a tray of small madeleines, which were scrumptious. The big-for-Paris-lodging bathroom had a tub in which I managed not to fall asleep.

Jet lag conquered in the first round? We'll find out tomorrow.

I will accelerate the pace of this report as I go along.

On Sunday morning I went to the Guimet museum and the modern art museum - the Guimet was even better than I remembered; I figured it would take me two full days to go through it as much as I'd like.
There was a grand opening of a new Chinese exhibit and also a big tribute to Kazakhstan, but my favorite has always been South Asia. The politics/history of how so much great Indian stuff ended up in France is pretty dramatic.

The modern art museum is such a miracle in more ways than one. They had cleared out some of the floor space to allow more foot traffic during the Olympics but there was still plenty on display.

The Guimet had set up a Korean street food stand on the rooftop cafe space, one of those actually secret rooftop cafes in Paris, and I had some Korean tempura there, which was described as a friture.

The skateboarders were out in the courtyard at the art museum as usual.

https://www.guimet.fr/fr/expositions

https://www.mam.paris.fr/fr/un-artiste-un-chef-doeuvre

My timing for this trip hardly two days into it was turning out to be fantastic -- Ribera; beaujolais; Tang; Kazakhstan a few others --

but it got even better on Sunday evening: the official holiday lighting ceremony of the Champs Elysee was Sunday evening.

But first, an afternoon walking tour of St. Germain!

Very much enjoying your trip report. I love Paris, I’m a museum junkie and I’m hoping to get to Rouen on my next trip in 2026. So I can’t wait for your next installments. Thanks

Great last minute trip! Can’t wait to read the rest of your report.

Yay! You made it back to Europe! I enjoyed reading your report on my favorite European city. Paris is always a good idea!

Avi, what a great report! I’m so glad you were able to make the trip.

Glad your getting out there again!

Avi, I'm loving it so far! I can't wait to hear the rest, but what a wonderful first day!

Avi, I am loving your trip report. I just bought plane tickets for a week in April myself so the research phase of my trip has begun and your post is very useful!

Sunday afternoon

I had reserved ahead with Paris Walks for their tour of St Germain des Pres. Rick has long recommended this company and so many posts here on the Forum agree that their guides are formidable. In my head I have unfairly lumped this neighborhood together with the theme-park-ified Bou Mich and Shakespeare's 'Left Bank' performance / commercialization, so if anyone could rehabilitate it in my esteem I hoped it would be this guide.

And I was right. Wow. Brigitte (who is more of a Bridget) filled every minute of our tour with saucy and insightful stories and she could have gone on longer. Almost everyone in the group had been to Paris before [who is going to focus on St. Germain on their first visit?] so she didn't need to treat us like newbies. She got us both literally and figuratively into the nooks and crannies of the local churches and impasses and courtyards, and she operates the old-fashioned way --- you hand her cash and she makes a note on paper with a pencil by your handwritten name, which I think co-owner Oriel informs her about by phone. No whisper systems, no QR codes or Venmo, just some pictures in sheet protectors stuffed into her handbag. The old ways work best, non?

Rewind:

I didn't want to leave the MAM but knew I had to get over to St. Sulpice for the tour, and I gave up on getting a good lunch to save some time. But riding the 63 over to the 6th changed my attitude -- the tourists walking along the river, the people in American-logo'ed clothes gazing up at the American Cathedral; the freshly shined monuments and statues on the bridges -- it all got me in a bright mood. Walking along the rue de Seine south toward the meeting point, I detoured into the upscale patisserie Maison Mulot, got myself a croissant garni, and perched in the window to watch the world go by for a few minutes.

https://www.maison-mulot.com

The strollers were so upbeat! Many had their phones out, but to check their maps, not to take selfies like those a few blocks over on Bou St Michel. I really liked the streetscape -- dense like the Marais but not claustrophobic. Every time I spoke to a counterperson for a chocolate croissant on this trip I called it a chocolatine, as they do in the south, and it got me a little smile. I stuck a tradition in my RS civita and jogged over to the tour.

Brigitte remarked on how I seemed to nosh my way through the whole walk, with my fresh baguette and squirreled away snacks. She told us about the origins of the later additions to the big churches and included the story of the Butter Tower at the Rouen Cathedral, and I said that I would be there in a few days and would relate it to the version they gave. She made a few off-color Joan of Arc jokes with me as we moved along. If only she knew how much attention I spend on butter :-)

In the course of the gabbing in the group as we walked, it came out that the lighting of the Champs Elysee was later that night. Scheduled for 5:30pm, though, Brigitte said, so you'd miss the beginning. Ha! I thought to myself -- I know the transit system. I can jog across the river and get on the line 1 and get off in the middle of the Ch El. She was sure it was 5:30pm but she also wondered if it would be dark enough by then to appreciate the spectacle. Oh well, she turned her attention back to pointing out the windows of the assignation apartments of Gerard Depardieu (boo hiss) and the unlabeled side-chapel murals by Delacroix (yay wow).

The tour wrapped up below the atelier where Picasso worked on Guernica, and I had thought earlier I would occupy myself thereabouts until Chez Fernand opened and I could get my bœuf à la Bourguignonne fix. But instead I headed to line 1

(cont'd)

Fortuitous

It was difficult for me to renounce my attachment to dinner at Chez Fernand, but it seemed like a good decision right away -- I crossed the river on the Pont Neuf just as the sun set. Pinks and light blues to the west and over the Tuileries filled the sky. The lights on the Samaritaine dept store were starting to do an imitation of a fireworks show. That minty block beside the store (r d l Monnaie, get it?) has been pedestrianized and was bustling with window-lickers and apero-seekers who almost managed to keep the illegal acrobatic street performers in the background. Mo Pont Neuf is not line 1 so I needed to brave the 1st arr for two blocks to get to Mo Louvre/Rivoli,
and in that short walk it was clear that everyone knew that they themselves were No 1 -- the sense that they had made it to the center of the action, that they were winners in the attention/social media economy, was palpable.

Xmas music was piped out to the sidewalk. I slithered inside just long enough to look at the wreaths and lights decorating the interior and to feel a couple of cashmere Burberry scarves (they had anti-theft thingamabobs attached, darn). I chuckled at the spelling of 'BVLGARI' and moved on.

I got off the 1 at Franklin Roosevelt rather than the bottom station Clemenceau or the top station George V aiming to be not too close but not too far from the Arc de Triomphe, checked the quartier plan for the right staircase, and walked up directly into the sound of a marching band playing the can-can. I was getting giddy.

The band's name was Band' A Leo (ha ha) and it was surrounded by family and supporters. They stopped every 50 meters or so and did a few songs beside the can-can, and when they went into "Oh, Champs Elysee" the crowd spontaneously joined in as a choral accompaniment. It was genuinely moving -- Fraternité in action. A conga line snaked by me. That snippet became an ear-worm for the rest of my trip, and I realized that Prince borrowed it for the chorus of Raspberry Beret. [Background--last year's Halloween costume was a raspberry beret with a palette, paintbrush, striped pullover, and a curly mustache. Children pointed at me and said "Look -- he's a artist!"]

At this point, around 5:30pm, I was honestly thinking to myself "I could live here."

The stage in front of the Arc was mobbed, and there were jumbotrons teasing us with a countdown that kept going 10 9 8 over and over again.

Within half an hour my mood had swung 180 degrees. (or whatever that is in celsius)
The jumbotrons weren't teasing us -- the machinery was malfunctioning.
When would the lights finally light up? No one knew an answer. In the meanwhile, minor celebrities vamped onstage and local dignitaries and chamber of commerce gave speeches that would still have been boring if I had understood them. The drizzle changed its mind several times about getting stronger or weaker.
And to while away the time waiting for the big switch to be thrown, there was the glitz and glam of International boutiques and tasteless fast food marketing -- Five Guys has made it to Paris!!

The ultimate frustration was that I would have had plenty of time to go back to the room and tidy up and make a decent dinner plan if only the organizers had been honest to the crowd and said that they were aiming for 7:30pm now. All I had to do beside hate on Five Guys and do mock countdowns with the Spanish college girls shivering beside me was to indulge my prejudices and note that there were such a wide range of Arabs making the scene -- from friendly full-abaya types to skintight leather pants and stilettos with a designer handbag hanging off their elbow. In other places maybe the Americans or the Chinese nouveau riche would register more but here in this mise en scene the Emirati 13th-removed royalty caught my eye.

Kim, I can find other ways to express my distaste for commercialism along the Ch El of course and I will. Wait until I get to the cemetery for more on mass tragedies.

Coming up when I get a chance: how do you spend a rainy Monday in Paris?

[note that I missed seeing whichever comments got us in trouble with the webmaster, but I hope everyone appreciates my honest account of moment-to-moment reactions]

"...I hope everyone appreciates my"

I for one appreciate it. As someone who struggles to make a connection with Paris seeing such a viewpoint as yours helps a lot.

local dignitaries and chamber of commerce gave speeches that would
still have been boring if I had understood them.

...French Hooters for women.

This is one of the most uniquely written Trip Reports I've read. I'm hooked.
Hurry back to finish it.

So, how do you spend a rainy Monday in Paris? Especially when so many things are closed?

The obvious answer is to go to the Louvre, but I usually resist the obvious answer,

so instead I went to the Musée Jacquemart- André.

This family were serious Italophiles, so their collecting and decor and habits leaned heavily towards Italian art, and to turn that up a notch the new visiting exhibit in the newly refurbished galleries was on items from the Borghese Gallery in Rome. (This exhibit mentioned elsewhere on the Forum)

https://www.musee-jacquemart-andre.com/en/masterpieces-borghese-gallery

Right at the top of that webpage in red it says:
Due to high demand, online booking is strongly recommended. If you buy on site, you'll have to wait a long time.

Recall that Rick has updated his advice to something like "if a popular attraction lets you reserve ahead, then reserve ahead" and if it doesn't you should go early or late. The ticket line when I arrived went all the way out to the street.

It was more than the usual drizzly grisaille that day, so between the metro and the museum I stepped out of the downpour and into a Pret for a quick petit déjeuner . I wouldn't normally give my custom to a chain, but it was bright, dry, and there were bins with fresh fruit. Fresh fruit! Not something you run into in European cafes generally.

The museum has joined the tech revolution: there are QR codes at the start of the visite that let you download a multimedia guide in the language of your choice. I wasn't heading back out in the rain anytime soon, so I put the guide on my iPad mini and connected my ear buds and joined the stream of humanity flowing through the mansion. It is great to see rich people's stuff in its intended location, famous artist's work stuffed and hanging on the walls like safari kills instead of in a museum behind a rope. Imagine the 19th century rooms in the Carnavalet but you can walk around in them instead of past them.

Guides are usually worth using -- this one explained that Ed and Nelly were into the latest tech as well as fine art, and when they built this pocket-size Versailles in the 1870s they used hydraulic lifts in the basement to raise and lower the partition walls in the rooms whose windows face the streetside lawn, so servants could dismantle the wall hangings and the walls themselves, opening up the entire main floor as a ballroom that could hold parties for a thousand people. A thousand people wearing fashions that took up considerable space, too. I think 80% of the people admiring the frippery in those rooms now never notice that the walls are like convention center dividers for their 1%er guests. No one can miss the ornate mezzanines (more Italian) they designed for musicians and dramatists, though.

Around 11:30am the crowd seemed to thin and it became a pleasure to take in the furnishings and the Titians and such. What I didn't realize was that the museum cafe, which is a hot ticket, doesn't take reservations -- first come, first served. So when I took a break at 12:15pm to go get lunch, the dining room was complet already. Major oopsy. If I wanted lunch I would have to stand in the line. The clever folks had queued a little early and gotten in the first seating.

I had to wait over 45 minutes. I had the second half of the guide on my iPad to listen to, but after that I had nothing to turn my jaundiced eye upon beside the stream of tourists gushing about the convergence of the entrances to the food, the cloakroom, the boutique, and the galleries. My spirits were not buoyed by what I saw. I concede that I undoubtedly put words in their mouths, but there were many people who were more concerned with being seen dining in a room with Titians on the wall than with appreciating Titian and his art. [background note: I did some in-depth looking at the Titians in the Prado some years back] Women of a certain style, especially, were anxious about doing this cafe --

-- and it interferes with my idolization of Paris living to have to acknowledge that for a good many visitors the attraction involves seeing themselves being seen. No one was so gauche as to hold up a selfie stick, yet people were checking their clothes and their makeup , discreetly , a bit too often. I should also mention that the winter garden room in the mansion was being used for a wedding rehearsal where the couple's photographer and a handful of assistants were trying to capture both the figures and their surroundings in the best light. There's more than one way to construe 'the best light' though.

Lunch was very good. Since the walls and ceiling are covered in priceless art, lighting is provided by shaded floor lamps at each table, such that the scene reminded me of some Impressionist interiors by Sargent or Degas. A yacht-race-winner size silver bowl in the center held several bottles of chillin' champagne at the ready. I had the mocktail du jour, which was red, my favorite mocktail color. I don't have my notes with me right now so I can't be specific about the butter they provided when I asked for some. For me the most important French phrase after Bonjour and Merci is "un peu de beurre pour le pain, svp?" For the plat I chose the saltimbocca (more Italian), which was plated beautifully. Topped with some microgreens and two edible flowers, one yellow the other purple. It was served with new potatoes that were actually new potatoes -- if you've seen Jacques Pepin demonstrate how potatoes are conventionally pared into various shapes, you know that often small potatoes are formed rather than grown, but these were the real mccoy. [dammit, Jim, I'm a doctor not a chef] . Desert was the cafe gourmand but with hot chocolate, and it was merveilleux! A perfect pistachio macaron, an orange creme brulee, a crumble with chantilly, and what looked like a rice pudding or vanilla mousse turned out to be a very moist tiramisu (more Italian), and very moist is my favorite tiramisu texture. The red wine was perhaps a cotes du Rhone? Again, no notes handy.

https://www.musee-jacquemart-andre.com/en/nelie

This brings together two related topics -- the RS advice about either make a reservation ahead or go early or late and the issue of how to weigh/prioritize your use of time. Two+ hours including the wait for a great lunch at this hot address (a bit pricey) when the previous day I had a croissanwich and a chocolatine perched in a traiteur window in St. Germain for less than half an hour and less than ten euro. Even with a reservation, is a long lunch worth the time? I used to pretty unequivocally say yes, but now I'm not so sure. Especially when you aren't choosing between a great lunch and a bad one, but between a great one and a good one. It frazzles my skin crawl to know that plenty of tourists are getting the worst of both worlds over by Shakespeare's with cookie-cutter food at high prices in caricaturish surroundings (just as true in Fisherman's Wharf in SF) but that's not the choice that is germane for me -- I can spot a good sandwich or quiche and find a spot (when the weather cooperates) to enjoy it, and there are so many other things to do with my time and attention besides critique the butter they bring when I request it.

Anyhoo, after lunch I continued stuffing the mansion's contents into my eyeholes, now with the flood of poseurs replaced by schools of schoolchildren, and enjoying the borrowed Borghese masterpieces in the special exhibit. You might say that it was the cafe gourmand size version of the Borghese Gallery. I didn't notice any porphyry, another favorite color (and texture) of mine, but there was at least one bust employing it outside by the oval courtyard.

What would my third try at avoiding the sunsetter syndrome yield that evening? Stay tuned.

The third time was not the charm.

Dommage!

Somehow my brain insisted that we should catch the last hour or so of the Gustave Moreau Museum back in the 9th, but it didn't allocate the resources needed to get there adroitly. I proved lacking in ept. Inept. Had trouble with the bus, my feet, and took a while to get there, and when I did, there was a handwritten note on the front door apologizing for an unforeseen closure. Oy.

Wish I had looked at their website earlier, so I could see how wifty they seem to be:
https://musee-moreau.fr/fr/informations-pratiques

I had broken another basic rule -- use the facilities when you can. I left the J-A without going, thinking I would go when I got to the Moreau. The situation was becoming urgent. I walked into the business center across the street and gave the reception a chance to practice their Franglais, and succeeded in gaining access to a WC.

https://www.formeret.fr/en/our-spaces/space-la-rochefoucauld

I was ready for an apero. The famous La Rotonde brasserie is there on rue Saint-Lazare, but once again, too obvious for me, so I went into the Café du Mogador, the spot for people not concerned with being seen, and had a pastis Ricard.

https://cafedumogador.fr/fr/gallery

I decided I might as well have a snack, and to show you just how cranky I was, I complained to the barman when he gave me the English version of the menu. "You spoke to me in English, so I thought you would want the English menu!" he riposted.

Touché.

I'd had my fancy meal already, so I ordered a croque monsieur with salad and fries. Meh, non?
When it comes out from the kitchen the barman throws it in front of me. We're this close, monsieur, I am thinking.

It was delicious. Easily the best croque monsieur I can remember having. And the butter he gave me for the bread was intriguingly yellow. My scruff settled back inside my collar.

Lesson: a generous amount of béchamel can solve many problems.

I am going to post my mid-week break in Rouen as a separate trip report and then come back here to go over my Thanksgiving weekend experience in the Marais.

Teaser: the French know next to nothing about Thanksgiving, but do they take any notice of Black Friday?

Indeed they do.

Hello Avi,
Thanks for the report so far! I am reliving my visite to Musee Jacquemart-Andre. It wasn't crowded when I was there and I didn't have to wait long to be seated at le Nelie where I also enjoyed the saltimbocca. I am also remembering standing in the rain in the dark morning waiting for the Luxembourg RER station to open, ha!
I will keep going back to Paris.

I was in Rouen overnight in 2023 and I was a bit disappointed, so I will read about your visit.

Thursday afternoon I took a non-stop train from Rouen back to Paris, and checked in to Hotel de Nice at 5pm.

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/rouen-side-trip-report-late-november

This has been in Rick's lodging listings for more than twenty years, and I don't think it has changed at all, except for getting pricier. I think of it as two star luxury at three star prices, but it is worth it -- location is on the rue de Rivoli (or one flight up) and I was on the 5th floor in room 16. How to pronounce '16' became my running joke for my whole stay, because this is a spot where you turn your key in to the desk when you go out, and the doors have those turn-twice-around-plus-a-little-more locks. I booked by email correspondence and paid €200 per night. The room had low ceilings and a low bed (which I liked) and two sound-proofed windows that looked over the backyard of the Caserne Napoleon [I see now that the backyard is called Place Baudoyer] below with the towers of Notre Dame in the distance. When you step out onto the rickety balcony/eaves you can see the sun setting behind Nanterre in one direction and the night coming from the bois de Vincennes in the other. Major plus for me was a bathtub. Yay! One of those knees-bent tubs with a tricky partial glass shower partial-blocker but still enjoyable. Not enjoyable: no toiletries supplied besides towels and a soap dispenser in the shower. If I'd known I would have held on to some of the fancy potions and powders that the other hotel provided. Fresh towels the next day were left on the radiator by the door -- take that high-tech towel rail in the Hyatt! The tiny front desk shared the .5th floor with a kitchen and a living room that is rearranged for breakfast. All very thoughtful and hippily decorated, and would be tempting if there wasn't Paris waiting outside.
https://www.hoteldenice.com/chambres-hotel-familiale-paris-marais/

I had some strange nervous energy so I went for a walk to the Panthéon, poking around for new developments on the way -- right away you find that the Pont Louis-Philippe and other small bridges have been pedestrianized, luring you across the river. Linger on the bridge a moment to watch the dinner cruise boats getting ready to depart.

I luckily fell into the Eglise SAINT-ÉTIENNE-DU-MONT during mass and took a seat in the back, and it calmed me down. Very heartening to see such a monumentally pretty church being used regularly. I stuck around a few minutes to take pictures afterwards but the deacon shoo'ed me out pretty quickly. The lingering parishioners seemed to be mostly Spanish-speaking guestworkers and some students from the nearby Sorbonne.

https://www.saintetiennedumont.fr
https://www.saintetiennedumont.fr/a-propos/visiter-leglise/

My OCD repulsion for the obvious choice propelled me into a British pub for dinner, the Bombardier. Fish & Chips with mushy peas and a pint. I asked for Smithwick's because I love the way it's pronounced with most of the letters missing, and they had something close to it.

https://www.bombardierpub.fr

Tight quarters in the pub and the couple I was rubbing shoulders with was from Paris, so I tried engaging them on the topic of foreign dining -- what foreign restaurants do they like here in Paris besides English? Thai? Peruvian? Sushi? I thought they might be fans of creole / New Orleans / jambalaya dishes since they weren't so explorer-y but they had never heard of it. Show us a picture! So I pulled up a tasty photo of jambalaya on my phone and showed it to them. "Oh-- you mean paella!" Not quite, but ok.

On my way back to the hotel I wandered around the Notre Dame fencing (one week too early to get inside) and some other in-process projects, and did those things you're supposed to do on the pointy parts of the island.

The night desk attendant at the hotel gave me some shampoo samples.

Friday was chilly but sunny and clear -- buildings and trees cast shadows! I was on the move -- 21K steps recorded on my fitbit.

There was a lot more going on at the National Archives museum than you would guess:

The formal garden in the front court is familiar to most of us, but there is a smaller more secluded leafy garden to the right as you face the building that would make a great picnic spot in the high/hot season. Note that the gate may need to be opened, and the signage on it reading 'Interdit' means 'enter here.' I had it practically to myself on this Friday.

The main exhibit about the archives is called The Archives in 100 Documents, which is a riff on the beloved British Museum series from years ago called something like the World in 100 Objects.

https://www.archives-nationales.culture.gouv.fr

My favorite items included the keys to the cells in the Bastille prison, and complaints sent between various aristocratic admin support offices about sloppy and inconsistent handwriting, which led to laws that standardized calligraphy and certification of clerical staff in fluent French. I knew about the federal imposition of Parisian French on the rest of the country, making people use French even though it was not the native language of most of the country, and certainly not the Empire(s) but i hadn't thought about correspondence and recordkeeping and court testimony. Federal diktat continues to be both a blessing and a curse to this day.

The mansion/chateau has its own interesting history -- the Hôtel de Soubise was a royal hangout and there are furnished rooms to gawk at, including a bedroom that has like twenty sidechairs for hangers-on to hang around in when the Duke or whoever was having breakfast in bed. As happens in other museums nowadays, contemporary artists are invited to do site-specific commentary pieces in these displays, not unlike the cutesy graffiti that go on street name signage. One funny (ha-ha or uh-oh?) thing here was a coatrack had an added orange-life-vest such s refugees crossing into Europe are wearing in the TV coverage, except this one had some delicate and expensive embroidery on it, fit for a fleeing king, perhaps.

A large special exhibit about the history of the French textile industry and how state/royal/federal support of it was key to the spread of those industries and the lingering notion among other countries that France makes the good stuff. I couldn't help but think that this was trying in some measure to counter the current concerns about fast fashion and the offshoring of wasteful and polluting clothing manufacture. Anyhoo, if you paid attention in Lyon to the guide when they were talking about silk production and trade, and in Nimes when they were talking about the dye industry and canvas, then this exhibit will make sense and expand on your understanding. And there were sample fabrics to feel up, too. No live models, though, darn.

There was also a new exhibit about the engineering and engineers of the Eiffel Tower construction, so if you really like the recent documentaries by Ken Burns et al on the story of Madame Eiffel, this would whet your appetite.

https://www.archives-nationales.culture.gouv.fr/made-in-france

https://www.archives-nationales.culture.gouv.fr/en_GB/web/guest/hotels-de-soubise-et-de-rohan

But wait, there's more. Spread out through the salons and ballrooms are display cases with significant documents like treaties and proclamations that got me wow-ing over and over. For example, one had the Edict of Nantes.

This was the treaty that settled the Hundred Years War and (sort-of) legalized Protestantism -- a very big deal, and it's just sitting there with very little English explanation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edict_of_Nantes

There are also some very big important maps like those in the Vatican that you aren't allowed to see, unless you are.

Oh how I wish I had more days scheduled in Paris this September! What a great trip report!

One odd oversight at the Archives -- their boutique did not have any logo'd pens or journals. Who wouldn't want a swoopy signature pen with the National Archives logo on it, or a nice pocket journal? I did get their pencil.

Next I went over to the Picasso museum, where the new special exhibit was about Jackson Pollock's early years, and his connections with Picasso's crowd. And crowded it was. I don't want to sound elitist (??) but if 95% of your visitors only know three things about Picasso -- famous, Guernica, womanizer -- then how much can you really accomplish with your curation besides showing some samples of things that aren't Guernica ? Apart from that conundrum, I feel like the curators here have never gotten past the '90s when it comes to display and wall text habits.

The older part of the building is pretty interesting, though. Here's a text that caught my eye:

"This room features rare historical evidence of the Hotel Salé's interior design. On his arrival in 1728, the new owner, Nicolas Le Camus, initiated ambitious renovation work to make the building more comfortable. One of the changes included deciding to turn the cabinet de toilet on the first floor into a dressing room, which he lined with panelling decorated with flowers and gardening tools. In the 19th century, while the panelling remained unchanged, the room changed function.
It became the office of the deputy director of the École Centrale des Arts et Manufactures, which occupied the building at the time. When the latter was chosen to house the Musée National Picasso, the wood panelling was dismantled and reinstalled on the second floor. With the museum's latest renovation work, the panelling was moved once again to decorate this room."

One painting that I was unaware of before now was his sort-of editorial commentary about the Korean War:

Massacre en Corée
Vallauris, 18 janvier 1951
Huile sur contreplaque

but accompanying text says that Picasso denied that it was specifically about the US in Korea, that it was anti-war more generally, and it certainly echoes the Goya painting.

There's a children's path through the museum and I found this exercise listed beside a portrait of a cat catching/murdering (saissisant) a bird, from the spring of 1939, notable [and quotable here]:

Penses-tu que ce tableau ne représente qu'un chat et un oiseau? Quand un sujet semble parfois difficile, les peintres peuvent utiliser une image plus simple pour l'ab. rder. Pablo Picasso réalise cette œuvre à la fin des années 1930. À cette période, l'atmosphère est particulièrement tendue en Europe, où les conflits se multiplient. Peindre cette attaque animale lui permet de dénoncer habilement la violence humaine en réalisant une œuvre plus politique qu'elle n'y paraît!

There is a sandwicherie on the upstairs terrace of the museum, another of those 'hidden' rooftop cafes in the city. I had a quick smoked chicken baguette sandwich and a few minutes to chew over their presentation of Pollock's origins before zooming over to another sort of art display from past age.

As Sacré Cœur up on Montmartre shows, a church doesn't have to be too old to be special. Right there in the Marais is the 19th century Saint-Denys du St-Sacrement.

https://www.saintdenys.net/visiter-l-eglise

Delacroix painted some of the side-chapel murals here, too. The church was designed by the same architect who did the chapel at Cimetière du Père-Lachaise.

Among the notable items in this church is a chapel honoring the first millennial generation saint, Carlo Acutis (1991-2006) who was a web designer and soccer enthusiast. He died of leukemia and is interred in Assisi. Since then he has been credited with several healing miracles.

Pope Francis approved his canonization this past summer.

https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2024-05/pope-francis-saints-decrees-miracle-acutis-allamano.html

The statue of Carlo here in the Marais shows him in bluejeans and a polo shirt holding a bible and a rosary, with one foot on a soccer ball, accompanied by a friendly floppy-eared dog. I haven't checked to see what the dog's name is or if it is credited with any miracles. In millennial fashion, there are QR codes you can scan that will take you to his youtube page.

There is an impressive organ, restored in 1969, and several nifty architectural elements in the church, but the main distinction is its being all in on Mary and her superpowers. Carlo was a major Mary devotee (fanboy?) which may be why he gets a prime spot here.

I would have been fascinated in seeing the Edict of Nantes, that piece of religious tolerance by royal decree.

Was the counterpart also displayed, the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes by Louis XIV, an ill-advised move and one that affected also Prussian-German history. Fascinating to see these primary sources.

Cimetière du Père-Lachaise.

Friday was my only sunny day in Paris so what better way to spend the afternoon outdoors than at the cemetery?

I like Rick's plan of attack -- take the metro to Gambetta and then work your way back from the far side of the plot -- which claims to be Paris' largest open green space.

Between the metro and the entrance there is a florist -- not unusual for a cemetery, non? and I stopped in on a whim/inspiration/whatever that French expression is for a whim/inspiration to get a boutonnière for my jacket for the big American Club dinner later that night. The duo running the shop exuded friendliness and pleasantry, and even though they didn't speak much English they understood what I meant by a boutonnière, and got me a yellow rose that went perfectly with my yellow striped school tie and my new marigold raincoat. They get great reviews:

A.c. Simon
14 Av. du Père Lachaise, 75020

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Cimetière+du+Père-Lachaise/@48.8626013,2.392759,16z/data=!4m6!3m5!1s0x47e66d8b5c69a785:0xa1cf6127530b6419!8m2!3d48.861472!4d2.3934725!16zL20vMDJmcmZr?hl=en-US&entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI0MTIxMS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

On to the hike through the land of the dead!

Very nice detailed report, I am a frequent visitor to Paris and have bookmarked this.

Avirosemail,
I might be missing your sense of humor.....however, inderdit was one of my French vocabulary words yesterday on Duolingo and it doesn't mean "enter here". My apologies, if it was a joke : )

Vandabrud, You are correct. I assumed it was a tongue-in-cheek joke, but if taken seriously, it could get a reader who chooses to follow what Avi has implied in trouble. Yes, it means forbidden.

Interdit does not mean 'enter here'? Wow, is my face red. At least that's the only mistake I made on this trip.

The road at the east entrance to the cemetery is under renovation now; the info kiosk and WC were both closed but should be refreshed and open by the time the season arrives for 2025.

Rick has an upbeat audio tour available through his app which overlaps with the celebrity tours at various points but also includes a good look at the memorial statuary for the victims of the many 20th century wars and genocides, not all of which were the fault of Germany, just mostly. You can get a better sense of French modern history by taking in the markers of the various opposition political parties which are generally concentrated along the inside edge of the circular road around the grounds, across from the more recent memorials to victims of mass natural and unnatural disasters on the outer edge.

Two funerals were finishing up at the columbarium chapel as I came by, and to avoid disturbing them I climbed up to the upper gallery/cloister to skirt around and inadvertently happened upon some other notable figures from the 20th century.

-Paul Ruinard was a cyclist on the French Olympic team and later team manager/coach in the '20s
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Ruinart
- ICI SE TROUVAIT L'URNE CONTENANT LES CENDRES DE JEAN MOULIN (1899 - 1943)
CHEF DE LA RÉSISTANCE, 1er PRÉSIDENT DU CONSEIL NATIONAL DE LA RÉSISTANCE, AVANT SON TRANSFERT AU PANTHÉON EN 1964
-INCONNU INCINÉRÉ 8-1-44

There were fresh flowers on the memorial to the August 2005 plane crash in Martinique, to the Sept 1989 crash in Niger, the memorial to Jewish infants murdered by Nazis in 1942 is very moving -- indistinct metal silhouettes imply the lives they never got the chance to live.

There were a lot of Communists who supported the Resistance yet survived the war. On the stone AUX VOLONTAIRES FRANÇAIS DES BRIGADES INTERNATIONALES ESPAGNE 1936-1939 there were a handful of smaller signs for specific fighters, like the brigadiste Jeanne Oppman, and Boris Guimpel who headed the 35th Division of the Spanish Republican Army.
A stone for the French commanders in Lebanon in the '40s has been defaced.

Gertrude Stein's grave would be easy to miss except for the many small stones placed on it by Jewish tradition.

Better cared for is the wall where it's traditionally thought that the leaders of the Paris Commune were shot in May 1871.

There are several death camps memorialized that I haven't heard of -- like Flossenburg, which was liberated by the US 3rd Army in April of '45 -- the monument is very stylish -- apparently the inmates were digging granite for German construction projects, so the monument must be made out of high-quality granite from that area near the Czech border.

If you haven't been here recently you might not have seen the grave of one of the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists who were murdered by Muslim extremists in 2015 -- Tignous (real name Bernard Verlhac) He has a quote on the stone from Paul Eluard, the surrealist, who is also buried in this cemetery. Instead of flowers there is a pen cup on his marker in which people leave markers and crayons. The quote is "Tu rêvais d'être libre et je te continue."

Jim Morrison's grave has been fenced off, which doesn't stop many people but the alternative is to leave a wad of chewing gum on a nearby tree trunk.

I found myself wondering not only how people from different countries understand what these graves are doing here but also how different generations take this in. There were some mopey rebellious teens slouching around, you know the type, with the hair and the clothes and the music. What were they imagining? What were any of us imagining?

I had thought I would go and do some mopey rebellious slouching of my own around Belleville but I lingered too long and had to get back to the Marais to make it to the big Thanksgiving shindig.

RE : "...just mostly" I wonder if Timothy Snyder would agree with that based on his book, "Bloodlands" (highly recommended relative to Nazi and Soviet totalitarianism ) or Henry Kissinger on Germany's solo responsibility based on his book, "Diplomacy. "

@Fred -- do those two come to conclusions any different from Mark Mazower in "Dark Continent" ?

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/50079.Dark_Continent

There's certainly no shortage of responsibility to spread around when it comes to sins of commission and omission, but the master race is more equal than others, certainly by their own lights.

what, a pleasant surprise!

The American Club had rented out the recently agrandissemented Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature for their swanky Thanksgiving dinner party, and swanky it was. Many of the gents wore black tie and tux; many of the dames were sporting elegant couture. I had on my gray Eddie Bauer travel blazer and gray slacks with a yellow school tie and the yellow rose I got earlier at the florist in the lapel. Let's not talk about my footwear. OK, if we must -- I was wearing the same Columbia brown leather hiking boots that I wore all week, with red bootlaces. I wasn't the poorest dressed man at our table, and that's all that matters, amirite?

https://www.chassenature.org/le-musee

The dinner was called for 7:30 to 10 pm and at midnight it was still crowded and swingin'. Yadda yadda yadda and I didn't get back to my own bed until three in the morning. At about 9 am Saturday I awoke out of my drunken stupor, pulled open the curtains and there in the square directly across rue de Rivoli was a marché. Zounds!

This was like a Parisian dream come true: I pulled on some clothes and my boots and in a minute was doing some window-licking through the piazza -- after a once around to get the lay of the land I bought some cheese and fruit and bread, all the sellers chipper and happy to help; I didn't need any effort to communicate. There were roti chickens and such so if you had an apt. or somesuch you could have put together dinner easily, and at non-Parisian prices. This unexpected surprise knocked the hangover right out of me. I don't recall seeing it mentioned in any of the mentions about the Hotel de Nice that it comes with its own Saturday market.

https://cityseeker.com/paris/396093-place-baudoyer

On a last-moment whim I decided to join the 10:30 am Paris Walks guided tour of the Marais -- Oriel answered my message asking if the tour was happening quickly and the starting point was at the next Metro stop along the r d Rivoli. Easy peasy. I get over there and who do I see stamping her feet by the stairs but Brigitte herself! We had a chance to get caught up on how our weeks had gone; she didn't expect me since I wasn't on her list and when I told her Oriel answered my demandette she was surprised again because Oriel never answers on the weekends.

Why take a tour of the Marais when you have spent plenty of time there yourself already? you ask. Don't be concerned for me. Brigitte had more stories and hidden corners to show and tell us. I again snacked the whole time, and she side-eyed my wedge of Cantal and mock-affronted "Where's my piece?" I gave her a bit That's a good one she praised it, and I continued to skate happily through the morning. "How can you stand it with just a jacket?" she exclaimed. It was cold. I think back on it now and I don't know where I got the energy.

I think nine of us made it to the end of the tour in Place des Vosges (the oldest square in Paris) and I got a great pic of us huddled together hands in pockets and shoulders scrunched against the chill. Brigitte has a long dress over thermals and a leather jacket with wool gauntlet-thingamabobs and a scarf wrapped severally around her chin, but her fingers are uncovered so she can point.

12:30 pm on a Saturday in the Marais is a bad time to be looking for lunch ("The lines will be miserable!" shivered Brigitte.) So I didn't try -- I went over the the Victor Hugo apartments in the corner of the square and went through the tribute to monsieur Les Misérables himself. Like every museum I visited this trip it was better than I expected. Gives a great sense of the position striving and successful artists were in when the royalty had left the stage (or Place).

https://www.maisonsvictorhugo.paris.fr

I'm looking at some of the illustrations of his books and one style catches my eye especially.

Hi,

I am not familiar with that book as I am with Timothy Snyder. In terms of sheer numbers who perished, I keep in mind that Stalin had killed, eliminated policy-wise 5 million (at least) before Hitler began the war. I suggest looking at Snyder's works.

Dang if it isn't by Albert Fourié, the artist I noticed for the first time in Rouen at the fine arts museum courtyard!

• The art of being a grandfather Albert Fourié (1854-1937). "L'art d'être grand-père". Huile sur toile. s.d. Paris, Maison de Victor Hugo.

Turns out Fourié worked for both Hugo's and Flaubert's publishers, doing illustrations for his better-quality printings of his books.

Didn't I say how much I love it when bits and pieces of a trip connect what you see together? Swoon.

Since I've been home I learned that I missed another opportunity -- the Fourié family is buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery and I could have paid respects when I was there yesterday afternoon.

One drawing he did is of Hugo sitting on a park bench with his pooky girl Jeanne in a bassinet beside him, eyes on the little imp but a notepad in his other hand in case inspiration strikes. The flowers and leaves are waving in the background.

Albert Fourié (1854-1937)
• Jeanne endormie
Huile sur toile, vers 1888
Don Paul Meurice pour la création du musée en 1903

So, I didn't get to lunch until about 2 pm, but that worked out pretty well, too

@Fred

This isn't the right thread for us to haggle over who gets first place in line at the entrance to hell between Stalin and Hitler; I will start another thread in the books area here on the forum about Tim Snyder's place in recent historiography.

Let me be frank with you, Fred. You like Germany. I generally do not. I believe that you tend to give German evildoers an easier time than they deserve because you see them as exceptions, not the typical example of German culture and accomplishment. [Much like we hear from CAIR and other Muslim interest groups that terrorists don't represent the real Islam, you (I think) consider the dark side of German history and character to be the oopsy/atypical part of its collective personality.] You tend towards German apology (in the rhetorical sense). Here on the Forum you often bring up destruction and deaths caused by the Allies in WWII or France in its conflicts with its neighbors as though that death and destruction was somehow equivalent to the death and destruction caused by the Germanic aggressors. It isn't.

If your main takeaway from Snyder's 'Bloodlands' was that Stalin was worse than Hitler because he was responsible for even more deaths, then you are severely under-appreciating what Snyder has been up to. To go further and claim that everyone's hands are dirty so Germany shouldn't be singled out is an even worse rationalization. (Not least because it's irrational.) If the record shows that a friend of ours murdered a man it does not lessen the crime to raise our hand and say 'but I know someone who killed two men.'

I do not think you need to justify your sympathy for Germany. I don't think I need to justify my antipathy. I'm still occasionally guilty of spotlighting the unlikeable things there, as you are of downplaying them. There are so many wonderful things there and I appreciate it when you share them with us.

To connect this comment back to travel, let me say that it's up to each of us as conscientious travelers not to take the well-worn paths through European tourism that file down the sharp edges and simplify the stories to the point where there are good guys and bad guys and not so much gray area in between.

Very good and interesting read. I too spent Thanksgiving weekend in Paris, but with a different itinerary. I arrived Thursday just after noon and stayed in the 1st Arr. Thursday was the Musée de l'Orangerie, which was much too crowded to enjoy, a walk up the garden to the Petite Palace, and then back down through the Christmas market after which I checked into my hotel. After dark I went back to the market, got something to eat, and just walked the streets back and forth to the Opera.

The next day was planned for the d'Orsay, I had a ticket for the 0900 entrance, and I got out of there about 2 pm having started at the top and worked down. Lunch was a sandwich from a Boulangerie and then a quick walk through the Musée national de la Légion d’honneur, which I had not planned but enjoyed. After dark I headed down to the Place d'Concorde, where they were building a temporary structure, across the river, and then more or less along the river down to the Notre Dame. They were still working on the small Christmas market there, and the cathedral was still closed, but the whole place was well lit, and there were a fair number of walkers out.

Saturday was the Louvre, which I had not visited in 30 years, and which I enjoyed a lot more this time. Again, I spent most of the day there. I really had a good time as for the first 2-3 hours the rooms I visited were mostly empty. Late that afternoon I took the metro to the Arc d'Triomphe and then spent the evening walking back down the Champs El. (more or less) to the Christmas market at the Tuileries. I rode the Ferris Wheel, ate from the stands, and called it a night, and Sunday I caught the early train home.

I've spent more time in this past year in and around Paris, but rarely in the city center. It was fun, and I've got some places to add to my list or next time from this thread. I'll be west of the city in March for an antique fair, which will probably see me wandering some back roads home, but I'm really leaning towards a weeks trip south through Dijon, Lyon, and Avigon and points south to Marseille.

It's a very short walk from Place des Vosges to ground zero for bobos who brunch:

Le Loir dans La Théière is where all the kids who are too cool for school do their head-to-head-ing; even though it was after 2pm I still had to wait a bit. They are known for excellent pastry and bricolage decor. And you're just a couple blocks from the crowds getting their over-hyped falafel and holding their arms over their purses to protect their valuables. Feels like a world away. More specifically, it felt like being where the Castro overlaps the Mission District, main difference being that more people here understand English.

http://leloirdanslatheiere.com

Everyone is digging into brunch but I can't do the obvious, and on the slate they have Beef bourguignon! I don't think it's really their thing, but maybe because it's wintry? And it lets me make up for missing Chez Fernand last weekend.

I'm rubbing elbows with the woman beside me who is here from the Netherlands with her daughter for a holiday shopping trip. I didn't catch the town but it wasn't Amsterdam or Utrecht and she said it like I should know it so I pretended I did. Do you drive down? Fly? No-the train is just 2 1/2 hours so who can resist when it is so easy? I'm wondering how we can keep her daughter busy but she seems determined to do as much photobombing as possible. I swear that she was 'doing' Girl With A Pearl Earring -- same clothes, same pose, same facial expression. And the faces they were making over their meal were similar to what I probably looked like in Rouen.

The Beef bourguignon was an excellent example of the species, just the right tastes and textures but the presentation was distinctive, dare I say a bit effeminate/feminine? Beside the host's scarf tied like a cravat and his making sure everyone knew he was getting over a cold, there were no clear indicators, and I am notoriously bad at reading people.

The pastries really were indulgent -- intended for two people at least. I savored half of my carrot cake and asked if it would be too outré for me to get the rest wrapped up. It was like I broke the ice - now the woman decided to get hers wrapped up and the other tables around us fell like dominoes. I will remember this for the future -- someone needs to take the point to get everyone moving.

The butter for the bread was a Charentes-Poitou PDO but I can't find my photos of it to see the specific label, sorry.

The upshot was that I didn't get to the Musée Carnavalet until close to 4 pm.

This was my first time back since the Musée Carnavalet reopened in 2021, and it truly is better than ever.

They saved everybody's favorite bits from before, like the metal signage (which is presented in a more refined way than the junkshop in the V&A in London) and have laid everything else out in an order that makes sense, starting from the bottom and going up.

A fresh exhibit opened in October about the second year of the Terror, called An II of the 3rd republic (did I get that right?), which was entrancing.

PARIS 1793-1794
Une année révolutionnaire

Exposition du 16.10.2024 au 16.02.2025

https://www.carnavalet.paris.fr/expositions/paris-1793-1794

It was busy with serious museum-goers who appeared to have a lot of emotional baggage tied up with this part of French history, understandably.

A couple things that stood out for me were Jean-Paul Marat's death mask and a fragment of his jaw. Marat was assassinated by Charlotte Corday, a Girondin sympathizer, while taking a medicinal bath for his debilitating skin condition. Corday was executed four days later, on 17 July 1793.

Also, Porte de cellule, provenant de la prison Saint-Lazare / a prison cell door from Saint-Lazare.

If you'll be in town during this show you should go; here's their English intro text:

--At the heart of the French revolution, imbued with its ideals, its contradictions and its excesses, the years 1793 and 1794 have not yet arisen from the thick fog of legends that surrounds them. It is often difficult to separate fact from fiction.
The material left to us from this period is reexamined today in research laboratories. It bears the many marks of silence, erasure, and reconstruction that the struggle for memory has produced over time. Erased Phrygian caps, hammered street names, beheaded statues, demolished crosses, invented relics, reconstructed pictures, and falsified archives: if this inventory is proof of this revolutionary year's cumbersome legacy, it also allows for a now-tempered rereading.--

This museum is a good part of why the Marais remains so high in my esteem, despite the slide it is undergoing in the direction of the Champs Elysee and the Bou Mich -- did you see the notices about the new Krispy Kreme opening?

https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/08/business/kripsy-kreme-paris-open-store/index.html

Many spots in the Marais keep us from falling too far into the dreamy illusion of Paris as the city of romance and savoir faire. As much as I adore it, they put on their tights one leg a time like everyone else.

On Sunday morning I turned in my key to the desk and stashed my backpack in their kitchen. There was only one other bag there, a hard-sided spinner. The Hotel Nice welcomes all kinds, apparently. Rick's book does call the place laissez-faire.

Time for church

Catholicism in France is not just in the past. Saint Merry Church looks like many other historic ornate flamboyant Gothic praise-yells in stone but the parish/PAROISSE is pretty progressive.

https://www.paroissesaintmerry.fr/histoire

I really recommend letting your translator tackle the story on that page -- Saint Merry is built on the original Roman intersection of the cardo and decumanus. For a long time it was called the mini Notre Dame.

In the Fall of 2021 a post-Vatican II denomination called St Egidio (created 1968 at a high school in Rome, now spread to over 70 countries) has been occupying this location. Their charitable focus is on war/peace and "une attention particulière aux périphéries et aux personnes périphériques," Very ecumenical, too.

The Chapelle de Notre Dame du Mont Carmel has now become The Altar of Bibles, with many modern translations on the table. --> Since 2020, the Catholic Church has celebrated every 3rd Sunday of the ordinary time as Sunday of the Word of God instituted by Pope Francis and dedicated to the celebration, reflection and prodication of the Word of God. For Pope Francois, the Sunday of the Word of God also expresses an ecumenical value because Holy Scripture indicates to those who listen to the path to follow to achieve an authentic and solid unity <--

Chapelle Sainte Geneviève has now become the Altar of The Cross:
-->So many crosses, all different, like the diversity of cultures from which they come. So many because today still many women and men are oppressed by the weight of unbearable crosses So much cross because even today Jesus continues to die in so many places of the world. • Several crosses from Latin America, Africa, Asia and Europe were deposited on the altar. A painted cross representing Jesus from El Salvador a small country in Central America marked by violence. In the center, a cross carved in the wood of a boat of migrants stranded on the Italian coast of Lampedusa in the Mediterranean • At the foot of the altar, a basket collects the names of the sick recalled every first Monday of the month at 8 p.m. in this church. Each one then writes the names of the people he wants to recall on a sheet collected during the prayer and then deposited <--- there was a fresh pile of prayer cards in a basket in front.

There's a new large painting by Maxim Kantor that was donated by la famille Ainbinder hanging in a side aisle. This place really deserves a visit. A guided visit. I poked around the side alleys and impasses in this multi-layered bit of the Marais.

Of course Sundays are just as much about brunch as church, and for my final meal in Paris I reserved a table at another recommended bruncherie, this one more kitschy/Americanized than the one near Place des Vosges, this one called Le Ju.

Le Ju' is a darling of yelp and tripadvisor and instagram

https://www.instagram.com/leju_restaurant/

and it is pretty much tourist bait, but not to the point where they've forgotten where we are: the place settings include a bowl for your cafe au lait, not a mug. The tables are right out of American Graffiti, or Pulp Fiction maybe. The formules include 'French' 'English' and my choice of course 'The Maxi' €14

Àt will: Coffee filter, Tea, Chocolate (or 1 latte / 1 cappuccino supplement 2,50€)+ «Croissant» or «Pain au Chocolat»+ 2 baguettes (Nutella®, butter, jam)+ Fresh Squeezed Orange+ 1 Omelette single or mixte, bacon, salad and tomatoes + 1 Granola with Fresh Fruits or fruit salad.

If was just ok, not great. Better choices nearby. BUT, the butter was Paysan Breton

https://www.paysanbreton.com/nos-produits/nos-beurres/le-beurre-doux-moule

C’est magnifique, Avi. I love that you spent time in smaller museums and described them so richly.

I’ve never heard of Musee Jaquemart-Andre and that sounded wonderful. Thoroughly enjoyed your descriptions of your Paris Walks, Pere Lachaise and just being in Paris, its neighborhoods, patisseries, sandwicheries et eglises.

We’ve only been to Paris twice. Our second visit a year and a half ago focused on smaller sights and neighborhoods. Maison Balzac and the 16th, the Petit Palais, passages couvertes in the 9th and 2d Arr., St Sulpice for an organ recital and Rue M in the 5th Arr. We may be back in Paris for just a couple of days this fall. Whether we go large (Notre Dame, Louvre, d’Orsay) or small(er) (Cluny, J-A, Rodin or Belleville), your TR is an inspiration.

I also enjoyed your explorations of history that has shaped Paris and France … and our world. (Even if some guidelines about what is “interdit” may have been crossed.) I will look forward to your TR on Rome and the decline of the western and eastern empires … and 21st century parallels.

Merci pour partager votre sejour a Paris.

The timing meant that I could do a Sunday church doubleheader.

Services were still going on when I processed into Notre-Dame des Blancs-Manteaux with my phone at the ready, and I almost walked right into the prepared table with the Host and Cup resting under a tidy white throw-blanket. (I don't know what that item is called in iglesiese. OK, I just looked it up and it's called the corporal.) Now that I'm looking at my pics I wonder if the story we've all heard about Spanish tapas coming from the tidbit put on the topper that kept the bugs out of your drink may have a church gadgetry aspect, since there's a nice card covering the chalice.

https://ndbm.fr/histoire-culture/histoire/

Among the interesting things about the layout of this church is that a Mary statue occupies the spotlight with a Holy Ghost/bird divebombing down from a Jesuit-style gold fireworks burst. The image of Christ on the Cross is waaay up in the stained glass of the dome above. If you zoom in He is depicted all swole, not gassed. The building has a basilica feel to it.

There was a rivalry in the 13th century between the Servants of Mary and the Servants of the Blessed Virgin --- two different orders, as different as black and white. Literally -- the latter wore white outfits (hence the name White Shawls) and the former black ones.

On 18 July 1297, Pope Boniface VII, complaining that this is why we can't have nice things, gave this church to the Guillemites, because if you two can't settle down then neither of you is getting to play with it.

More horrible things happened to the building and its contents in the 1790s, and it was put back on its feet in 1802.

On 25 November 1407 the Duke of Burgundy, called Fearless Jean, killed his cousin Louis the Duke of Orleans, at a nearby intersection while Louis was returning from a 'visit' to Queen Isabeau of Bavaria at her mansion called the Barbette. Louis' remains were deposited here at this church.

From 1618 to the 1789 Revolution this church on the left bank and Saint-Germain-des-Prés on the right bank were the preeminent religious institutions of the city. I also learned that the bishop of Paris and the king got along poorly more often than not. 20K books from the collection of this convent were taken and made part of the National Library and the Archives.

Post--WWII, Juliet Greco (va va voom) had a hit song "In the rue of Blancs-Manteaux" with a poem written by Jean-Paul Sartre against capital punishment and put to a melody by Joseph Kosma in 1944.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOJhGz8c4fY

The Hotel de Nice arranged a ride-to-the-airport pickup at 12:15 pm, so I got back to the hotel at five minutes before noon so I could move some things between my backpack and my civita and use the bathroom before leaving.

The manager at the desk frowns at me and says that my ride is at 12:15 pm, implying that I'm doing something wrong. I said that I know it is at 12:15 pm but I want to move some things between my backpack and my bag and use the bathroom before leaving. Her anxiety does not abate -- You can wait in the living room, I guess. Yes, I replied, I thought I would wait in the living room. My backpack is now buried under a mountain of stored luggage in the kitchen, so clearly everyone's Sunday morning-arrival flights did arrive on time.

Not even five minutes later I hear someone bounding up the stairs and chatting briefly with her; she leans into the living room and says 'that's your driver' with an expression that is part wonderment and part pity -- like why would anyone want to leave before the last moment that they had to leave?

My reaction was instead relief, knowing that I wasn't cutting it too too close. Lufthansa flight CDG-to-FRA was scheduled to depart at 2:30 pm. The driver was fine and no incidents on the way to airport or getting to the gate.

The only food besides vending machines flight-side near the gate was a Brioche Dorée, and the only situation in which I would eat from a Brioche Dorée would be if I was stuck in a German airport, so I was extra glad that I still had some good cheese and carrot cake leftovers to nosh on.

The scheduled layover in FRA before getting the United flight to SFO was one hour and fifty minutes, so given that it's FRA, I would probably only have time to shop for a Lamy pen anyway, not enough time to eat. FRA is worse than Washington Dulles when it comes to needing so many ground vehicle interconnections to get from anywhere to anywhere.

(Lamy sometimes has models of pens that are not available outside Germany)

So, there is a bit of a hiccup. The flight boards 35 minutes late. There are people on board who are transferring to JFK with a short connection, and being those kind of people they made sure everyone knew about it. Will they hold the flight? What are you (Lufthansa) going to do if we miss it? (these are all codeshares) No need for me to be a squeaky wheel about the SFO connection because they were doing enough squeaking for everyone.

Shortly before landing the crew announces that several flights are being held and there will be a gate agent at the end of the jetway to give directions to your next flights. Well, that's a relief.

We land. We taxi. We taxi. We taxi some more. Followed by some taxiing. Finally the bell bings and we do the hurry up and wait for everyone to deplane in order (I'm in the far reaches) . When we go out the door, we're in the middle of nowhere and there's a staircase down to the ground with three articulated buses idling. No jetway at all.

I and a few other fleet-footed people hustle into the first bus, so we get going while the others continue loading, and we're piled in like cattle. The driver tells only one person too close to the front door to get off and go to the next bus. He gets rolling. And rolling. And rolling some more. We're getting a tour of the property. He seems to be taking the scenic route, and giving every jeep and 4-seater and gas truck the right of way, and lots of wiggle room before he continues on. When we get to the jetway, we are the last bus to arrive and people who did not fleet-foot it on the tarmac are already climbing two flight of stairs to get up to the gate area.

So, when I get to the gate area the agents holding printouts and handheld devices have been directing a lot of nervous passengers already, and the group in front of me and I pose our flight number questions and this Lufthansa woman actually just turns to face one of the branching hallways

and waves her arm as though we just made a first down.

She can't take any more of this brouhaha/kerfuffle/agita -- who do we think she is, a gate employee?

It takes me several minutes of signage reading and watching where other people are going and asking people in uniforms to ascertain that I have to go through passport control, and then go to another floor, and then walk to the tram system, and then go several stops, and then walk way down to the end of another branch to get to the United flight.

Oh, I forgot to mention that while we were waiting to get off the plane the United app on my phone pinged to say that boarding had begun.

There was a United podium with several staff standing around doing nothing at the start of the final branch, with a bunch of biometric data stations set up for the new steal-your-face-and-eyeballs security system. I pointed down the hallway and called out "Gate xx is down there, yes?" and they said Yes, but you have to stop here with us before you can go down there.

They did not, unfortunately for this story, say "Your papers please" but they did want my passport and to look at a screen that took my image. Did you know this is the 4th time I've been asked to show my passport since I landed? And that's why you can be so sure that United Airlines cares about your safety and takes every security measure possible to insure it. She actually said that, although she couldn't quite keep a straight face.

Since most people are on board, when I get to my seat the other people in the row have already spread out their things figuring that they lucked out and have an empty seat to make use of. While they tidy up I stroll around to find any overhead compartment space left to hold my backpack.

I get to know my neighbors for the next half-a-days-worth of hours and we still haven't closed the airplane door. Why did I work up a sweat getting here? There are a good number of seats still empty when I know from the app seating chart that this flight was full. Eventually, the crew announce that we're going to stop waiting for the rest of them and get going.

Well, the woman next to me grabs her stuff and moves to a row she can have to her self, and the girl next to her stretches out and uses her boyfriend's lap for a pillow and my lap for a footrest. (This is the middle section last row). There is a tetchy woman in the window seat of the right section, and she defensively defends her row from both the woman and me, claiming them all for herself. The couple was returning from a Mediterranean cruise that missed two ports due to weather trouble, and the girl playing footsie took several group photos of us and a photo of my Facebook profile page on my phone and promised to tag me in the photos and friend me when we got back to SFO. So far as I can tell she did not, but maybe I don't have the right apps or settings to see it.

How many people missed the flight? One indicator is that when the carts made it to us in the last row they still had all the choices of everything being served. When does that ever happen in the back row of a flight? I am not able to sleep much on planes and once I went to chat up the stewardesses in the galley and said that I liked one of the snack items -- an actually good snack on a plane? Ha. They said here, take a bunch and grabbed two handfuls of them for me. I distributed them to my neighbors.

SFO was much busier after 10 pm Sunday night than FRA had been in the afternoon. On the way to passport control (again?) an usherette was yelling One Line, One Line for everybody! and I and a couple other business-attired among the walking dead said what about Global Entry? and the woman started yelling Global Entry to the Left! Everyone else One Line One line for everybody!

There were two windows serving the Global Entry line while the Everyone line had maybe six, but it was probably about three times longer, so six of one and half-dozen of the other.

The young officer in the closest window, though, seemed to have the zeal of a new convert to the 'merican religion. He was processing 1 for every 4 that the other window was getting through.

A couple with a young boy seemed to be getting the deluxe wash. The officer was grilling them about the boy's age and whether he should be on his own passport rather than his mother's, and the boy had to stand a few feet back while the occifer manually re-aimed the camera down to his level to get his picture. After some more trading of info and querulous queries the officer gestured at his screen, which they couldn't see, He does show in the system as having applied, but that means that he is not yet approved. Mom says something like we've been waiting for a reply for a year / since before he began walking. This has me wondering how much of a problem smuggling children into the country through airports is.

The couple behind me (t-shirts and jeans) are making exasperated body and eye movements and grumbling Would you look at this? Did he just transfer from Ciudad Juarez or something? Maybe I should have shown more restraint but I said If you think this is bad just wait until next year. Now they're giving each other the side-eye and telepathically saying to each other See? They're all commie elites here!

Part of what is so entrancing is that the kid is having a ball -- he's so pleased that they want his picture and that there's a metal railing that he can make monkey bars out of. I'm shocked out of my focus on this by hearing the other officer in the next window yelling my last name. 'Are you ready?' he sounds and looks like a DI from from a Demi Moore army drama.
I got distracted, sorry. He grabs my passport and stamps it in one fluid motion (clearly his system already knew me or he wouldn't have yelled my name) while sharing a brief facial expression with me about the other window 'Rookies, huh?'

Honestly, I loved, loved reading all about your experiences in Paris. I laughed and I learned so much from you. Thank you for writing up this trip. Much appreciated! :)

I notice at least one other mistake in this portrayal -- I have switched the banks of the Seine that St. Germain d Pres and Blancs Manteaux are located upon. Remember to look over your mapping apps before venturing out.

That church adjacent to the Pantheon is really worth a look.

https://www.saintetiennedumont.fr/english/history-architecture/

Among its interesting points is that the St.Vincent-de-Paul movement had some key early conferences there, long before liberation theology and caring for the poor became cool.

This was wonderful to read. Thank you for sharing.

I wanted to give this a skim before our online meeting... little did I know I would be chuckling from one install-ment to the next until way past my bedtime.

Looking forward to the live version!

For the live version I want to do something a bit different, mulling it over now. Might we turn over the topsoil a few times to get it aerated and see if there is or is not so much distance between the traveler and the tourist? What am I to make of having been to the Shoah memorial before, and the back side of Notre Dame before, and so on, but never noticed the backyard marche until this time? And in the past the LGBT culture in the Marais was kind of in-your-face (at least my face) but this time I hardly noticed anything other than some holiday decorations that mixed wreaths with rainbow bunting. Can anyone ever step into the same Marais twice?