J'adore le Marais. The Jewish quarter is great, the best place to be in Paris on a Sunday (everywhere else is closed and boring). This area is buzzing with fashionistas, tourists, Frenchies etc etc. Many of the shops sell Jewish food and traditions, as can be expected. The falafels are très yummy and at 5 euro a piece a reasonable price for lunch in Paris. The vintage shops offer real fur coats (if you're into that kind of thing) for as little as 60 euros, and a host of other strange but quirky things. The range of shops is huge... clothes, shoes, Japanese bags, vintage, designer, books (I love these ones of course), arts and crafts etc. The winding roads and pebble paths add to the area's authenticity. Many buildings appear to lean towards each other, and offer a glimpse of Parisian history, in all its trend-setting glory of the 1920s. One day, when I am very rich and successful, an apartment in the Marais wouldn't be amiss!
I visited Les Catacombes recently. A morbid but almost compulsory experience when living in Paris. The underground collection of cemetries consists mainly of piles and piles and piles of skulls and bones, some 6 million bodies in total so the guide leaflet tells me. These piles are impeccably arranged, rows of skulls, rows of bones etc, all of which appear to have been cemented together by the age of time. The underground passages originated in the 18th century, and for the most part the bodies were long since dead, being moved there to prevent disease, but it's interesting (?!) to discover that many who died during the Revolution were placed directly into this strange equivalence to a grave. As one first descends the narrow winding steps, a sense of trepidation occurrs and we couldn't help wondering what to expect and, even, if they get people to jump out at you like they do at the London Dungeon? Luckily, it's not that kind of place, and although the morbid factor never fully leaves you, the experience of trudging under Paris witnessing a past generation's attempt to juggle the dead with the living is worth the visit.
Arrete! C'est ici L'Empire de la Mort!
Another great thing I did... was to go see Harry Potter. Yes yes massive geek I know, but it was great. We did of course watch it in the Version Originale, but as we watched it in the St Germain des Pres area, a ticket was very expensive. Also, not being French, we didn't realise that having already bought your ticket you are expected to queue again to secure a reasonable seat. Seat numbers do not exist! The French are strange in their logic, in so many ways. But all turned out well and drinks after in the area were nice, as were the discoveries of English (and cheap!) second-hand bookshops.
Over and out.
Nathalie ma chérie, j'adore your posts! It so makes me want to be a poor, malnurished student again, living on wine, cigarettes and.. well, nothing else, really.. I'm really happy to see you're enjoying la vie parisienne, you aparently don't need me as a guide at all - rather the other way around: next time I'm over (but that won't be before summer decides to come back to Paris again), I leave les enfant with les grand-parents, and you show me what's hip now in la capitale.. All the best, good luck with the cold - if you're fed up with it, I can always use a babysitter here in Abu Dhabi (where it only snows in the shopping malls)!
ReplyDeleteBisous cousine, and kuesschen to the rest of the family!