It's a tough life, but someone has to do it. I'm back in Paris this weekend. As I noted last week, you could live here five years and not see all there is to see. But there are some musts that can be taken care of one trip at a time. This time it's museums.
My original intention was to catch the 9:00am train from Nantes to Paris and arrive about 11:00am. But I forgot I had a medical examination for my long-stay visa. I ended up catching the 1:00pm train arriving about 3:10pm. I'm staying at the same hotel (but with a better deal and bigger room this time...ah, experience...there's no substitute). I checked in and caught the tram down to the Museum d'Orsay. I thought it was open until around 9:00pm so I could still have time to see alot before it closed. By the time I stopped for a crepe and got to the museum it was almost 5:00pm and I discovered that it closed at 6:00pm. The late night time is only on Saturdays. So...what to do? Well...sight see, huh?
I started walking on Boulevard Saint Germaine. On rounding the corner to the street I was faced with the following sight.
Yep...full of Yuppies.
Jaime...I looked all through the place for you, you Starbuckaroo.
Stopped by this window and almost fell over.
If it doesn't blow up enough, the brown shoe on the left is only 1360€ ($1822). The brown "booty" on the right is 1600€ ($2144).
I don't know about you folks, but I couldn't bring myself to spend that much on shoes if I won the mega-lottery.
It's things like this that explain why I have so little sympathy for the wealthy. I don't want to hear your blues if you can spend money on such things.
F. Scott Fitzgerald: "The rich are different from you and me."
Ernest Hemingway: "Yes, they have more money."
I'm still having trouble with my leg (hip?) so caught a bus and went further than I wanted. On the way back I managed to pass to the rear of Notre Dame again. The place is so beautiful you can't stop yourself from taking another photo.
As before, I just love all the narrow streets and the special architecture
My primary reason for being on Blvd. Saint Germaine was to find the Vegenende restaurant. My friends Bob and Karen Kenagy love Paris, and Bob had recommended the sole at this restaurant. Sole being my absolute favorite fish, I had to find it and give it a go.
142, Boulevard Saint-Germain
The Sole Meunière
It was terrific!
In classic service, the whole sole is sautéed tableside and boned by the server. It wasn't prepared at the table, but I did allow the server to bone it.
According to Wikipedia, Julia Child recalled her first meal in Rouen of oysters and sole meunière as a culinary revelation. I can understand why.
The fellow at the right was dining with his lady, a very attractive young lady of oriental descent. They were English (a language I almost understand) and we struck up a conversation...I think about the rack of lamb he had ordered, my favorite meat (next time, huh?).
Anyway, while his lady was visiting the facilities he confided to me that he was going to "pop the question" a little later tonight on the Seine. He showed me the box with the ring in it. This, as is to be expected, brought the others around us into the conversation. There was a nice young couple from Connecticut and a lady with her son (pictured behind him). We were all happy for them (including me, after learning they'd been together six years...I don't think one should rush that decision). So...a treat, in addition to the excellent food. They were very nice people and I certainly wish them the best.
"Good luck, mate!"
After dinner I strolled along a little while until I passed this school entrance. It's a little famous,
The Sorbonne.
(I thought it was the University of Phoenix at first)
Deciding that my decadent lifestyle this evening wasn't complete, I purchased a nice 11.5€ ($15.41) Cuban cigar, and lit up, walking down the street as if I owned it. No one seemed to mind, but, then, a cigar that expensive doesn't stink...it wouldn't dare.
Stopped at the lovely Fountaine Sainte Michel. As you can see, I wasn't the only one.
Man, that was a good cigar. My first in probably twenty years. But it was a special occasion, you know. I'm in Paris, fair health (except for the leg) and, for a fat guy I don't sweat much. Enough for which to be thankful.
If you haven't figured it out yet, these folks know how to live. My hat's off to 'em.
In the sixties there was a comedian named Vaughn something-or-other, who talked about Little David sitting under the pyramid playing his guitar, going "chink, chink, chink". When asked why he didn't move his fingers on the fret board Little David said, "Them other fellow are looking for it...I flat got it!"
The French sort of make me feel that way. I think they "flat got it."
What with the beer before dinner, and the wine with dinner, and the celebratory beer after dinner at a nice little bar on Saint Michel, I found myself in need of the facilities. On asking their location I found myself facing this invention.
At least as interesting as one of those cattle troughs one sees in certain "cowboy" bars in Texas. But no...no damn way I put my feet on those "steps." Wasn't gonna happen pardner. In this, or any other, life.
Friday night in Paris and everyone was out! Great!
Music in the metro station.
Another bucket list item. The unbelievably beautiful Paris Opera building at night.
There's art in the subway, too. The ceiling at one of the stops.
Up past my bedtime, I caught the train here, wended my way back to Monparnasse to the hotel, and, after a little blog-writing, and a little Masters Tournament on the internet, I slept better than a baby. (They often wake up crying and wet, you know. I did neither, and, at my age that's a blessing, too.)
Up early...too early probably...but I was really looking forward to today. My primary goals this trip were to have sole at my buddy's recommended restaurant, and to visit three museums: The Louvre, the d'Orsay, and the Rodin. But first, my mainstay for breakfast, The Pont Neuf Café.
The café is on the right bank (don't tell Jamey or Rita I was on the right...they won't believe it), so up the street I go to Rue Du Louvre, turn left and then enter through a relatively innocuous entry.
Kings and Queens of France lived here so you can sort of expect a lot of room, a lot of opulence, and a lot of a lot. Yep, you get it.
On entering the courtyard, a look to the right yields this view. (Remember the door on the right.)
Straight across the courtyard, looking out through the portal, one sees the Invalides, ordered erected by Louis XIV as a home for wounded and aged soldiers in the late 17th century. This dome, along with the Eiffel Tower appears ubiquitous in Paris. They seem to be in every skyline.
(Note added 4/21- My friend Didier informs me this dome is not the Invalides, but a smaller one further south. Could have fooled me, and obviously did. In any event, the real Invalides and the Eiffel Tower seem almost ubiquitous in Paris.)
Yet another bucket list photo - The fat kid at the Louvre
And then I enter the doorway to the right (remember?) as I came in. A marvelous greeting from Mr. Pei.
Interesting stories of the criticism of the work and the "devil" structure with 666 panes (it doesn't...but crap like that doesn't stop those afraid of change. Lord knows it's hard to be right all the time.)
Once inside, the view upward. Wow!
Has a certain symmetry...doesn't it?
So, okay...from art to art.
Greek statues
.
Those Greeks had a sense of humor. This one can only be entitled, "It is not!"
And the ceilings. Gorgeous, each and every one.
And, of course, the most famous piece of art on the planet.
She is encased behind glass...you can see the reflection of the audience in the picture. There are signs everywhere requesting everyone not to use flash photography. But, of course, that doesn't stop the truly myopic and stupid. There were flashes going off all around the Mona Lisa. I hope, when they get home or back to their hotels and look at them they get the flash reflection back at 'em. Wouldn't it be neat if she had "red eye?"
As I showed at Saint Chapelle, the flash actually harms the image if there is a little light available. All the pictures taking here and in the Rodin museum are without flash. All the pictures at the d'Orsay are non-existent. More on that later.
The nearly as famous Venus de Milo
Aphrodite gets a lot of press in Greek statuary.
For the record, in Roman mythology she is Venus (above).
As I saw these statues, and write these lines, I remember the difficulty wading through Bulfinch's Mythology. And then I remember I did it on my own, not as part of a school assignment, and really wonder why in the hell I did that.
Michelangelo's 'The Dying Slave'
Mary Magdelane
That was it for the Louvre for me. Leg was killing me by now and I realized that the major museums, like the subways, have an ingenious method for helping reduce and control the crowds...no public restrooms. So, I exit the main display area and what do I see...well, it wasn't the Eiffel Tower or the Invalides.
Man, you can't escape these guys!
Okay...about the d'Orsay. The d'Orsay is in an old train station, built around 1900. In 1977 the French government decided to turn it into a museum holding mainly French art from the period 1848 to 1915. And, what period did that entail class? The impressionists. Man was that something. But I have no pictures. Why? Because they didn't allow photography, even sans flash. I found that to be, frankly, stupid, but then I remembered the idiots from the Louvre. Unfortunately, I don't usually break rules unless the payoff is there, or it's a total failure in judgment. I saw neither here so I have no pictures. I saw an oriental woman snapping some surreptitious shots, sans flash, but I figured between visa applications and other paperwork, I've had just about enough contact with French authorities, so I chose to forbear.
Seeing all these great works in one place was really something. It also helps one appreciate the changes in perspective from the confines of the "old" school to the new. My favorite Impressionist has always been Monet...but I like most of them. (At least up to Jackson Pollock).
The juxtaposition between Manet's scandalous Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe and Monet's, two years later was really interesting.
Manet
Monet
And then, a few short years later to see Monet doing this work. It's really something.
It was getting late by this time so I made a couple of stops and took a couple of city-scene pictures and went back to the hotel to rest.
Got my attention. Age test. To what does the following refer? And when was it?
"Midnight, one more night without sleepin'
Watchin' till the mornin' comes creepin'
Green door, what's that secret you're keepin?"
The Green Door
Down the Champs-Élysées I saw this very interesting effect for
Citroën.
And, of course, no trip is complete without the Arc de Triomphe.
I made the mistake of exiting the subway three stops early and paid for it with the walk up the hill to this.
Didn't take long after taking this shot to get back on the subway and back to the hotel.
Too many photos...too much seen. Tomorrow I'll show today's visit to the Rodin Museum.
