So, how warm is Paris?

Apparently, warm enough to grow palm trees outdoors (yes, this tree is actually planted in the soil, along with several others). At least, they seem to be able to do this at the Serres d'Auteil in the Bois de Boulogne.

First visit to Palais Garnier

I payed my first visit to the Paris Opéra, or Palais Garnier (named after its architect), the other day. Unfortunately, my camera battery died mid-visit so I couldn't take all the shots I wanted, or re-take some of the poorly-lit shots you can see here. But I'll go back...

The building is a total delight. It has often been said that the idea of the Opéra was to put the audience on display in a kind of bourgeois theatricality. Even the little brochure I picked up says, "The Grand Staircase is itself a theatre where, in years gone by, the crinolines of fashionable society ladies would brush." This description certainly works. I get the sense that the unbelievable opulence of the place---every surface of spaces like the Grand Staircase and Grand Foyer (is anything here not "Grand"?) are completely crenelated with decorative carvings, paintings and ornament, to the point that practically no one detail really matters so much as the whole effect---as well as the way the Opéra was clearly influenced by Baroque palaces, were meant to give nineteenth-century theatre-goers the sense that they too were aristocrats, if only for an evening. This is curiously, and often sensuously re-inforced by how the building's monumental architecture is brought down to an individual's scale. Thus small dragons slither up dark corners of the Grand Staircase, if you happen to notice; the extended bronze feet of lamp-holding female figures have been kept polished by generations of hands and evening wear brushing past; the marble balcony railings overlooking the Grand Staircase perfectly curve at the sides to accommodate single bodies. Traditionally, a palace is a place of gathering in honour of the resident lord or lady celebrated by the art and architecture; it is a building ultimately focused on a single individual. But in Charles Garnier's bourgeois palace, members of the prosperous urban classes take turns as the "object" of the building, touching its luxurious surfaces possessively and displaying themselves from elevated perches. The balconies overlooking the square from the first floor say it all: No single privileged balcony for one mighty person to address the crowd, but a row of identical balconies framing (nearly) identical views of the square and avenue for the elegantly-dressed congregation within, and reciprocally isolating and framing fragments of that group for the public in the street. A vague middle-class fantasy of aristocracy is realized as a dream of the modern city.

They do build modern things in this town

Here are some crappy photos of a nifty modernist building in Montmartre.

Angels, flowers, and more

Most Parisiennes may be very good at keeping down their wrinkles, but this matron sure knows how to wear her age beautifully.

What French electricity did to my toothbrush...

... in spite of the current converter I used. Good thing I caught this before it melted through.

Proposing to suggest I get back on my feet.

I haven't posted much lately because I started coming down with a nasty cold last week, bringing with it an evil sore throat (the kind that makes you wince just thinking of swallowing any food) and, to top it all off, my first ever case of hives all over my chest and forehead, thankyouverymuch. The doctor thought that the hives were maybe an allergic reaction to the decongestants I was using, and the antihistamines he prescribed seem to be bringing the hives down while my cold is finally starting to improve. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to do any research this week.


Funny thing when I phoned my travel insurance before I went to see said doctor: The phone rep asked if I wanted the names of any clinics in Paris, and I replied, "Oh, are they recommended?" He answered very quickly that no, the insurance company can't recommend clinics for liability reasons---but that he could "propose to suggest" some options instead. I'll try to remember that line, "propose to suggest."

Which should I try next? (Yes, I'm asking you!)

I've already had a pistachio meringue from the top shelf and a fig pastry on the lower shelf, far left (both great). I'll let the people decide where to go next...

Click on the photo for a closer view.

Random photos

"Fiery" windows, Saint-Severin.

Cobblestone lighting in an alley leading to some sort of art gallery/bar.

Théâtre des abbesses in Montmartre at night.

The best shop name I've ever seen (but what do they sell?).

Montmartre Cemetery

So they actually built a road overpass over the cemetery...

Fat cat naps

In a vine

Covered grave.

On the metro, Friday...

- A teenage dude with a low-cut v-neck shirt showing a lipstick kiss mark on his chest. I wondered if it was from a real girlfriend, if he'd merely had a friend do it for him or if he'd painstakingly drawn it on himself...


- A man with a tattoo on his face got on board a fairly full train car. He had the shakes, like he'd suffered some sort of neurological damage. He stuck a cigarette in his mouth and searched around his pockets, and I worried that he was looking for a lighter to smoke on the train. Instead, he pulled out a purple Crayola marker from a pocket full of markers and slowly started to tag the stainless steel train door in front of everyone, as though none of us were even there. He wrote:


HARAS

PRENEZ LE TEMPS DE VOIR

So I'm walking up this curving street in Montmartre and quite unexpectedly I come across the surreally interesting Tristan Tzara House by Adolf Loos.

"Take the time to look," scrawled on the sidewalk in front of the Tzara House.

Around the corner from here was a cute little lane with tiny cottage-townhouses.

And further up the street was a park, raised above the level of the street, with rather tightly-pruned trees (which looked all the more bizarre in their leafless winter state).

Later that day, I turned a corner in the 8th district and out of nowhere, this Eiffel Tower appeared!

Apparently I'm poorly-educated, or, How do you say "oops" in French?

Arrived in Paris. Met Leona at airport, took the train into city, got to the apartment and met the landlord's very sweet mother, as arranged. Amongst other things, she showed me my apartment mailbox, although the key seemed to have trouble opening the mailbox, the previous tenant's name was still on the flap and there was mail in the box (she removed all of this). I was advised to relabel my box as soon as possible, as the landlord had mailed me some documents.


After she left, I shopped for groceries and whatnot. When I got home and went to re-label my mailbox, I found that someone had replaced the same label that had been there that morning. There was also some note scrawled above the mailboxes saying something about them, but I wasn't sure if it hadn't been there earlier. In my exhaustion, I assumed that someone thought the previous tenant was still around (or something) so I tore off the new label and replaced it with mine, without giving it a second thought.


That night, as I prepared for bed (and the exhaustion had finally REALLY hit me), my doorbell rang. I opened to see a man and woman standing there, the man asking if I was Edward Houle. With no further ado, he proceeded to yell and berate me for having used his mailbox, screaming that he's lived at this building for twelve years, and asked what kind of "poorly-educated person" would do such a thing in the first place. 


Having been thus subjected to his petit-bourgeois insult, I apologized and explained that the landlady had apparently shown me the wrong box by mistake (for what it's worth, this neighbour's name and that of the previous tenant are somewhat similar, although I didn't bring that up). He said that a first mistake might be understandable, but when he replaced the label AND had added the note above the mailboxes...? And hadn't I even seen the note?!? I said that I hadn't understood that the note was related---a silly mistake on my part, I would say now, although his note, from what I can recall, could have addressed the situation more clearly. Nonetheless, he never seemed satisfied with anything I said, even when I tried explained (in a French more broken than usual, given the jolt I had been given) that I hadn't done anything to purposefully insult him. Either he was too angry to accept that at the time, or he felt that my "slight" had been too egregious.


His friend, who was much calmer and more reasonable, tried to calm him and end the conversation. She told him that no matter, this had all been taken care of now, and the only strange thing in the end is that my mailbox key could also open his. After all, I had merely been shown the wrong mailbox, and, she added, "he doesn't know French very well." I hope she assumed that the quality of my French was so poor that I wouldn't be able to gauge the quality of her tact.


I went to bed thinking that I should have checked my neighbour's name more carefully against the previous tenant's, but also impressed by the former's extremes of passive-agression and full-out aggression. It reminded me how when I was in Rome, some of my friends had problems with neighbours who would also just pop up at their doors screaming and yelling from the get-go. Eventually I was able to relax enough to fall asleep.

Compact Life

So that's all I'm bringing with me. Almost everything I'll (hopefully) need for the next year is in these three bags and one box. (The box is being shipped. The bags I'll have to drag around airports, trains and the metro.)