Heather and Bob's Paris Newsletter #3 - 8 October 2005Bonjour tous mes amis. It has been over two months since we have sat down to collect our thoughts and activities about life in Paris to our friends and family.
My big news is that I will be in Ottawa from September 22 to October 12, mainly to visit my Mom, with a weekend visit to James and Zaheela, and my new granddaughter Alexis in Orlando (Sept 29 to Oct 3). I will be staying with my Mom at 175 Riverside Drive (523-9421) and renting a car for at least the first week.
On Sept.17th, Bob went to his first professional tennis tournament at Roland Garros. The women's finals of this division of the Federation Cup were played here and I had two tickets. France was playing Russia. For those tennis fans out there, the first game was Mary Pierce and Dementieva. Then Amelie Maurmeso played Anastasia Myskina.
My volunteer work with the Resto du Cour food bank started up again September 6 and we are as busy as ever, serving about 500 families a week (Tues. and Thurs). It was good to be back and last Thursday they had me in the baby kiosk giving out formula, baby food, and diapers that were too small for most of the babies.
I continue to explore Paris and visit museums during the week. I have a couple of friends that I often spend time with. Unfortunately, one has just moved back to Ottawa and the other is a teacher and not available as much now that school is back. Several weeks ago while walking along the Saint Martin Canal, I spotted someone with a tennis racket. I approached him and asked where he played (in French). He responded in English. He was from Scotland and had come to Paris to buy a racket and was going home the next day. So as you can see, I am still searching for a tennis club and partner.
The highlight of the summer for me was the opening of the Paris Plage (Beach). For a month the centre of Paris along the Seine River was transformed into a 2 kilometre beach equipped with sand, grass, chaise lounges, palm trees, children's activities, music, cafes - even a large swimming pool. I spent many hours there during that month. It was so much fun and lots of excitement, plus the view was spectacular. A visit to the Musee de la Mode et du Costume Palais Galeria introduced me to an exhibit with a comparison of clothing in France and the Netherlands during the period of Louis the IV and Louis XI. The Musee itself is magnificent and is situated in the heart of the posh 16th arrondissment. The Guillot Museum is one of the finest Asian art museums in the world. Again the building itself is worth the visit. There was a special exhibit on Japanese wood blocks. I also had an opportunity to visit the permanent collection and a Japanese garden adjacent to the building. An exhibit on "commercials" let me see some old film footage of Perrier ads and some old french lingerie ads that were hilarious. Not all galleries are wonderful. I went with a friend to an exhibit by some Brazilian artists and neither of us were impressed, but we had a lovely lunch in the Marais district. The most humorous museum I visited with another friend was the Musee National d'Histoire Naturelle. The exhibit was all about the birds and the bees. It was geared for children, showing various mating rituals of selected animals, birds, insects and fish. It was a hoot, and at the end they showed a comparison between human and animal mating rituals on a circular screen. The latest exhibit I visited was at the Jeu de Paume which featured photographs, posters and vignettes of Charlie Chaplin's career and personal life.
My WICE lectures start in mid October and am looking forward to them. More news on that in our next newsletter.
My hikes with the Wednesday Isle de France hiking group continued in the summer. Our group was smaller, but no less loyal to our walks and our cafe, beer, or lemonade at the end of the hike. I have been introduced to a drink called Panaché (beer with lemonade). A great thirst quencher. The one hike I'll highlight actually occurred at the end of the walk. We had just completed a walk through Parc de Saint Cloud and La Foret de Fausses, and were enjoying our "refreshments", when our guide/leader for the day asked if anyone would like to continue and visit the town. Four of us said yes and proceeded to visit the town - and a very beautiful, old, staid town it was. It also had a racetrack, so we went in. Apparently one of the best in the area. Two of our members were very knowledgable and tried to guide us along with the betting process. Knowing nothing about horses and horse racing, I listened, then chose horses for other reasons. To get to the point, I was the only one who won (26 euros on a 2 euro bet). I was so excited watching my horse come in.
A college from the Archives visited Paris with her son in August, so it was nice to spend some time with Canadian friends.
Just to let you know Bob and I do spent a lot of time together too. We have done a few Isle de France hikes, picnics, and promenades around Paris. I will let him fill you in on those. We spent a few days in August at Boulonge sur Mer (about a 2 hour train ride north, just south of Calais). It is the largest fishing port in France. We visited an aquarium and watched the fishermen bring in their haul. The old town is up a very steep hill, surrounded by an old rampart. We found a quaint, inexpensive restaurant and ate fresh fish there every day. We hiked along the coast, saw the White Cliffs of Dover across the Channel, walked along the beach, got a soaker in the North Sea and watched kite surfers. The old WW2 military bunkers were visible everywhere amongst the sand dunes. We visited an old fisherman's house/museum on the Sunday.
We were in Brussels last week for 4 days. Bob had meetings and I played tourist. I enjoyed a lovefest of visiting Art Nouveau and Art Deco museums and buildings for which Belgium is renowned. We stayed in one of the oldest areas of Brussels, called Quartier Bruegel, in a square where they have an antique and flea market everyday. The Sunday we arrived Bob had a meeting. So I stayed in the Quartier, only to find out that it was "festival" day, and lots of things happening, like a parade with local bands, food kiosks, a music band shell and lots of local people celebrating (I'm not sure what). But it was fun. We also spent time with Bob's group at night.
Bob and I planned to officially celebrate our joint birthdays on Monday the 19th. I got roses for my birthday and we went to a documentary film on Rue Crimee (our street) which was filmed in February. Too bad it wasn't done in March, because I might have been in it. You know how camera shy I am - joke joke. I cooked Bob's favourite meal (lamb) for his birthday on the 20th. We received a lovely poem written by Bob's Mom to commemorate our birthday.
Time to sign off and let Bob say a few words
Take care, love heather
p.s. Don't forget I still want to hear what's going on in your life.
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from Bob
I had breakfast with a high school acquaintance and her husband on September 23rd. She saw from the little blurb I wrote for the Port Arthur Collegiate reunion organizing committee last spring that I'm living in Paris and tracked down my email address to say she'd be here for a few days this week. I wonder what my old French teacher would say if he knew I was commuting 7 km to work through Paris on a bicycle on my 60th birthday?
I don't know if I have any words of wisdom to share after 60 years. Listening to a favourite Enya CD last night, the lines below come close:
Pilgrim in your journey
you may travel far
for pilgrim it's a long way
to find out who you are...Of course, who we are changes from year to year, or even day to day, according to the experiences of our journeys.
In addition to the long weekend in Boulogne sur Mer, we spent quite a few days day tripping outside Paris. We have a book on "Les Environs de Paris..à pied" which proposes 60+ walks, most of which are accessible by train from one of the Paris train or RER stations. The quick overview:
July 9 - La Ferte sous Jouarre - including a Benedictine Abby founded in 630 and a trek through fences and fields because we took the wrong path.
July 14 - The Bastille Day military parade on the Champs Elysee. Too many people to see much. Lots of hardware for the boys with guns.
July 15 - 18 Maastricht to visit our friends the Basers. One day we visited a small town where an annual parade of some 60 traditional Dutch village "militias" takes place.
July 24 - The finish of the Tour de France on the Champs Elysee. Again, too many people. We could scarcely see anything and when we did it was just a blur of flashing cycles. Anti-climatic, since it had rained all morning and they declared the race over before the finish anyway.
July 31 - Cergy Saint Christophe. A very long hike - 20 km + according to our Kellogg Special K pedometre. And we cut it short. We did see a deer however and a 12th century church.
Aug. 14 - Crouy sur Ourq. Another very long hike. We even tried (to no avail) to hitch-hike back from the far end. One of my glasses lens fell out on the trail and fortunately I found it a few dozen metres back. An optometrist in the little town at the station at the end of the day was still open and fixed them for me for free!
Sept. 3 - Dourdan. A lot of open fields (no shade) but a very different and interesting dry land agriculture ecology. Dourdan is a wonderful little medieval town which we'll go back to and take visitors to as a good example of France just an hour from Paris.
On Sunday Sept. 18th we went to the Grand Palais just off the Champs Elysee near Place de Concorde. Built for the Universal Exhibition of 1900 (stone, glass and steel architecture), it was closed in 1993 for restorations and apparently will be closed after Oct. 1 for another 2 years, when it finally opens as an exhibition centre not generally open to the public. The nave is still essentially a construction site (bare concrete floors, no decorations) and has been opened to the public temporarily for national heritage week. It was free from noon until midnight until October 1st and I went back on the last night (see below). We only waited 20 minutes in line on the second day and I was absolutely mesmerized by the place. They suspended Coronelli's two 5 metre diameter spheres of the heavens and the earth (gifts to Louis XIV in 1643) from construction cranes under the 35 metre high centre dome and had strategically placed mirrors above and below them. They spent days (or weeks?) calibrating over 40 speakers around the palace and the sound system playing classical music, the odd church bells, rushing water and other strange sounds has to be heard to believe. It was one of those rare magical opportunities to see something truly spectacular for free.
Last Saturday (Oct.1) was Nuit Blanche in Paris. Dozens of events all over the city all night long. I went out with an American colleague from ECA Watch here for the meetings and "painted the town". Not too red however. We started at the Grand Palais, which was every bit as spectacular at night as it was during the day. Then we went to Les Jardins des Halles where there was a Brazilian music concert. However, it turned out to be Brazilian rap and half naked go go dancers. I don't know how you can butcher Brazilian music, but they did. After a beer downtown, we traipsed up to Montmartre to a concert for 300 electric guitars in the Sacre Coeur cathedral. (How many of you have been to a concert for 300 electric guitars in a cathedral?) No Jimmy Hendrix however. We had to climb over the steel fence around the entrance to the church and then squeeze with the crowd into the church between "numbers". It was all volunteer players and they had 4 conductors flashing signs (presumably with chords) at them. After another beer we took a taxi home at 3am.
My work is proceeding well. We participated in a consultation with the OECD here in Paris on October 3rd and had our own strategic planning meetings for 2 days afterward. Lots to do in preparation for that and now I'm working on the minutes. It got a little hectic at one point as there was a transit strike on the first day of our planning meetings and I had to talk the hotel owner into letting us use the lobby for our meeting as getting to the Friends of the Earth office in Montreuil would have wasted over 3 hours of the day.
I'm getting more into the web site maintenance and put out my first monthly bulletin pretty much on my own last month. The OECD is trying to include environmentally and socially destructive large hydro dams into a new policy designed to support renewable energy projects, and we're battling to try to force the guidelines of the World Commission on Dams on them. It seems such a travesty when the Bush administration's opposition to measures to combat global warning have been proved so narrow minded after Hurricane Katrina. (Not to mention the blatant incompetence and lack of concern for the plight of the poor in New Orleans who didn't have cars or credit cards to back an evacuation.) If governments don't wake up to just how desperate we're going to be for alternative energy sources in 10 years, these virtually meaningless incentives will be seen in retrospect as criminal. Since export credit agencies spend over US$100 BILLION of our tax dollars every year, they could make a difference, if they'd only wake up and realize the private sector is only interested in and geared up to profiteering and will never do it for us fast enough, no matter how high the price of oil gets.
I'm still riding my bike to and from work - 14 km a day. It's getting dark earlier now however, so Heather is bringing a florescent vest back from Canada for me. I'm hoping to go out on a long ride out the Ourq Canal tomorrow to see how long it takes to get out of Paris to the north.
I'm looking forward to Heather coming back this coming Thursday. I ate out a number of times when all my colleagues were here for meetings, but rather than subsist on pasta and bbq chicken, as I did back when I was here by myself in the room at Barbes, I've been a little more creative. I did Pad Thai one night and I've discovered Picard, a sort of gourmet M&M frozen food store a few blocks from our apartment. Karine Baser, daughter of our friends in Maastricht was here for one night this week attending a business school workshop. Today I got caught up on all the newspapers that have been accumulating since last week's meetings.
I'm hoping to get around to adding some more photos to our web site tonight, so check it out at http://www.web.ca/~bthomson/paris_photos/paris_photos_mainpage.html
Regards,
Bob
P.S. Don't forget to write. As Heather notes above, it's nice to hear what's happening in your lives in Canada and elsewhere.