Paris...not so much.

I'm sorry Paris.  I tried.  I really tried.  I visited you in 2001 and really wanted to like you and left with a bad taste in my mouth.  I waited 15 years to come back and in the meantime listened to everything Julia Child said and wrote about you tried to give you a second chance and once again you blew it.  I'd wait another 15+ years before going back.

Really I shouldn't be so hard on Paris because IT IS A HUGE CITY, almost twice as densely populated as New York City.  In any large city, you will have culture, excitement, activity and shopping as well as your fair share of unsavory people, areas and experiences.  It didn't help that we were traveling via Eurostar under the English Channel after a recent terrorist attack and Paris was already under suspicion as being a home base for the terrorists and possibly the next target.

We traveled to Kings Cross/St. Pancras to catch the Eurostar train under the English Channel.  There was an armed presence in the station.  The lines moved much slower and rightfully so given the recent terror attacks.  We found these machines in the terminal which reminded us of Coinstar machines we have here at home. My dad is a big coin collector/enthusiast and sends $100s of dollars in foreign currency with us on trips...but in nickel equivalent coinage which is bulky and heavy.  Once we found these machines, we were able to dump our bags of coins, both unused English pence and Euro cents, into them and receive paper euros.  The machines came complete with a helpful aide.

Here is my brother and his older daughter boarding the Eurostar to Paris.

 

Here is my brother's beautiful wife and younger daughter riding the train to Paris.  Boarding and riding the train in London was no problem and for all our nerves considering everyone was on high alert and the fact that we were taking a train under the water--just like in 2001, the trip was over before we knew it and there was never any indication that we were under the channel.  

 

Here is my brother getting some well earned relief once we reached our apartment in Paris.  Once again Paris, you disappointed me because you targeted my brother.  He is an active member of the US Navy complete with the haircut to match.  Never once when we were in London during the weekday morning rush hour, boarding the hideously crowded Picadilly line, broken up into two person groups and pressed literally body to body with the throng of other passengers did we ever feel as threatened as we did when riding Line #5 from Gare du Nord to Place d'Italie.  Three men surrounded him and had their hands in his pockets attempting to pick pocket him.  I have been traveling for 15 years and have always worn a money belt and been hyper vigilant and never had anything near that kind of experience.  You take steps to be cautious and pay attention but I couldn't believe how brazen those men were.  Had I seen what went down, I'd have screamed, "OI!" and thrown myself across the cars.  As it was, they picked the wrong guy because John shoved one of  the guys into the walls of the car and out the doors once they opened and his accomplices followed behind.  Needless to say, I was already livid and coursing with adrenaline before we even reached our apartment.  You dropped the ball again Paris.  Thankfully John was wearing a money pouch around his neck under his clothing so they didn't get anything but still I was just shocked.   Shame on you Paris.

Moving on...our apartment was much better than London.  Much better equipped.  Views of the Eiffel Tower.  A grocery store across the street.  Here is Mother catching 40 winks after our harrowing ordeal on the Metro.

We nipped out to our grocery store for food and souvenirs (more on that later) and had soup and bread for supper.

 Our grocery store was Marche Franprix and I loved it.  I bought more of my souvenirs here:  soaps, sea salt, french lentils, herbes de provence, etc.  The staff here was lovely and was a breath of fresh air after our shocking experiences outside the store.  At one point, we were walking to the store and a French man began walking up to a tree growing out of the pavement and proceeded to undo his pants (IN PUBLIC!) and whip it out to urinate against the tree.  The tree was little more than a sapling.  He would have had more coverage if he'd urinated behind a flagpole.  I was walking with my 9 year old niece and literally grabbed her around the waist with one arm and covered her eyes with my free hand.  REALLY?!?  And while I'm on the subject and being catty, Paris and the sites and the subway still smell like pee.  There.  I said it.  It stunk like a litterbox 15 years ago and they haven't figured it out since.  And as a woman it angers me because I don't think women are doing a lot of this public urination.  Unlike London, you see exponentially more public drunkenness.  I don't think we saw any in London this trip.  Paris you are just poisoning the well.

The following day we were a little nervous about riding the Metro to the Trocodero to see the Eiffel Tower.  This day we weren't as slow moving because we didn't have luggage and weren't as easy targets.  They do announce overhead in both French and English warning about pick pockets throughout the trains.  Nice.

 We rode onwards to take pictures at the Arc de Triomphe.  Free activities are always good.  We noticed right away that the French do not have subway etiquette like the English do.  In London, people on the platform wait for the riders to disembark the trains whereas in Paris, the crowd on the platform just presses into the car and the riders be damned.

It is also worth mentioning that Metro security is non-existent.  When we first arrived in London, we were standing around on our Northfields platform while I monkeyed around with my phone trying to get my Google Maps to cooperate and were promptly asked if we needed help by the attendant.  Yes he was trying to be helpful but more than anything, he was trying to move us along because it is a security breach to have people loitering on the platforms if they have no business there.  And this was DAYS BEFORE the bombings.  Also, there was at least one attendant physically STANDING and MONITORING the turn styles whenever we entered or exited the system anywhere in London.  In Paris, there is an employee behind glass in a little cubicle with no direct line of sight of the entry gates.  You insert your ticket and the gate opens.  The gate returns your ticket so you can prove you've paid if questioned on the train but you do not require a ticket to exit the system like you do in London.  You simply approach the gate doors and when they sense you, they open.  We saw plenty of buskers in London but they were in the corridors approaching the platforms.  In Paris, they were ON the trains.  We also saw homeless people sleeping everywhere on the platforms.  And mind you, all this was after the Belgium attacks.  Unbelievable.  Paris, you have got to tighten that up!

We hit the Louvre and proceeded to wait in line for almost an hour and a half.  It was Easter Sunday the day we were there and very crowded. It is also a good thing to mention that even if you buy advance tickets, you will still wait in line because it is a security line.  That was new since '01.  We ate our lunch standing in line.  The maps of the museum have printed warnings on them against thieves and pick pockets.  The most well known art museum in the world is now a haven for thieves.  Awesome.  But there again, if you mind yourself and use common sense, you'll be fine.

Once inside the Louvre, you see signs everywhere that say, "Mona Lisa this way."  Do people really come all the way to the Louvre just to see the Mona Lisa?  I like her because she came from the hand of  Da Vinci but there are other Da Vinci's I love a lot more. 

Here is La Belle Ferronniere by Mr. Da Vinci.  My pictures of the paintings are all terrible because I was fighting the crowd.  I bought postcards of all these works years ago.

Ms. De Milo.  I wonder what kind of bra she wears?  She looks great!

I don't know who painted this one but I love it because it is Elizabeth I on her deathbed and they are imploring her to choose a successor.  I think that is King James VI of Scotland portrayed in the picture.  I'd seen this in a biography of her and didn't realize it was housed here so I was thrilled to see it.  I didn't crop the photo to show the architecture of the room.  All the ceilings and walls had such beautiful molding and a detail.  It is truly a palace for art.

This is Ophelia but most people think of Millais' Ophelia.  Beautiful.

I always liked this one too.  She is the spirit of France during the French Revolution.  It is very Les Miserables-y.

If memory serves me, the man was Hindu and the woman was a Christian and they were forbidden to marry but did and she died and a hermit is helping him to bury her.  Very Romeo and Juliet.

In a way I'm happy this man is in my picture so you can see the scale.  This painting is GINORMOUS and one of my favorites.  It is Napoleon being crowned emperor.  The detail is exquisite.  I could stare at it all day long.  The story goes that his mother was against the idea of him crowning himself  Emperor and she did not attend the ceremony.  Napoleon simply had her painted in.

The Virgin and Child with St. Anne by Mr. Da Vinci. 

Madonna of the Rocks by Mr. Da Vinci.  Don't you feel like you want to start out on a mystery solving adventure surrounded by all these Da Vincis?

Winged Victory is absolutely glorious.  She sits atop a staircase and is a joy to behold.  Whenever I think about her-or the Louvre in general, I think of the movie The Rape Of Europa.  Can you imagine trying to catalogue, package, and ferry away the contents of that building to keep it away from the Nazis?  They say in that film that they constructed a special ramp to bring Victory carefully down the stairs and at every moment they were terrified she'd shatter.  As they loaded her onto the truck, the curator wept saying he was sure he'd never see her again.  

La Jaconde

VerMeer's Lacemaker

The following day we split up and went on separate day trips.  John and his family went to Notre Dame and Mom and I went to Montmarte.  The Montmarte area was featured in the movie Amelie.  On the way, we had to go back towards the Louvre and come up to the street through an underground mall.

Lo and behold, in that mall was a Yves Rocher shop.  They are kind of like a French Avon and have physical stores all over the world but do only mail order business in the USA.  I've visited these shops all over Europe but never in France.  We stopped in but I didn't buy anything.

We also made a stop at E. Dehillerin which is the cullinary shop Julia Child used to patronize when she lived in Paris.  It was Easter Monday and they were closed.  I was crushed.  But at the same time, maybe it was a blessing because I'm sure I would have found all kinds of stuff I couldn't live without and as it stood, I already had to pay an overweight fee for my luggage by the time we left the country.  I was so disappointed though.  I wanted to buy macaron tools and baking mats.  Maybe some pots de creme ramekins.  I'll just have to make nice with Paris and go back.  A friend of mine at work has already said she'd be my travel buddy and go with me.  Here's hoping.

Back to the Metro to the Barbes Rochechouart stop.  It looked familliar but it didn't.  All the ironwork is silver but I could have sworn it used to be deep green.  When we were sitting on the bench, you could see where they'd painted and sure enough there were remnants of green paint peeking out from beneath the silver.

We hoofed it up to Sacre Coer in Montemarte which means Mount of Martyrs.  St. Denis was marched by the Romans up this hill to be executed but halfway up, they lost patience and beheaded him right there.  Then the miracle occurred because his beheaded body carried his severed head a further mile up the hill according to legend.  This area of Paris is famous for the Bohemian artist movement of the late 1800's.  The films Moulin Rouge and Amelie were based in this area.

We tramped around this area and stopped into a cafe for coffee and a jambon crepe to escape the cold rainy weather.

We rode the funicular UP the hill but walked down.  The buskers were very aggressive here.  I'll admit that when I don't want to be bothered overseas, I pretend to be Norwegian and I don't speak English and for the most part they leave me alone because they have no idea what language you're speaking.  With only 4.4 million Norwegian speakers in the world, it is definitely a language off the beaten track.  It didn't deter these "friendship bracelet" scammers.  They walk right up to you and if they can accost you and succeed in slapping their bracelet on you, they will argue that you're obligated to pay.  They came at us and I had my arm around Mother but I didn't look at them and said, "Nei takk," and we kept walking.  They walked right up to us reaching for us so I held my hand up and looked over my sunglasses and barked at them, "NEI TAKK!"  They backed off but Jesus Martha!

We only had 2 full days in Paris which is both good and bad.  I was sad to not have more time but because of the news headlines and our experiences so far and the fact that it was the end of our trip, I was ready to get the heck out of Dodge.  It is tradition to leave a padlock in Paris and we'd brought our cheap IKEA padlocks.  I know I'll never get my husband to travel overseas with me but I wrote his name on a lock with mine to ensure our true love.  Awwwwwww.  We didn't have time to leave them on the padlock bridge so we left them instead on the fence by our apartment.

The Eiffel Tower had been lit up in the colors of the Belgian flag our entire stay and on our last night, it did the traditional "sparkle" on the hour and was beautiful.  There is also a searchlight on the top that circles.

As crabby as I was with Paris, we had a good time...considering.  It is a beautiful city at the end of the day.  It is crawling with history.  I'm not Anti-French, just Anti-Paris.  We received wonderful help from those we approached individually.  I love the contributions of France to the culinary world.  I have pictures of Jacque Pepin and Julia Child taped inside my kitchen cupboards.  I absolutely respect the French language.  My sister was born on Bastille Day.  I've loved Cinderella and The White Cat since I was a little girl.  I love French cinema.  Dave knows that Jean Reno and/or Vincent Cassel is my free pass fantasy man. I guess what we experienced was a perfect storm of anti Paris experiences but I'll try again if you will Paris.