Open Letter to Mike W
Trip Start
Apr 27, 2006
1
28
110
Trip End
Apr 01, 2008
Paris,
France
Monday, July 17, 2006
I apologize for denigrating Paris all these years. While it is still not my favorite city in the world, I consistently enjoyed myself there for the first time. Maybe it was because I did nothing cultural at all - no musees, no cathedrals, no Champs De Elysees, no arts, no Seine, no Eiffel tower, nothing. Maybe it was because I decided to explore the neighboorhood(s) I was in, rather than spending half my time on the Metro going hither and thon. Maybe it was because I stayed in a neighborhood that better suited me. OR, doubfully, maybe I am growing up and am now sofisticated enuff to preciate it. Who knows?
Per your advice, I stayed in the 11th Arrondizement, at the Place Blum, midway between Bastille and Republique.
Bar Game
On the 13th (the day before Bastille Day), I didn't know to go to a Fireman's Ball (parties thrown in firehouses), so I walked to Astiér (note to all - this is a rockin restaurant Mike has taken me to before). The menù is 28€ now before any supplements. I had the foie gras and salmon. I wanted veal like last time, but this time they only had kidneys; they must have finished the head earlier in the week. Regardless, the food was great and the cheese plate (all you want, slice it off yourself from 30 or so cheeses) kicks ass. I even ate dessert. I then walked to the Oberkampf area. You said it was the closest thing to the Mission that Paris has, and that seems fair. I spent the night talking with random Parisians and the bartender at a place that offered 15 or so infused rums.
On Bastille Day, I went to the Bastille (which, as you know, doesn't actually exist anymore, there is just a monument), and there was nothing happening except a sleepy sit-in of Tamils protesting their treatment in Sri Lanka. And I wasn't going to wake up early to go to the Champs De Elysees to see a French military parade, given that the closest thing they have seen to victorious combat in 80 years was Zidane's headbutt of an Italian incapaple of standing up. (Good thing too, because I heard later it took hours to get a Metro train off the Champs after the fireworks show.) Instead, I had sushi for the first time in almost three months
Bastille Day at the Bastille!
. Not great, but not bad. What struck me, though, is how many Japonais restaurants there are in Paris, or at least the places I wandered. They are practically more common than doner shops, although they seem to feature more skewered cooked meat than our sushi bars.I followed that with an interesting evening on Rue De Lappe (a block of bars parallel to Rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine off the Bastille), first talking with two recent Paris arrivals from some town in Brittany I don't remember, and then going to a bar where me and an international crowd of drunkards spent hours trying to balance a 0.10 Euro coin on a lemon floating in a glass. I write to tell you that it cannot be done. I fully intended to go to one of the Fireman's Balls that night, but never motivated. (Insert Gallic shrug here.)
On the 15th, I completed my neighborhood tour by wandering the Marais (the 3rd/4th Arr.). I started up at Republique, though, looking for a couple of Irish/Aussie Bars. I found them (but they were either shitty, featuring a bad band, or charging a cover), but only after I walked The Longest Mile of Sex Shops Ever. Apparently all of the ones that used to be by Montparnasse have moved to the Rue St. Denis. There must be thousands of men masturbating in and around Paris to support that many DVD stores on one block
Making Friends Again
. A river of semen-clogged Kleenexes flushed into the Paris sewers and then the Seine. This amount of this Parisian Louvrecation of the river can only be described as Seinesational. Ugh. I did find the Marais. You called it "precious." I'd call it gay, but you were always more PC than me. I was pleased to see a bar called the The Bear's Den until I realized it wasn't owned by a Cal grad. I can say, though, that French bears don't like leather as much as American bears, nor do they wear man capris as much as the Italians. I evntually found a place that wasn't too "precious" and killed the evening there.That's about it, Mike. Sunday I did laundry, watched the Tour De France, had a "Geant" croque monsieur, and otherwise vegetated, but I enjoyed even that. I promise now to visit you in Paris once you get transferred there (just pick a cool neighborhood to live in), but not before I visit you in Hong Kong first. Cheers, Colin
Coming Attraction: The Gentse Feetsen in Ghent (Gent), Belgium
Comments
must be the cheese
i knew you would come around
You've clearly been gone too long...
Singing the praises of the French? What's with you, man???