Laila and I set off from JFK late Friday night. I insisted we fly KLM because I'd heard it was very luxurious. It was. There was a lot of leg room, a very extensive selection of movies and TV shows to watch, and the free alcohol, of course. Also they love birds and bird videos which was neat.
We arrived in Paris after missing our connection in Amsterdam.
Jo met us there from Dublin which was a fun surprise. Here's Daniel moments after we arrived.
He's there on a Fulbright studying Oulipo, this literary group based in Paris. It sounds really boring, but some of it is really boring. JK it's cool. Like look at this exercise from a New Year's pamphlet Georges Perec sent to his friends in 1979:
MILES DAVIS
quelle différence y a-t-il entre la moutarde AMORA et la moutarde
MAILLE?
aucune, sinon que le couvercle de l'une se décapsule alors que celui
de l'autre se dévisse.
(what's the difference between amora mustard and maille mustard?
only that the lid of one uncorks [roughly] while the other unscrews.
...MAILLE SE DEVISSE)
JOHN COLTRANE
je connais un homme qui erre, sans trêve, sans répit. il est toujours
habillé d'une vieille redingote et porte un faux col jadis blanc, que
les années ont jauni.
(i know a guy who wanders constantly. he's always wearing an old
frock and a detachable collar that used to be white but that the
years have yellowed.
...JAUNE COL TRAINE)
Clever, right?
One of the first things Daniel mentioned about Paris was that about 50% of the signage in the city is in Comic Sans typeface. I found this baffling and charming. What a funny sense of humor and design to put so many signs in the ugliest font ever!! One point for Paris (though I think this point is nullified because every time I saw a sign in Comic Sans I died a little bit inside).
Basically, our trip was an exercise in wanderlust and eating. Every day we set out walking in some direction. We'd walk until we wanted to eat (I say 'wanted to eat' rather than 'got hungry' because our eating had little to do with our collective hunger level). Then we'd eat. Then we'd walk more. It was extremely leisurely and enjoyable.
I. FOOD
Laila ate about 1000 huge meringues. They were gooey inside and oh so sweet.
I always forget that my favorite thing to eat in Europe is ham sandwiches. They're delicious. Baguettes with butter and ham. So simple. So tasty. I had one pretty much every day. The ham in Spain is better, but the Parisian baguette and butter are not to be beat. One point.
Laila insisted we eat a prix fix (or a forumle) one day. We wound up at the most insane restaurant ever that did NOT respect standard portion size. This three course meal consisted of a HUGE salad (with corn (de rigueur for Parisian salads apparently), whole radishes, tons of tomato, and beets), half a chicken with fries, and THREE DIFFERENT FLAVORS OF CREME BRULÉE in standard sized ramekins. It was out of control. I felt so ill afterwards. I couldn't even finish the creme brulées.
Here's Laila, defeated after the intense mealsperience.
A dog was in the restaurant too. Cute!
Daniel ate a lot of tartines au beurre.
Definitely the most amazing thing we ate was macaroons from Ladurée. These cakey cookies came in tons of exotic flavors, including fleur d'orange, cassis and rose. The taste actually deepened and changed as you consumed them. It was remarkable.
II. WANDERLUST
We walked by an ice skating rink on of the first days we were there. The kids were using these ingenious things to make sure they didn't fall over. I was really impressed that the French thought of this. It's so smart!
Daniel works at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France (BnF). This bridge exits right into the main plaza of the BnF. Curvysexycool bridge, eh?
The BnF is amazing! It's kind of like the Getty Center in L.A. without the weird, holistic, New Age-y undertones. The space is a big boardwalk with four buildings at the corners. The buildings are meant to look like open books, an effect that is kind of lost when you're actually standing in the plaza, but apparently stunning when viewed from a helicopter. In the middle of the plaza, there is a large courtyard that looks like something out of Jurassic Park.
It's a line enthusiasts wet dream. Check this linearity!
There were also these neat shrub containers.
I was really impressed with the BnF. I expected the National Library to be some boring neoclassical bullshit, but I was surprised and pleased with what I saw. One more point for Paris.
We also visited some cemeteries on what was dubbed "Death Day."
We saw famous peoples' graves, including Ionseco, Chopin and Sartre. Daniel was understandably appalled that Perec wasn't listed on the Père Lachaise map of notable people. Normally I wouldn't have been particularly impressed with the cemeteries, but on the way home from JFK we drove by a cemetery in Queens that was the most depressing piece of shit ever, so I'm retroactively giving Paris a point for pretty cemeteries.
We also saw some people making out for about a year. They got mad at us for taking pics, but they secretly loved it. I guess PDA is the cool thing in Paris.
Here's a statue of Voltaire the looks just like Mr. Burns from The Simpsons.
Heyyo! 10 points for this:
Laila found the French translation of the American novelisation of the film Face Off. It was an amazing find which she lovingly gave to Daniel.
Later this happened . . . VOLTE FACE F'REAL!
Lastly, TIN TIN TINS!!
I've lost track of the points, but I'm sure they total the numerical equivalent of a return trip to Paris. I couldn't have asked for a better host. Here's Daniel's number in case you want to go to Paris and have a great time too: 88 83 07 96 10. The numbers are anagrammed, so you'll have to unscramble them. HAHAHA GOOD LUCK THERE ARE 3,628,800 POSSIBLE COMBINATIONS!!!11
No comments:
Post a Comment