From the beginning: this trip started the eve of the 22nd on an SNCM ferry. We headed out of the bay of ajaccio at 7pm sharp and landed safely 12 hours later in the port of Marseille. The second and hopefully last time I’ll greet Marseille. I haven’t yet discovered it’s magic. I don’t know if I ever will. (or if there is any to discover!)
7.36am I found myself at the train station as you can see:
… with just under 12 hours until my flight to London left the airport.
Should have done as this chap did:
Being an expert at waiting I waited out my time, had a tea at a café across the street, watched people, tried to find fondue cheese and a functioning Banque Postal (I was unsuccessful in both ventures). Eventually I found myself at MP2 – the budget airlines part of Marseille-Provence Airport.
Here, I did in fact follow the good advice of the chap above and fell asleep over my baggage for awhile, as having slept on the ferry the night before, I didn’t sleep particularly well.
Eventually it was time for my flight and I had to pay 12 euro to check a bag! Ryanair tip: don’t always believe the one cabin baggage rule… because in all the airports I’ve been in now for Ryanair (including my last voyage a total of 6 different airports) only one was strike on that rule.
Our flight to London was delayed forty minutes due to incredible pea-soup fog at all airports. What else can you expect from England I guess! Everyone clapped as the pilot successfully landed the plane in the fog… you could barely see the runway. (But also now in my grand Ryanair experience it seems every time a Ryanair flight lands everyone claps – probably because everything about Ryanair is precarious!) I arrived at my London family’s house at 11pm where they had dinner already ready for me! And we had a nice visit before I crashed.
I unfortunately didn’t take many photos in London! Not sure why. I carried my camera with me everyday but only took photos once.
24 dec was shopping in Harrow and visiting Harrow school where Rafi is a student. This was also meant to include listening to him play the organ (I love listening to anything Rafi plays!) but that didn’t work out so after I had shopped in Primark (thank God!) and La Senza and H&M and met Tony and Amanda at the church we went for a little expedition in Harrow looking at different things and then went back home to Wembley for a nice cup of tea and a snack.
That night we all visited and Amanda and Rafi gave me a concert of Piano and Cello it was lovely.
We also had chocolate fondue mmmmm! And mulled wine!! The first time in my life!!
25 dec MERRY CHRISTMAS! We slept in late (it was raining and foggy – sort of like Christmas at home last year!) I read in my bed a book that Amanda had and we visited did different things I don’t really remember but it was a nice Christmas day. We even had a full Christmas dinner with a turkey, sweet mashed potatoes, root veggies, stuffing, and other yummy things I think I’m forgetting oh ratatouille (like the movie!) which I helped make and cranberry sauce made from fresh cranberries! And after dinner we opened presents and drank Muscat and talked to Dani on skype who is in the states various parts and not giving away any information about her new bf – except that he doesn’t have a wooden leg!
26 dec was meant to be the day I would meet Alice but I didn’t. So hopefully we’ll meet again… some other time but I don’t know when! I played the piano secretly in the house since it was empty and it was glorious but I’ve forgotten everything except the moonlight sonata – so my resolution for the moment is to find a piano in Ajaccio and re-learn the five or so pieces I used to know how to play and loved playing. After that, I went off by myself downtown thanks also to Lou’s oyster card – free to roam the city at whim! It was fun to be back in London and go on the tube again! So I went shopping on Oxford street on Boxing day! Of course it was unbelievable madness! I also went to one of my favourite used bookstores (in fact the only one whose location I can remember) and bought FIVE BOOKS!!! Ahh English books – it’s a blessing though my bag was a lot heavier after I left London then when I arrived there! I also bought new enormous sunglasses! HALF PRICE of course it was boxing day! I may have done something else but I forget. Anyway went back home and watched several episodes of a show the title of which I can’t remember now ahh!
Also in the midst of all this was maeve trying madly to book a hostel in Valencia only to find out they were all full… and also trying to find a hostel/somewhere to stay in Paris… which was also full to the gills thus this also equals maeve freaking out and Lou and Tony and Mom trying to calm me down and convince me it would work out!
27 dec I was going to go to Oxford with Lou and Rafi but the galleries had all been closed the 26th so I went to the Tate Modern to see the fabulous Louise Bourgeois (not just show) RETROSPECTIVE and I also went to the V&A to see an exhibition of photos by Lee Miller (!). This was one of the best parts of being in London – the art.
Here are some pictures outside the Tate Modern of Bourgeois’ Spider!!!! (I was sure that this was in the collection at the NAG but apparently it’s in a collection in New York but I’m sure I saw it (or something just like it) outside the NAG when I was there a few years ago!) anyway… spider wooo!
St. paul’s cathedral in the background with millennium bridge and Thames river.
A bicycle and the Thames river
The spider is called Maman and was made in 1999. “This gigantic spider, sheltering a sac of eggs under her abdomen, is one of Louise Bourgeois’s most famous works. She has explained that the spider symbolizes her mother: My best friend was my mother and she was deliberate, clever, patient, soothing, reasonable, dainty, subtle, neat and useful as a spider. That is the beauty of Louise Bourgeois. How fabulous is that!! Makes my heart sing! I am so happy I got to see this show!!
So this show included works spanning Bourgeois 30 year (or longer?) career. I also happened to walk into a free exhibition on poetry and art I think that’s what it was called only to find a display of FRANCESCA WOODMAN photographs! Only one of my inspirations but I’ve never seen any of her work in person either. It was a good day!
There was also a piece in the turbine hall, part of Unilever called Shibboleth by Doris Salcedo and here are some folk trying to work out the fissure down the middle of the floor:
Ah modern art! It was interesting what they wrote about it: With Shibboleth, Doris Salcedo has opened a long, snaking crack across the vast length of the Turbine Hall. Fracturing the concrete floor, her new work strikes to the very foundations of the museum. … A shibboleth, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is ‘a word used as a test for detecting people from another district or country by their pronunciation; a word or sound very difficult for foreigners to pronounce correctly.’ It is, therefore, a way of separating one people from another. … A shibboleth is a token of power: the power to judge, refuse and kill. … Walking down Salcedo’s incised line, particularly if you know about her previous work, [which I doubt the folk in my photo did, as they peered down and along quizzically trying not to fall in!] might well prompt a broader consideration of power’s divisive operations as encoded in the brutal narratives of colonialism their unhappy aftermaths in postcolonial nations, and in the stand-off between rich and poor, northern and southern hemispheres. If Shibboleth speaks openly to our moment, it is also concerned with an archaeological sense of history. Indeed, Salcedo infers that the two are fundamentally connected. Look down into the crack, and you see not Tate Modern’s foundation but a carefully constructed concrete cast formation, embedded with chain-like fence. . … And it continues… but I don’t think you want to read anymore of this. I found it interesting the part about the foundation of the museum being cracked open and revealed but then they went and backed over what they had originally stated so I’m not sure what I think of what’s been written by whomever it is that wrote it (oh pardon c’est Martin Herbert!)
Anyway…
After this I went off to the V&A to see Lee Miller. There was also a fashion couture show, which made me think of Dani. Here are some things I found photo worthy on my way:
Flowers left at Holburn station:
Crazy art – mom and I saw this guy’s stuff at Kew two years ago at Christmas!
The show was excellent – some really interesting. They even had original vogue magazines with the articles she had written while working, liberating the death camps, and taking fashion photographs such as one of my favourites of Marlene Diethrich – however they didn’t have this photo (disappointment) but they did have the one of Miller in taking a bath in Hitler’s bathtub. And a flim (flim?!) film clip that was weird and cool.
Then I went home, but first I treated myself to a bag of PRAWN COCKTAIL CRISPS! Needless to say, even though I was only in England for four days – I managed to do everything I wanted to do and came away with a huge sac of PG tips! I won’t run out of tea for the rest of this year!! As well as all other esstentials possibly imaginable (!) I had hoped to pick up and did plus a brain art-tri-fied and ready for new adventures!
At home that evening we watched the Queen. And I think the night before we watched a funny British film called ‘the man who went up a hill and came down a mountain’ (maybe the English man who…etc) it was set in Wales. We also watched Dr. Who – which I haven’t seen since the last time I was at my London families house.
The 28th Amanda and Rafi went off to Pro Corda and Lou drove me to Golder’s Green where I caught my bus to the airport. I had a long day of travel ahead. And many heartaches due to my luggage. Thankfully (big thankfully) Lou had given me another bag because I had managed to collect a lot of stuff in London that would no longer fit in the bag I had brought! (and I wasn’t done accumulating either!) (in London: Tea, razors, a bag, four t-shirts, three tights, two bras, an umbrella plus seven books (presents and used books) and candles). Got to Stanstead – beautiful, far away as the land’s end, Stanstead …
(I think this to be possibly the worst airport yet.. though they were all pretty soulless) Yes… got there early, how pleasant. Lined up for my flight to Bologna (because I was meant to be in Bologna but plans changed so I had to go to Bologna to get my flight to Valencia – I’ve created quite a carbon footprint for myself in the last two weeks!). The lady at the check in said ‘any bags to check’
me: ‘no.
lady: ‘how many bags do you have?’
me: three.
Lady: ‘the security at this airport will only allow you to go through with one bag’
me: ‘what? But I’ve gone through in every other airport no problem.’
Lady: I know but here it’s different.
Me: oh. (also me thinking of the 12 euro I had to pay to check my bag the last time and not wanting to pay in pounds!)
lady: you can try to go through but if they don’t let you come back here.
So off I went… was turned away as the lady had said. Feeling horrid and still not sure of where I would be in Valencia I considered not going at all.. and even called Lou in my panic but she wasn’t home – probably a good thing. I managed to get my sleeping bag in the new bag that Lou gave me (it’s extendable!) but couldn’t get my hand bag in… I just couldn’t. So I went back. And the lady said: I told you but you didn’t listen well you tried anyway. So one bag to check? Good girl.’ (could you be any more patronizing!) But the best part is… she didn’t charge me!!! I’ve decided you can tell a lot from countries by their airport systems. I’ll explain that later. After we’ve been through Italy and Spain – by that point we’ll have covered four countries. Took off and landed successfully from London to Bologna. Got my bag, walked out of the arrivals terminal after having several people try to break into my toilet because the door wouldn’t lock, and walked into the departures terminal. Saw a lot of Bologna, just like last time! Read and waited for my next flight. Decided my bags would be fine this time. And I was right. The check in man asked me how many bags I had I said three he took a look at them and said fine go ahead. The Italians (at least the ones who were at this airport in particular) don’t have any concept of what a queue is. I happened to sit next to a funny Spanish couple. The man asked me in English if I spoke Spanish and I said no and his wife/gf said in Spanish ‘she doesn’t speak Spanish!’ and then he said ‘you speak English?’ and I said ‘yes and french’ and she said ‘she’s English and French!’ in spanish! It was funny – maybe only cause I was there and exhausted. He made jokes about the shoddy-ness of Ryanair in general the whole time and yet again when we successfully touched down in Valencia everyone clapped and Ryanair played champion music over the loudspeaker. It was odd as well that on the flights going to Italy and Spain all the instructions were only given in English but in the flights going to or leaving France everything is given in French and English. Also the flight that went from London to Bologna, seconds before we landed a kid in front of me, as we felt a soft lull in the aircraft said ‘that was the gentlest landing ever’ and his brother said, also seconds before we landed ‘we haven’t landed yet’ and then we hit the runway with the usual bumping along and sudden change in speed so you can almost smell the burning rubber on the runway! Classic.
Landed in Valencia at 10.30pm and there Maria met me! It was really really nice to visit with her, since I haven’t seen her since before the first vacation and we only spoke in French the whole time – was a perfect way for me to enter back into French and prepare to be back in French land two days later.
That night we went to two bars in the Barrio del Carmen, with her sister and sister’s boyfriend and then went back to her house around 1.30am. I was so tired I fell asleep the instant my head hit the pillow and didn’t wake up till 10.30am the next day! From there we explored the city but I can’t remember a lot of what we saw because I didn’t write any of it down and I was going to get Maria to write it all down for me and then I didn’t oops. Anyway pictures of Valencia: (and yes it was warm!)
29 dec:
Just off of Cólon – a main street:
The cathedral – we didn’t actually go in because it was 3 euro, but it looks beautiful.
A main square: the steeple to the right is something important that I also saw the night before but I can’t remember.
Me and Maria!
Little streets in Valencia:
The Façade of Palacio del Marqués de Dos Agus (which is an example of traditional Valencian architecture, which generally feature elaborate Baroque facades – like this one!)
Then we headed over the river that is now a park stretching through the city.
It was a river, but there were really bad floods and so they diverted the river to the sea and made the riverbed into a park! It’s really nice. I’m not sure if the whole thing is called the Jardines del Túria but part of it is anyway. Anyway … then we went to the Museo de Bellas Artes.
Here is some graf art outside the museum with some Valencian locals
This apparently houses famous pieces by Bosch and Goya – I didn’t remark on this but there were some extrodinary paintings and an example of a Spanish representation of Judith Slaying Holofernes… which I of course enjoyed enormously.
Inside the museum is an enclosed garden, which is something typical to Spain
Then we decided we would go to the beach for a late lunch and a stroll on the beach. We headed to a newsagent to get a bus ticket and Maria showed me the wall…
It used to protect the city with moats and now stands as a monument to the city’s past.
Little street:
Baked goods
And a balcony covered in plants!
Then we headed out to the beach where we also saw (on our way) the Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias – which is a multi million euro collection of fancy buildings housing various sciences and arts. We didn’t go in but looked at the outside. Sorry I didn’t take a photo.
So we got to the beach and ordered in a very expensive restaurant paella – which is a typical Valencian speciality – made with rice, meat, vegetables and/or seafood. Ours had chicken, rabbit, escargot, and a Spanish vegetable I forget the name of. It was delicious but I did feel a bit carnivorous eating rabbit and snails… you could see the little eyes of the snails and everything! Eep! It was still good. Here’s a photo of it… we also had wine that was not so good but that’s ok!
It also so happens that Maria is interested in photography so I gave her a lesson on using a manual camera with the help of our wine bottle and glasses and only in French… not sure how well that came across (!) and I’m sure the other diners were a bit confused about what I was doing! I also loved the fact that an Anglophone in Spain visiting a Spaniard were only speaking French!
After lunch or linner as it was about 4pm, we went to the beach. Got a nice piece of storm-china for my collection – it’s purple!
Here’s a dilapidated building – my favourite!
Beach
As we were leaving Maria explained that the place we were in, mostly gypses live there. And it has a lot of old, original buildings that the current mayor wants to tear down in order to build new homes. I hope he is not successful.
Here’s a squatter home that’s been shut down (I could have stayed there!)
Typical homes:
Interesting
Beautiful
The street in the quartier by the beach
Then the bus came and we got on and as he pulled away the lady who was near us fell down. Her shoe had gotten caught on something and she fell over. He helped her get up and she explained to Maria that it was her shoe that was stuck, and I un-stuck it. What struck me though is she was the Spanish version of my landlady from Quebec!
So then we went to see the Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias and went for a walk along the park in the river. As it was dusk it was nice. And we chatted.
On our way home we passed this covered market
Next day 30th of December Maria was heading down to a place south of Alicante for a vacation with her family and I went off to see IVAM museum and catch my flight to Paris at 5.30 or something like that.
Here is some photos from Maria’s apartment:
Kitchen:
Living room:
A very beautiful welcoming place to have passed my two days in Valencia. She accompanied me to the metro station and helped me buy my ticket even though she had told me how to ask to buy it: por favor un ticket para ir a l’aeropeurto. And also I figured out how to ask where the museum was if I got lost: donde es el museo IVAM (pronounced IBAM). I did get lost of course and ended up hanging out in the riverbed park for the whole time I was meant to be at the museum. But that’s ok because it was a beautiful day outside – warm and sunny 16 C (!) and I think I even got some sun on my face! Imagine that in December! Here are some photos from the riverbed park – the part I was in was called Jardines del Túria.
Trees
Cloud streaked sky
Me and my new sunglasses
(more bug-like then I’ve ever had before!)
went for a stroll and ended up in a sunnier part where lots of people with babies and dogs passed.
Then I went to the airport. The Airport is directly linked by the subway in Valencia and it only takes about 30 mins to get there! And of course, it’s Spain, so no problems with my luggage.
Here’s the metro
And just before I got on my flight, the gate for which was switched about four times.
I arrived in Paris, safely again, found the bus ‘downtown’ (ha!) and got on. The bus actually left us in Neuilly-Sur-Seine. So if I had been staying with Shannon’s roommate that would have been perfect! Found the metro after some confusion, and went in the wrong direction, got back on in the right direction on line 1 and eventually made my way to the Peace and Love hostel. (I think one of the BEST hostel experience’s of my life…) I could see it from Jaurès station – “accessible by lines 2, 5 and 7” (the hostel’s amazingly clear and concise instructions on how to get to the hostel.) I couldn’t miss the hostel though, big glowing purple letters screaming ‘peace and love’. The reception/lobby was actually a bar. Of course everything I had on started to reak of smoke immediately since people were enjoying there last moments of smoking before the new law came into effect. There was beer all over the floor, and I was hit on the minute I stepped in as well as called love by the oh so charming Aussie bartender. The man who was trying hard to hit on me said ‘where are you from?’ and I said ‘Canada’ and he said ‘what! What are you doing here? At this time of night?’ very clever. So I said ‘I live in Ajaccio’ – dead silence. I guess some French don’t react very well to their neighbours in la Corse! Fortunately there was a nice view and a big window and I was roomed with nice girls who were quiet when they arrived home in the late evening… however… I was on the 6th floor… which meant I had to climb about 12 flights of stairs. Anyway. Here is the splendid room
And the view from the window
There was also a shower half the size of a telephone box in the room. Thankfully I never had to experience using that.
Next day was NEW YEAR’S EVE!!!
I checked out of the peace and love, sadly, … and headed up rue la Fayette towards the Banque Postal and then bought an expensive but splendid pain au chocolat. From there I headed on the metro out to Cergy to the Première Classe Hotel – what would be my home for my séjour in Paris. Thankfully, it was clean, a shower was at hand and was not too expensive. After checking in at Première Classe, showering and changing I headed downtown to St. Michel off line 4 – and my new favourite quartier of Paris! I spent the majority of my days here. And enjoyed every minute.
On my voyage:
A band playing in the metro
In St. Michel: A PEUGOT!!!
Bookshop
Flower stand
Little street
More flowers – I love tulips!
To go along with the assistants joke: Pour votre santé bougez plus, buvez plus and apparently fumez plus! (ew!)
A graf that looks remarkably like Edith Piaf (Edith Piaf with an eyepiece!)
(* NOTE: now that I am back in Paris I’ve seen that this graf has been removed! So sad!)
Les deux Magots – the name I found funny, mom cleared up for me that it’s in fact a very famous café where the likes of Simone de Beauvoir and Jean Paul Sartre hung out! It was full so I never had a tea there but I walked by many times.
I ended up calling a bunch of ‘catholic all women hostels’ that had no rooms or were closed or had no idea where I got the idea to call for a room. However it was good to practice my French I guess. It always makes me feel a bit better when the person I ask a question to in French responds to me in French. Then I called mom to ask her to book me a hostel because I had been unlucky in finding even one internet café. At the same time I accidentally hung up on her and Karim, Shannon’s friend called me and then mom was trying to call me at the same time – calls like crazy! It was nice to be able to use my mobile again though! From there I went to a café and only realized after I sat down that it was called (you’ll never guess)… LE BONAPARTE! Man oh man I just can’t escape that guy! But it was a nice Parisian café experience. (despite the name having a certain way of connoting Corsica!)
The tea was expensive and the waiter was fairly rude but there was a couple drinking flutes of champagne
And outside a couple of ladies waiting for there grandsons I assume
There was also a little girl behind me watching me with her hands pressed up against the glass and another couple drinking white wine behind the champagne couple. (I tried to take a photo of the little girl but it didn’t work).
After this I went strolling. Saw some fabulous boots I wanted to buy and found a restaurant where I sat next to an amazing old man and had ‘pâtes aux legumes de soleil’ (aka Mediterranean vegetables) and un petit pichet du vin rouge to celebrate the New Year approaching. It was just enough to make me warm and happy! (light weight that I am!) I wrote a postcard to mom, spoke to the man next to me and when he left he said ‘bonne année’ to me. We didn’t share a lot of words but there was something about him, that when he left I was sad to see him go… or it was the wine. From there I wandered some more till I ended up at the Seine river and felt incredibly happy to be in that place at that moment.
Notre Dame Cathedral
As I strolled along I came across some paramedics and some pedestrians and a trolley. The paramedics were well I can only assume giving CPR but I’m still not sure and then as me and other pedestrians were staring one of them eventually said ‘Alors vous pouvez faire le tour parce que je crois ça va aller’ and as I myself made the tour, along with others, I turned and saw a hand and felt a little ill realizing that there was a dead body there. So as the rest of us walking there along the Seine river were welcoming the new year, that person, that the hand I saw belonged too had said goodbye to it.
I continued on trying to forget about that unfortunate moment and looked up at the apartments I was passing imagining the beautiful things inside – grand pianos, antique wood furniture – and saw one woman at her window with her dog looking down at the scene passing her by below.
A bridge, because I know mom loves bridges
Apartments
From there I found a metro station and got on the metro, headed to St. Paul which is the district where mom and I will be living in our own Parisian apartment for a week in Feburary… however there wasn’t much to see at that point though I’m sure usually there is. But when I got off the metro it was just a bunch of teenagers waiting to party hardy the eve of the New Year. So I went back to the Cergy Première Classe and slept like a baby through the new year.
The first day of the New Year I went to Père Lachaise cemetery.
But before we get to the cemetery you need to see the Première Classe hotel! It cannot be missed!
The view from my window (at least I had a window!)
The outside
Given that the Colman’s gave me Eats, Shoots and Leaves for Christmas I thought it was a funny coincidence that Cergy’s logo is “L’apostroprhe”!!
The square outside the metro – where all your Cergy dreams will come true!
Inside the Cergy Prefecture RER station
It was a somber experience (as in solemn but not depressing). It was also weird being in a cemetery that also happens to be a top ten on the tourist attractions. There were many beautiful and interesting monuments there. There are also a lot of famous people there but I only happened to see Chopin.
Here are some monuments I liked the best:
Collection of dying/dead roses:
Sleeping man
Sleeping woman
A path in the cemetery (they actually have street names it’s so big!)
The guardian of the names
Something I peaked through the trees to see
I saw this angel’s wings from behind and was trying to find it
I liked the quote on this one: “Que devient le reve quand le reve est fini” as well as the ballet man statue and the juxtaposition of scaffolding behind
A white stone woman
Someone across from Chopin – I like that it’s like a cradle and there’s a caricature drawing (also looks like someone tried to butcher the rose bush!!)
Chopin – covered in beautiful flowers and tourists having their photo taken with his grave. Weird.
Another dude across from Chopin – someone put a rose in his hand
A destroyed grave
This one is a bit creepy! From far away I thought it was a decapitated baby – I’m glad it’s not!
Woman embracing a monument
The metro from the cemetery
So then I left, having discovered the map after all that but deciding mom and I would probably go back there and I could enjoy the famous people’s graves with her. So I’ll find Edith Piaf yet – and maybe Marcel Proust is there too.
Here’s Père Lachaise metro with people looking metro-fied
Another metro stop – I really love the metro!
Then I went back to St. Michel to find the shoe store I had seen the day before so that when it was open the next day I could try on the boots. Here is the St. Michel fountain
I went and had a tea at a different café called Le Conti which I liked quite a lot. It had flags from nearly all the Anglo countries (it was missing UK, USA and India – according to my Anglo country lesson!) they had a Canadian flag though!
And some Quebec nationalist lingo in the toilet!
I can’t escape the nationalists either!! It also had a cute SDF chein hanging out watching the world go by. He’s the perfect beggar dog! (SDF = sans domicile fixe aka homeless).
I sat next to a woman drinking red wine and on the other side of me was a couple of guys shooting the breeze about their teaching jobs I think… but I can’t be sure. It was hard to separate their French words from the rest of the French words swirling around that café! And my tea was less expensive and yummy as ever!!
Then I searched around for the boots again and came across a seafood stand
They had sea urchins the night before but since I don’t know how you eat those… I didn’t buy any. I’ll find out from my Corsican people I know how you eat them! I’m a little scared to find out but we’ll see. Also they had Corsican clementines in the Monoprix… and everything at Monoprix was more expensive than our Cours Napoleon counterpart! After I finally found the shop I went to Montparnasse Bienvenue to go to the tour Montparnasse where you can have a 365 degree view of Paris (cool!) but there was a huge queue of course… so I left. I also found an internet café. It’s 52 stories high
The day before I had seen an ad for a concert at L’Église Saint Julien le Pauvre for 5pm that day of Chopin pieces – it’s the oldest church in Paris and thanks to my lady Alice in Burgundy I could tell it was a Medieval church! Hooray!! So I found my way there it was a bit tricky to find and it was a stunning concert in a sweet little church.
The ‘Steinway’
But he didn’t play the Nocturne I struggled to learn and forgot – I wish wish he had. Then as I was leaving feeling music-fied and happy as a clam I saw a poster for Bach cello suites at another church and found my way there immediately. This was at l’Église Saint Epherme which I had a time finding but eventually did and there I met a new friend named Shannon from Northern California who is the absolute splitting image of Tanja – not just image, voice, gestures, laugh, everything. She is Tanja’s twin and now I miss Tanja a lot!! As she walked by me and sat down I thought ‘OMG it’s Tanja’ and then I thought ‘if it was Tanja I would know for sure it was and she would too’ and then Shannon said to me ‘est-ce que vous aimez le violoncello’ in an Anglophone accent and I was really happy to find an Anglophone friend! The concert was lovely and after we spoke to the cellist who is only 21. She thought he had a lot of skill but not much maturity. I can agree that skill comes before maturity in music but you could tell at certain moments his passion for cello. And I’ve decided cello is like the French language. I love them both in the same way. It’s the subtle nuances of a soft note that resonates through your soul that is the same for me as the playful cues of French that I love so much, the small words that make such a difference, the sweet sounds, the silent letters, the r’s, the cute and useful words you could never get away with using in English (coucou and truc!) – it’s everything!
So I said goodnight to Shannon and we agreed to meet the next day to go to the Musée D’orsay and the Centre Pompidou.
I was tired and hungry and cold but I thought a nice treat on the first day of the year would be a stroll in the nighttime on the Champs Élysses – probably the most famous street in all Paris. It wasn’t quite like in A bout de Souffle but it was lovely. This was a tricky manouevre to get this photo! The crazy tourist righ?! I wasn’t the only one!!
I walked up looking at the different shops, looked in an arcade and watched a man and woman playing tag. I called mom and we had a nice almost 30 min conversation thanks to Maria who gave me two French payphone cards. But the gutting thing is when the card cuts out in mid sentence and you have to walk away feeling somewhat unfulfilled! From there I got on the RER at Charles de Gaulle Étoile and headed back to Cergy.
The 2nd I had been waiting in line forever to buy my extremely expensive day pass (because I was in freaking zone 5!) and let a lady go ahead of me who was going to miss her train, which I didn’t think was mine, but it turned out was… so then I had to wait for another only to get on a train that was rerouted to Poissy and delayed half an hour! Just my luck! While I was on the train Shannon called and we agreed to meet at noon at the Musée d’Orsay. I really wanted to go but got there and there was a 2 hour queue to get in (everyone who couldn’t go on New Year’s Day came out of the woodwork!) I never found Shannon but she phoned me while I was in the metro (amazing thing about Paris metro – you get signal even in the tunnel!!) and so planned to meet at St. Michel at 5.30pm. So I went to the store with the boots I wanted for 49 euro (a bargain in comparison to Ajaccio) but he only had 38 or 40… and the 38 was too small just a by a bit so the 40 would be too big… so I said no, feeling disappointed… even though I don’t need another pair of boots (since I have two pairs already!). From there I went to the most beautiful public toilet in Paris at Place Madelaine – it was very beautiful. It’s all art deco and it’s a free public toilet! Imagine that! good to know anyway – when in need!! Here are some photos:
To the right were the urinals – glad I didn’t turn the camera too far to the right!
There is even a sink and dyer in the stall with you – how nice!
Dedication to the Art Deco toilet
Then I went into a very fancy bakery where I had an even more expensive pain au chocolat then the first one… and saw St. Georges spring water (corse) for 4.50 euro! Yow!! I guess that’s cause it’s ‘imported’. So then I went up to Montmartre to Place des Abessess which I’ve heard in a song by Pierre Lapointe a million times and I thought he was Quebecois but for some reason I just kept thinking he was French… maybe he is after all… here is place des Abessess!
Found a post office where I sent off a claude cahunesque postcard to mom and then headed off down the street into the heart of Montmartre – our favourite part of Paris thanks to Amelie.
Here is the famous merry-go-round (or ménage in French)
And the Sacré Coeur
After I found a place that was a bookshop, art gallery and café all in one!! Imagine that! It’s like a dream come true! And the best part was the giant FRANCESCA WOODMAN book sitting staring at me asking me to come over and take a look! Beautiful but more expensive than a cheap flight back to Ajaccio! 75 euro… and huge… my bag wouldn’t have stood for it. Nor my bank account unfortunately. It was lovely to look at anyway. From there I found the famous Montmartre steps …
not quite the same as the famous photograph. And I also found a poor vélo in need of love!!
Then I wandered a bit hoping I would stumble upon les deux moulins but didn’t… I know it exists since my friend Becky found it while she was in Paris but I have yet to do so. Maybe in February.
After this I went to Republique not sure why hoping to find a café and did called café Follie’s – but the Apostrophe should have been my clue that it was not a real Parisian hotel… do apostrophe’s even exist in French! I don’t think so but I could be wrong… actually I guess in words like ‘J’ai and other such ‘contractions’ I guess you would call that… or combining of words anyway… but not like Follie’s. anyway… it was not a nice café and super expensive… and really bad service. But it was warm facing the sun and an amazing French woman came in and order an espresso. She was wearing all purple and had on big green sunglasses and a bob haircut and left a big red lipstick stain on her coffee cup. I enjoyed watching her (that sounds creepy but you know what I mean). Everyone always seemed to be getting off at Republique every time I passed it so I thought there was something there.. but apparently no. From Republique I went to the Centre Pompidou…
…only to find it crawling with queue after queue of tourist trying to get in so I decided I should go when mom and I are in Paris in February and have museum passes. I went into a poster/postcard store and saw lots of postcards I wanted to buy but didn’t. and from there I ended up on Rue Rivoli which turns out is the place to go shopping! Went into shop after shop on the search for the perfect Parisian boot… and just as I had almost given up and it was almost 5.30pm, just as I was heading to Châtelet station… I saw some girls run into a tiny shop… that was swarming with people so I decided I should go in. and there were the prefect boot that I’d seen everyone wearing and as I searched for my size, tried them on and loved them… lined up and bought them for (you won’t believe this…) TWENTY THREE EURO! Yes 23… I can’t believe it! The magic number of all time! So now I have a new pair of beautiful boots from PARIS that were only 23 euro… but one unfortunate thing is there is something kind of sharp that sticks out… not sure how to fix that… and I somehow managed to not notice that while I was in the store.
I made it to St. Michel on time and met Shannon. We had a nice tea at Le Conti (I keep wanting to put Le Colis but that’s not a good thing to put!) we tried to give the SDF chein some warm milk but he didn’t like it and it made the patron mad. But it was nice to visit with Shannon again. After we parted ways in the metro I went to the Palais Royal …
… which I had been meaning to and had just read a beautiful passage about it in Shakespeare & Co. by Sylvia Beach (though I never found this bookstore either – which two years ago was my original reason for wanting to go to Paris! In February!) and it was lovely as ever, even in night. Then I went into a bakery and bought un pain déjà tranché (maeve trying to express herself in tired French-ness – the bakery man understood thank goodness!) and went back to the hotel for my last night in wonderful dream fulfilling Cergy.
Jan 3rd I headed to Paris Orly Sud (thankfully a lot easier to get to than Beauvais!) and was reminded of when I arrived in France with Thom and we went to Paris Orly together! I’ve come along way since that day. There, EasyJet turns out… you all queue in the same line for all the flights. But it moves fairly quickly and I got to check my bag hooray no problems and I also treated myself to perfume in the duty free shop… something I’ve never done (bought anything in Duty Free) and something I haven’t had for a long time (a special treat). Flight was delayed but took off swimmingly and makes me wonder what is wrong with Ryanair planes… they don’t sound natural when they take off. The walls are too thin or something I’m not sure… or we are sitting right over the engines. Landed in Nice, where it was raining, saw a bit of Nice on the bus which was nice (haha!). eventually found the port by walking and waited several hours for the ferry to take off (as I arrived around 7pm and it wasn’t leaving until 9.30pm). here I am… waiting again.. looking at the Corsica Ferry men do whatever they do before we get on the ferry.
Corsica Ferries happen to be very well equipped with a cinema and a discotheque/bar.
I decided not to spend the night here and found a petit coin for myself fell asleep for awhile woke up freezing got into my sleeping bag fell asleep again. woke up at 6am an hour before we were meant to dock in Ajaccio but an hour later we were still surrounded by sea with no announcement as to why we hadn’t arrived yet or where the hell we were in the grand scheme of being closer to Ajaccio than we were the night before. We actually docked at 9.30am – TWO HOURS DELAYED ergo I don’t think I’ll ever take a Corsica ferry again. It was also raining – nice welcome home. But in the end… Ajaccio is beautiful even in the rain:
So that was my vacation!
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