Encore! Encore!

I’ve had a good few days in Paris since we last spoke – seen some more of the highlights, and had a few distinctly subterranean experiences.

The Louvre was, as expected, entirely too big. I didn’t even try to see it all. In fact I swanned in around noon to get my entrance ticket and my ticket to the 2:30pm guided tour, and then went off to find lunch. After a lovely crêpe (well two crêpes actually, one savoury, one sweet, and a bowl of cider… it was a set menu, how could I refuse?) I wandered back for the tour. This one was similar to the one I did at the Musée D’Orsay in that each person in the group was given a headset and the guide wore a wireless microphone, which means that you were free to wander away from the guide’s immediate area and still hear the never-ending patter. It worked quite well until my guide, in an excess of passion, shouted at two miscreants fingering some priceless objet d’art saying “Ne touche pas les objets!” at top volume, which was then amplified and transferred to my ears at a dangerously ear-drum-damaging level.

Anyways, the tour was nice, and I saw all the big important stuff, like the Venus de Milo and the Winged Victory of Samothrace and this:

It’s small, and completely mobbed all of the time.

The crowd in front of the Mona Lisa. Wild.

I’ll only add that doing a tour of the Louvre in the mid-afternoon after a substantial lunch and a glass of cider leaves one feeling a bit dopey and more in the mood for a nap than a Da Vinci. Lesson learned. Objet d’art before lunch. Also: Ne touche pas!

On Friday morning I went to the market at Rue Cler – just a small street with a nice stretch of shops - and I bought the makings of a picnic to eat in a nearby park, before proceeding to the Catacombs (one of the aforementioned subterranean activities). Rue Cler was nice, and I got a chunk of cheese and a small baguette and a basket of really good strawberries and an enormous macaron and a café au lait. It was all really nice, so I took a picture.

Oo la la!

While I was eating my little picnic, in the metaphorical shadow if the Eiffel Tower (it was cloudy), I was treated to the overture of a well-known tourist scam, and am happy to report that I did not fall for it for one second. Here’s what Rick Steves says about how the scam is supposed to work:

The found ring: An innocent-looking person picks up a ring on the ground in front of you, and asks if you dropped it. When you say no, the person examines the ring more closely, then shows you a mark "proving" that it's pure gold. He offers to sell it to you for a good price — which is several times more than he paid for it before dropping it on the sidewalk.

And that’s exactly what happened, at least up to the “When you say no” part. The guy continued to talk and, having twigged to what was going on, I just held up my hand and shook my head and kept saying, “Non, non, non… allez!” Obviously the guy realized I was on to his little game and off he went to find someone more gullible (who would, no doubt, be wearing flip-flops). And so I finished my macaron, which was fantastic.*

After the picnic it was time for the Catacombs, a site that was on my “Must See” list. You’ve probably heard about this place, and seen pictures. It’s a series of underground tunnels – actually the remains of an old quarry under the city that’s now filled with bones exhumed from cemeteries all over Paris.

At the end of the 18th century, rampant disease in the les Halles neighbourhood caused by the adjacent Cemetery of the Innocents led to the mass grave being entirely exhumed. In 1785 it was decided that the bones were to be moved to the building stone quarry under the Mountsouris plain in the south of Paris. On April 7, 1786, after being properly converted and readied the quarries were consecrated and became the principal ossuary of Paris. Until 1788, cartloads covered with black cloths, escorted by priests chanting the office for the dead, crossed Paris by night to deposit their remains.

Not surprisingly, it’s pretty much off the charts on the Creepy Scale. Being underground in disused quarry tunnels, wandering for what seems like miles under the streets of Paris, feeling the chill in the air, slipping on the wet floor, and occasionally being dripped on would be interesting enough. Now add this:

And this:

And cheery messages carved into stone tablets, like this one:

Un monstre sans raison aussi bien sans yeux

Est la Diviniteé Qu’on adore en ces lieux;

On l’apele la Mort et son cruel empire

S’etend également sur tout cequi respire.

- Philip Hebert **

It just went on and on. At first chilling, and then sort of moving, and then finally kind of tiresome. (“Hmmm, I wonder what’s around this corner? Aha… more bones…”) At the end of the tour you emerge into a tiny, featureless office blocks away from where you started and a friendly attendant asks to see inside your bag to make sure you haven’t taken a souvenir. I’m not kidding, he looked into my bag and said, “No bones? Good.”

The other subterranean activity of the week was a visit to the Musée des Égouts de Paris – The Paris Sewers Museum. It was markedly less creepy and definitely more pungent than the Catacombs. I was hoping for something much more Jean Valjean, but it was all quite modern. Then again, next time you're in Paris with 45 minutes to kill and €4.20 burning a hole in your pocket, you could do worse. If you won't be here any time soon, the two most interesting tidbits from the tour are these:

1. They really did discover a small crocodile in the Paris sewers, who was apparently flushed down a toilet in a pet shop or something. She was about 1 metre long at the time, and now resides at the zoo in an enclosure painted, ironically, to look like the Paris sewers.


2. If you drop something down a sewer grate in Paris (like, say, your car keys, or your wedding ring, or your crocodile) you can phone up the sewer hotline and tell them where you were, and they will go try to find it for you. Apparently they have an 80% success rate, and there is no charge for the service. Maybe the pet store people above should have taken advantage of this (“Hello? Yes, I’ve lost something down the sewer at Place de la Concorde. Car keys? No, not exactly, but trust me you'll know it when you see it…”)

And of course I've hashed in Paris. Twice, in fact, on consecutive days. Both times involved taking a train out of town and crashing around in the woods for a while before settling in for some post-run beer. And since it's France there was also baguette, and cheese, and various other post-run treats. I'm not sure the French can do anything that's not accompanied by at least one baguette. Then again, you'll hear no complaints from me in this department.

*So good, in fact, I thought briefly that it might supplant sticky toffee pudding as my favourite dessert, but then I regained my senses. I did not, however, regain any self-control when it comes to macarons, because when I stopped to pick up a cheap grocery-store supper that evening I also dropped in to the local boulangerie/patisserie and decided to try one of each flavour of the small macarons, and there turned out to be eight (chocolate, lemon, raspberry, strawberry, pistachio, coffee, orange and something else unidentifiable). They were all fantastic, none more so than the chocolate, naturally.

** Here’s my ham-fisted, Google-assisted translation effort:

A monster without reason and also without eyes

Is the god adored in these places

We call it Death and it’s cruel empire

Extends equally to all that draw breath.

Steve's Weird Food for France: Steak Tartare

Steak Tartare. I know this would not be "out there" for a lot of people*, but it's definitely weird for me. I mean come on! Raw hamburger on a plate?

What can I say about steak tartare? My first forkful made me think, "Hey, this is quite tasty". Unfortunately, that thought was followed in approximately 0.00000001 seconds with the thought, "THIS IS RAW BEEF!" which kind of spoiled the moment. Mine was served with some decent fried potatoes, a green salad, and some baguette. I think it's often served with toast, for spreading.

And it was a lot - a mound the size of a softball. Too much for me to finish.

What did it taste like? It's chilled, and mostly you just taste the seasoning. I'm pretty sure there was some kind of vinegar-like thing in there, and some onion, and I believe it's usually prepared with Worcestershire Sauce. It was savoury and tasty, and the texture was like coarse, moist, stringy paté. I just couldn't separate the taste from the idea. Also, it is disquieting to get raw hamburger stuck between one's teeth.

I believe I can go to my grave without having steak tartare again.


* And by "a lot of people" I mean "the Paris Hashers with whom I discussed the 'Steve's Weird Food' project". One of their suggestions was Tête de Veau. But this came from a guy whose cafeteria at work serves frog's legs so he's clearly on a whole other Weird Food Level.

Ah, Paris!

Paris caught me unawares - I really hadn’t planned to get here quite yet. My intentions on leaving Belgium were to proceed to Arras, France and thence to the memorial at Vimy. But it turns out that touring the sights of Vimy and being sans auto are two largely incompatible states. After some fruitless research into tour companies, and a pleasant but unhelpful chat with a woman at the memorial, I just decided to chuck the whole thing and head straight for Paris, on the TGV no less.*

My current hostel is adequate – well situated mere steps from the Seine, near the western end of Île. St-Louis. The room is well-equipped with sink and shower en suite, and the breakfast is very French – a chunk of baguette, a small brioche, butter, jam, and coffee or tea. On my first night I happened on a comfy Scottish pub with free wifi and Guinness on tap, so I abandoned my plan to find a bistro and eat something with lots of duck liver and and butter and cream. Instead, I had the burger-and-beer special and camped out with the computer and finished (finally) the post on Ypres. A cop-out, I know, but sometimes you just need a pint of Guinness, even at a heart-stopping €6.90/pint.

I wandered over to Île-de-la-Cité after dinner, where there is a church you may have heard of.

Notre Dame

It was a beautifully warm night, so I sat in front of the cathedral and glanced through my LP France, and watched the fire-flinging buskers, and enjoyed the moment. When I got back to the hostel it was nearing midnight, but only one of the four bunks in my room was occupied. Midnight is not an outrageously late time to arrive, but I was careful to move about as quietly and politely as possible. Still, the woman sleeping in the bunk opposite radiated such a perfectly Gallic sense of contempt at my audacity that it fairly rolled off her in waves. I almost wanted to applaud. She repeated her quiet snorts of disgust as each of the last two occupants of the room arrived. Well really, who did we think we were anyways?

Being in Paris is nice. It’s comfortable in a city where the language is not a complete mystery. My French is pretty good, though paradoxically I speak it much more readily than I understand it. This is frustrating because I can make myself understood in almost any situation, but comprehending the response is often beyond me. Everyone in France should just bloody well SLOW DOWN when they talk. Apparently my tongue may be at least partly French, but my ears are stubbornly English.

Also, being around all these sophisticated French women makes me feel like a grubby under-dressed oaf, but happily this can often be rectified by finding an overweight tourist in flowered shorts and flip-flops to stand next to.

I’ve decided to spend about a week here, and I’m getting my museum/sight-seeing chops back, which is good. Yesterday I visited the Musée D’Orsay, did some wandering there on my own, and had a guided tour. It’s really big, but not so outrageously over-the-top big as the Hermitage (or the Louvre, on the schedule for Friday). I’ve decided that if I can locate one or two pieces that really move me in these places, then I feel I’ve done well**. Here is my moving moment from the Musée D’Orsay:

Monet’s “Londres, le Parlement – Trouée de soleil dans le brouillard" (The genuine article is really much nicer - all pale purple and hazy.)

Maybe I was feeling a bit wistful about being alone in Paris on a rainy day. Maybe I missed the familiarity of London.*** Whatever it was, I stood and stared at that painting and got a bit choked up.

The other most excellent discovery at the Musée D’Orsay was an enormous cut-away model of the 19th century Paris Opera House, the Palais Garnier. It was huge, and showed all the backstage mechanics of the fly system, and what looked like a system of moving scenery on stage as well. It was accompanied by a display of two sets of maquettes for 19th century operas that were delightful. I’ve kind of been avoiding theatres and such, feeling like that might be a bit of a busman’s holiday, but that was clearly a mistake. As soon as I saw that model theatre and those set renderings it was like I was home. I thought to myself, “I know this. I live this. I AM this.” I wanted to turn to the person next to me and say, “Look! This is a rendering for the 3rd Act of “Moses”, when he parts the Red Sea! Look at the painting – you can see where the designer gridded out the paper before he started to paint. I know all about this!”

Model of the Palais Garnier

In fact, it made me decide to have a look at the theatre itself, so I went for a guided tour of the public spaces of the building the next day. We got to go into the auditorium, and I itched to get on stage and have a look around. They were in the middle of fitting up a show, a very modern design with lots of gigantic mirrored legs and straw strewn all over the floor. The orchestra pit was down, and the piano was being tuned, and guys were pushing big lumps of scenery on and off stage, and people were wandering around wearing headsets and it was all just great. Then again, maybe it was only great because it was all not my problem. It’s entirely possible that they were days behind schedule and hundreds of thousands of euros over budget and that the straw on the floor was the result of the total and spectacular failure of some bit of machinery up in the fly tower****. No matter, it was just nice to see.

The stage of the Palais Garnier

I also had a reasonable 10k run all the way along the left bank from Île. St-Louis to the Eiffel Tower. That wasn’t my original aim, but as I ran along I started to see the tower in the distance and it just seemed ridiculous not to stop for a photo op. After that, it was a nice return trip along the right bank, past the Tuileries and the Louvre, and thence to the hostel and a shower and a beer.

Seen on the run. And yes, I do appreciate that this was not your average 10k.

And that’s been my first few days in Paris. Pas mal.

* The TGV (Tres Grand Vitesse) train was not at all exciting. In fact, it felt decidedly down-at-heal, and much less space-shuttle-like than I’d expected.

** I like to wander around and think about what piece I would take home with me if the management of the Musée were to approach and say something like, “Madame, you are clearly not an average tourist, as evidenced by the fact that you have lingered for more than 4.2 seconds in front of this painting. Thank you also for not simply approaching, reading the tag, taking a digital photo of yourself with the painting, and then moving on to repeat this process with each piece in the room. Please, it would give us great pleasure to present you with a small memento of your visit. Perhaps this Monet? Mais non, we insist.”

*** On my very first day in London, on the very first tube ride from Heathrow to the hostel, I saw a “Rhymes on the Road” advert in the tube car I was riding in, and it has stuck with me ever since:

Go where we may, rest where we will,

Eternal London haunts us still.

**** Technical Director to Stage Manager: “Yeah, ummm… about the Big Straw Drop… What would happen if you didn’t have that until next Thursday? Uh huh. Yes. I see. Of course. No no no, absolutely we’ll put a crew of 17 on overnight to get it fixed. No no, it’s no problem at all.” Heh. Sometimes I don’t miss work at all. Hey Adam, how’s it going?

Cuberdons – Steve’s Weird Food for Belgium

Steve: I know when you mentioned it you were mostly thinking about things that still had their eyeballs and toenails and such, but life can’t be all offal, so here’s what I came up with for Belgium:

Cuberdons

These are an odd sort of candy – it’s hard to tell the scale here, but they’re about an inch tall, and dark purple. I asked one of the guys who worked at the hostel in Bruges about them and he wasn’t really able to describe them at all. I could tell he thought they were really good though, since the best he could come up with was “If you see them, eat them!”

The outsides are a thick crust of sort of leathery sugar, and the insides are a goopy mess of vaguely berry-flavoured syrupy sugar. As you might suspect, they are not exactly tart. They’re not unpleasant, but given that one could expend one’s non-essential Belgian calories on chocolate, I’m a bit at a loss as to why they even exist. I’ve still got one or two left, which tells you how underwhelming they really are. Maybe I should mail them back to the guy in the hostel in Bruges.

Pick of Pics - Tyne Cot

This gentleman was on my tour with his grandson. He's standing at the Tyne Cot Memorial to the Missing. Heartbreakingly, despite it's massive scale, the Menin Gate is not big enough to list all the names of the missing, so another 34,000 are listed here.