Heat wave

For those of you envying the fact that I'm living in Paris right now, stop.

Its 83 degrees outside, and there is no air conditioning - anywhere.

The train workers are on strike, so no one can leave town.

The metro is hell. You wait, sweating, on the platform for the doors to open - when they do, your body is suddenly engulfed in a blast of hot air. It is ungodly.

I have already taken two showers in the past 5 hours in an attempt to cool off, and last night I went to bed with a cooler pack from the freezer.

Last time this happened, nearly 15 thousand people died.

"Springtime in Paris" indeed.

How was Cannes?

I just got back last night from Cannes, where I was attending the 2009 Film Festival.

*What?!*

Yep, I got myself invited to Cannes. Decided it would be a cool thing to do while spending a year in France, did my research, wrote my letter, and ended up with a "Cinéphile" Accreditation, which gave me access to certain screenings in the Palais des Festivals, as well as films associated with the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs (Director's Fortnight) and special séances at theaters around Cannes and in nearby La Bocca. All of which cost me 0€ - well, 55 centimes if you count the postage on the letter of my demande d'accrédidation.

So what is Cannes like?

I selfishly did not bring my camera - it would've been a nuisance to carry around and was not permitted in the Palais for screenings, so... the best image I could find of the tapis rouge is from several years ago (see below). It is a fucking big red carpet and you have to appreciate the ability of starlets to walk it, in high heels and long gowns, blinded by the flashbulbs of several hundred photographers, without stumbling. Chalk it up to nerves and the motivating horror of bad publicity.


(I, on the other hand, did stumble and take a spill on my way home from an evening screening. Damn shoes. My knee got pretty torn up, but is healing nicely due to magical French pommade cicatrisant - literally, healing cream).

The Palais contains several theaters, the main ones being the Grand Théâtre Lumière where the Gala-black tie-premier screenings take place every night (I never did manage to get a last-minute ticket into one of these), the Salle Debussy in which premiers the films from the selection Un Certain Regard (I saw two films there, Eyes Wide Open and Dogtooth), and the Salle du Soixantième (where I attended the premier of a restored version of Godard's Pierrot le Fou, with actress Anna Karina in attendance).

The festivities spill out from the palace eastward along La Croissette, with its grand hotels, designer boutiques, and exclusive clubs set up in tents along the beachfront.



Also along la Croissette are large theaters like the Palais Stéphanie (where I saw Ne Change Rien, and I Love You Philip Morris - Jim Carrey being in attendance at the latter).

In short, during my six days in Cannes I viewed 13 films/documentaries (Wake in Fright, Ne Change Rien, Rideau de Sucre, Pierrot le Fou, Images from the Playground, Redes, Pietro Germi Il Bravo Il Bello Il Cattivo, Signore e Signori, Taking Woodstock, Dogtooth, I Love You Philip Morris, Les Beaux Gosses, Eyes Wide Open), made red carpet sightings of Isabelle Huppert, Penelope Cruz, Pedro Almodovar, Quentin Tarantino, Tilda Swinton, Ang Lee, Demetri Martin, Anna Karina, Jim Carrey, and Juliette Binoche, crashed a party on the luxury yacht Insignia, ate 17 scoops of ice cream, and went swimming twice in the Mediterranean.

How was Cannes? It was fantastic.

Versailles, Wet and Wondrous

Today I finally made it out to Versailles (yes, for the first time... yes, it's only 30 minutes outside of Paris... yes, the train ride only costs about $6 round trip. But believe me, the crowds are horrid).

Despite typical French organizational inefficiency and some intermittent rain, I managed to have a good time. The Grandes Eaux Musicales has started for the year, which meant that I got to experience the famous fountains in all their 17th century, cutting-edge-hydraulics glory. Having seen them in action, I can say that it's not worth visiting the gardens at any other time of year.

There were some pleasant surprises, for instance the feral cat with whom I shared my lunch at the base of the Latone fountain.


Also the Jardin du Roi, which reminded me of a Charleston Plantation with it's azaleas in full bloom. And the sheep! There is a large flock in the field adjacent to the Domaine de Marie Antoinette - I was so pleasantly surprised to see them that, in my delight, I gave a little cry of "Moutons!"(luckily, no one seemed to have heard me).

Of course I took hundreds of photos, and couldn't narrow it down - so here's a lengthy slide show from the excursion. Note: if you receive my blog posts by email, please go to the website in order to see my photos.

When Flirting is a Fact of Life

Much has been said about the Parisian male's romantic tendencies.
The thing that tends to shock Americans the most is the unimportance of age - the fact that elderly gentlemen find it absolutely normal and appropriate to come on to a girl half (or even one third) their age. While such propositions can be alarming, repulsive, or disturbing, they are hardly ever made with serious intent.

"Flirting is a fact of life in French culture," writes Naughty Paris author Heather Stimmler-Hall, "in most situations [it] is merely a pleasant form of communication."

As much as I complain about the attention that I receive in Paris, there are rare occasions where the innuendo-filled banter is funny, or just nice. Today was a good example.

Overseeing the production of my lunch at the street-side counter of l'As du Falafel in the Marais, I was asked by the chef (a man in his late thirties) if I wanted the spicy sauce. "Je veux tous les sauces" I replied, hoping for an extra generous application of Tahini. "Et moi aussi?" he retorted hopefully, going on to describe how he was good for the housework, for making dinner... clearly as good an investment as the five euro falafel I was about to devour. I declined with a sardonic smile, took my plastic fork, and proceeded on my way.


After lunch, I made my way over to Angelina, the Belle Epoque tea salon across from the Tuileries, for chocolat and a pistachio Financier. The host, a formally clad man in his late forties, greeted me in the foyer.
"Vous êtes seule, mademoiselle?"
"Oui."
"Ahhh... moi aussi," he replied with a forlorn sigh as he showed me to my seat.

Violet Ice Cream, Canned Tuna, and Quantum Mechanics

Throw the word Perfume in there and you've got my experience this weekend in Grasse, en bref.

Let's start with the violet ice cream:


My newest obsession. I don't understand why Americans haven't had the ingenuity of making flowers into flavors - many of the best things I've tasted in France have been of this category: coquelicot bonbons, orange-blossom sparkling water, candied rose petals... and of course violet ice cream. I discovered this latter wonder at a generic ice cream stand near the International Museum of Perfume in Grasse, and went back twice before discovering an even more delicious rendition at a glacier near the Place aux Aires. It is a sophisticated flavor which pairs beautifully with vanilla, and is a specialty of southern France (both the southwest - Toulouse, and the southeast - Grasse are known for their violets. The ice cream that I tasted was probably made from the grassette, a variety of violet native to the region of Grasse).


On to the canned tuna and Quantum Mechanics.
Grasse is known for its smells - it has a valid claim to the title "Perfume Capital of the World". My presence there was justified by an Aromatherapy conference (phytotherapie and aromatherapie are closely linked in France). For two days, I attended talks with titles such as "Phyto-aromatherapy in gynecology practice", "Aromatherapy and the brain," and the ambitious "Stochastic resonance: one step towards making sense of life." The latter was one of a series of lectures attempting to validate the healing powers of plants through an understanding of physical reality based upon quantum rather than classical mechanics. It was heady.

This is how science is on the other side of the Atlantic (or at least in the confines of over-intellectualizing France). The experience was made bearable by the fact that I could see the Mediterranean Sea from the balcony of the convention center during coffee breaks.


When not consuming violet ice cream or having my mind blown by the latest research on noise and neural stochastic resonance, I visited the parfumeries of Grasse - including a guided tour of the Fragonard factory - and admired thousands of perfume bottles as well as a mummified hand and foot in the Musée Internationale de la Parfumerie. This, of course, was all during daytime hours. Grasse is a medieval town built on a steep hillside, and one gets around by way of narrow pedestrian passages. I seemed to have an uncanny knack for finding myself alone in one of these dark passages, confronted by a group of loitering, twenty-year-old-something Maghrebian men. It was terrifying. I spent most evenings in the kitchenette of my rental studio, dining on canned tuna.

Luckily, it was a cool little studio. One morning, I was visited by a snail.

Ciao, Roma...

I once joked to a friend that I had opted to learn French and study abroad in France rather than Italy because, were I to spend a considerable amount of time in Italy, I would probably fall in love and never return to the United States.

Of Rome, this is potentially quite true. Good thing I threw only one coin into the Trevi Fountain.


Captions and explanation: the glassy Tiber river reflecting the statues of Pont d'Angelo; the Capitoline Wolf suckling Romulus and Remus; the Forum; ancient statues from the House of the Vestal Virgins; the Trevi Fountain; a group of nuns in St. Peter's Bascilica; view of the Pantheon from the McDonald's across the piazza, with Cappucchino milkshake and spinach-parmesan croquettes.
"Legend has it that a traveler who throws a coin into the [Trevi] fountain is ensured a speedy return to Rome; one who tosses two will fall in love there." - Let's Go Western Europe

How to see France in under 2 hours and for the price of a sandwich

ambitious subject line, I know. Hear me out.


This morning I visited the Cité de l'architecture & du patrimoine at the Trocadéro, for which I'd be seeing adds on the metro since January. I didn't really know what to expect - but what I found was above and beyond all expectations. The museum features moldings from every aesthetically important historic religious edifice in the whole of France. The Galerie des Moulages, which takes up the entire first level of the palace, is divided by period/region (Languedoc Roman, Provence Romane, Gothique Flamboyant, Renaissance). The bulk of the collection comes from churches that were constructed in the XIth - XIVth centuries, and entails many of the middle ages' most important architectural specimens.

So moldings... big deal, right? Actually, these extremely detailed, life-size replications were super-impressive, and (having just been to Chartres this past Wednesday) -- dare I say it -- better than the real thing. When you visit a famous historic church in France, the architectural highlights are often darkened by age and weather, and are built at an elevation which (intended to inspire upwards thoughts towards the heavens) makes viewing them a literal pain in the neck. At the Cité, sculpted stonework is more easily scrutinized up close, under bright lighting and with a flattering red backdrop. Individual pillars and gargoyles are here presented as works of art.


The other advantage of the Cité's collection is contextualization. Each room of the gallery is composed of moldings taken from a single region, from churches built during a single time period - and is accompanied by a one-paragraph description of the dominant trends and important innovations of that architecture. One can follow the evolution from Gallo-roman to Gothic, or note the influence of Islamic aesthetics on the 11th century churches of Poitou (the Muslim advance into Europe was halted at Poitiers in 732). Over the course of an hour, I felt as though I had visited every major site in the history of medieval Christianity (I would add the adjective "French" here, but it seems redundant.

See for yourself - take the virtual tour!
(click at the bottom left on découvrez les visites virtuelles de la galerie, and then either the 1ère or 2ème partie)

When it comes to "seeing France" - touring the many small towns and cities of this country - historic churches are a major draw (Michelin guide multi-star restaurants, vineyards, and chateaus are probably the only other things that make a place a major tourist attraction). The Cité de l'architecture & du patrimoine almost makes such trips superfluous, and it only costs
5 or 7 euro (by comparison, my recent trip to Chartres set me back by about 60 euros). Then again - had I not physically traveled to Chartres, I would have missed out on the pastoral beauty of the river Eure, the unexpected pleasure of an organist practicing in St-Pierre church, and the culinary delight of the chocolaty Mentchikoff. Photos from my trip in the slideshow below: