Espionnage chez McDo (après le Métro)

My last full day in Paris for nearly a month -- a good time to capture a slice of life underground. I love the Métro !



McDonald's in France: a vexed subject. The man who (literally) destroyed a McDonald's, José Bové, is revered, yet business is so good here that a new 'McDo' opens in France every six days. This one is located in the basement of Terminal 1 at Charles de Gaulle-Roissy airport.

That's my carte bleu (debit card) and lens cap on the counter. After I took this shot, the man wearing the green backpack warned me not to leave my bank card out in the open. I replied that if someone had taken my card, I would have captured him on camera. His response: "Yes, but he would have left with your card!"

(Then the manager informed me that my camera was 'interdit'. Music to my ears!)

La Bastille à moi

One fine thing about living here: despite the fact that it's famous, it's not touristy. I love it that it's nearly impossible to find a postcard of the Place de la Bastille at the Place de la Bastille. Even at the height of tourist season, you'll hear ten words of French to every word of English. (Of course, when my husband and I are sitting on the terrasse of Le Bastille it's we who pollute the air with our Anglo-Saxon dialect.)

I like this photo because if you enlarge it (be my guest), you can see a woman descending from a westbound Ligne 1 train with blonde hair and sunglasses. She could have been me.

The photo below was taken from my seat on the aforementioned terrasse, just over an hour later. How quickly day fades into night! (That's the Opéra Bastille at left.)

L'hiver sans neige

I'm posting this photo because I'm feeling cranky. This primary season, I'm consumed with election news from the States, and I've become particularly fond of a writer, normally conservative, for the Atlantic Monthly who's a great source of tidbits from all fronts. Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish (he should rename it the "Hourly Dish," he posts so often) is, like me, nearly "all Obama, all the time," but occasionally it strays to other subjects.

Every few days Andrew publishes a photo entitled "View from my Window", apparently sent to him by a loyal reader. They are all great photos (better than this one), but they're all snow scenes. After the most recent one, I got irritated. I don't know why exactly. But I felt as if the rest of the world -- those of us who live without snow -- was being ignored.

So, when the sun finally rose high enough to hit the full heighth of the buildings across the street and the canal boats (around 10:30 am), I pulled out my camera. Here it is: the view from my window.

Sous les ombres des réverbères

Q. So, who are these people and why is the man in the hat holding a bouquet? A. My husband and our best friends in Paris. We'd just finished a less-than-perfect dinner at what has been our favorite haunt along the Viaduc des Arts, itself located in what Adam Gopnik has called the "famously unfashionable 12th". Here's to that brand of fashion!

(Oh, and the Frenchman was born very close to Valentine's Day, and is thus a natural magnet for roses.)

D'autres reflets

It's Sunday and we're leaving sunny Narbonne for cold, rainy Paris. One last shot for the road!

Eglise devenue musée réfléchi dans le marché

Like a lot of Americans, I have a thing for gargoyles -- they reflect a medieval imagination way beyond what my pre-revolutionary Protestant ancestors could ever have imagined would be attached to a house of God. This basilica, however, doesn't belong to God anymore, but to the Mairie de Narbonne. It became a Museum a couple of centuries ago, and contains the largest collection of funerary stones outside Rome. Some date back to pagan times. I recommend it!

Across from the old basilica is the rear entry to Les Halles, the fabulous daily market of which Narbonne is justly proud. Just inside this door are the fishmongers' stalls -- four of them! -- where I bought tonight's dinner from mon poissonnier préféré.

(And who knows, maybe God hasn't left Notre-Dame-de-Lamourguier entirely, for a little miracle happened as I started to take this photo. A large van blocking the doorway actually pulled away, giving me the rare chance to take this shot!)

La cathédrale inachevée en ville

In medieval times, Notre Dame de Paris and the other great cathedrals of Europe didn't stand proudly alone as they do now; humble houses crowded against them, cheek to jowl, as here. The young women are on the "Rue Droite" ("Straight Street") which was built by the Romans when they founded Narbonne in 118 B.C. -- the first Roman colony outside Italy. Back in those days the street was called the Via Domitia, and ran all the way from Spain to ... well, you know where all roads lead to!

La magnifique cathédrale inachevée

Narbonne has had high and low points in its history -- the story of this cathedral encompasses them both. It's a rare example of Northern Gothic architecture in southern France, and is truly stunning at 40 meters high. However, as you can see, it was never finished -- the worked basically stopped in 1354, in part due to the Plague. I love it just as it is --and for today's population of catholiques pratiquants, it's as large as it needs to be.

Espionnage à la Messe

It's Sunday morning, and John and I are back in Narbonne on the 3rd anniversary of the day we bought our apartment.

One's not really supposed to take photos during Mass, and so I grabbed this shot on the sly, holding the camera at my waist and hoping my aim was true. Believe it or not, they had actually twice as many altar servers as you see here: two more little ones and two more older boys. (Apparently no girls need apply here.)

The altar boy holding the candle did a yeoman job (it's heavy, and the liturgy was long), but he amused me because he was working hard to keep his little colleague (on his right) in line.


I took this photo about an hour later, on my way back home from Les Halles. Florida girl that I am, I'm finally getting accustomed to trees losing their leaves in the winter. In some ways I prefer the trees in their naked state. Not unlike la nouvelle première dame de France, their architecture is visible. But they don't call attention to themselves!