Paris

What can be more romantic and lovely than Paris in the springtime with your partner?! I wouldn't know... Peleg called a while back to inform me that they will be leaving Paris this summer and if I want to come and visit while he and Yosi are still there, I better be quick about it. Israel agreed happily to come along and so - for the long weekend of the 1st of May we went to Paris....

We stayed at this lovely pensione type hotel called La Sanguine near La Madeleine which was recommended by Marie. It's very well situated, the rooms are small but comfortable and the breakfast is great.

What did we do in Paris? Mostly walked around this pretty city. We were lucky to have very nice weather. We started out with lunch and a cafe creme (the closest the French get to a cappuccino and generally a better bet than their cafe au lait) with Peleg and Yosi in their suits (it was just after the Independence Day reception):


From there we went on to have a tour of the area with them and stopped to have some nice cakes - a strawberry tart, a lemon tart and a napoleon or a millefeuille (thousand leaves). The French were definitely there when baking was being taught (or as Israel said - they were the teachers...). Then we took ourselves to the Tuileries Garden to sit a bit, soak up some sun and do people and duck watching:


The next day we set out from our hotel and walked all the way to the Marais which is a very "in" area of Paris and where Peleg and Yosi live. I'll let the pictures walk you through the streets of Paris (some of the pictures were taken in the next days - for those into continuity...):



This is me standing in front of La Madeleine named after Mary Magdalene (how this turned into Madeleine is anyone's guess). It says in Wikipedia that originally a synagogue stood there and was taken from the Jews in 1182.






My favorite picture from the trip to Paris is this one. and no, we're not risking our lives in the midddle of the Champs Elysees - there's a kind of island in the middle of the avenue...






A scuplture of Churchill by Jean Cardot on Winston Churchill Ave. with his immortal words "we shall never surrender". A very impressive statue erected in 1998. We found it interesting that the French put up his statue - he being British, but then after all, he did have everything to do with the victory over the Germans in WWII and it is appropriate that he is there not far from a statue of Charles de Gaulle.


and this is us in my favorite bookshop in Paris - Shakespeare and Co. a real bookshop like it should be with books everywhere and a nice cosy feeling...


After having a cup of coffee at Peleg and Yosi's -


We walked with them in the Marais where we saw the Jewish stores, the people sitting in the park, the street players, everything alive and bubbling...


and then we took the metro back to the hotel -


The next day we "did" the museums - Rodin and Orsay - Orsay being one of my favorite museums in the world. Here are some pictures Israel took there, first from the Rodin Museum


and then in Orsay which started out as a train station and was turned into a museum of mostly impressionist and post impressionist art

notice how the viewers of the Renoir on the right seem to practically blend into the picture....


on the left you can see us through a mirror in the applied arts part of the museum and on the right is Israel in the lovely coffee shop of the museum.

On Sunday, Peleg took us to a special gem - the museum of modern art - the Musee d'Art moderne de la Ville de Paris - which I had never been to before. It's what you'd call "off the beaten track" but has some lovely and "different" works of art. Peleg stressed that it is not contemporary art but modern art - thus making sure I wouldn't make a face and run away.... Peleg likes to go there to relax.

The first hall he took us to in the museum is a huge hall dedicated completely to one of the largest paintings ever done "La Fee Electricite" by Raoul Dufy. Israel took some lovely pictures of me and Peleg sitting and looking at the picture:



We then went to see a work by Christian Boltanski (who, surprisingly, considering his name, is half Jewish) - a room filled with telephone books from all over the world (including, for example, even Bhutan). Peleg found the details of his relatives in Argentina over there.... Here we are looking in one of the phone books:


The museum also shows works by Matisse, Braque and many others. I liked these two pictures that Israel took of Peleg, me and some pictures over there:


After visiting the museum we went with Peleg to a market in the Bastille to buy some bread and parsley for dinner. As we were strolling through the market we came across someone making and selling this deep fried sweet thing called chichi in French (did we resist?! of course not....):

we also saw some musicians playing on brass insturments having the time of their life playing in the square:


From there we took ourselves to Montmartre to see the Sacre Coeur. The area at the bottom of the hill is very sleazy but the hill itself is lovely and you can do people watching there to your heart's content while enjoying the view:






We more or less escaped from the area at the bottom of the hill taking a metro to the Latin Quarter, which is like a completely different world compared with the area around Montmartre. Here we got to see some Brazilians practicing Capoeira. My, did they have impressive bodies...


We then took the train back to our hotel and saw this lady who's picture one could easily put in the museum of modern art we had visited earlier in the day:


Well, this post has been long, but there was so much to write about and so many pictures to show. I'll leave you here with a few more pictures, offered without further explanations from the wonderful city of lights...


and one final thanks to Peleg and Yosi for their warm hospitalty, we had a great time with you....


bon soir, au revoir...