Bidding Paris adieu!

Amazingly, two months in Paris have come to an end.  How can I possibly leave with so much left undone?  C'est la vie.

Running around like a tourist is wonderful, but what makes a new city more special is having personal contacts.  We had the good fortune of having two sets of friends who really enhanced our stay here.

I met sisters Francoise and Sylvie Blesson back in 1977 when I was volunteering at a restoration site in southern France.  We've remained in touch all these years and have seen these dear friends on 3 other previous trips to Paris.  This time we had a lovely lunch at their home in St. Cloud (suburb of Paris) and had an historic (and delicious) dinner together in central Paris.  Why historic?  Le Procope began in 1686 and claims to be the oldest restaurant in Paris in continuous operation.

 With Sylvie and Francoise at Le Procope

Even Napolean ate here.  In fact, here is his hat that he left in lieu of payment for a dinner.  Incroyable!

 Napolean's hat

Another couple, Laurent and Marianne Careaux, are old friends of my brother and now I've adopted them as my own friends.  Marianne is an art historian specializing in decorative arts and works at the Musee des Arts Decoratifs.  Not only does she do guided tours there, but she also does architectural walking tours and included us in a few of them.  I cannot  thank Marianne enough for her kindness and generosity in taking so much time to share her knowledge with me. I just wish I could remember everything that she told me!  More about Marianne's guiding to follow.

Marianne and me

One evening after a dinner out with Miles' host at the university and his wife (Samuel and Betina Forest),  I noticed a huge building that looked very interesting and different.  Why different?  It was an excellent example of 1930s art deco and I haven't seen much evidence of that in Paris.  Turns out it is the Rex Theater, a movie house built in 1932.  It is noted for its sumptuous decoration and its over sized main auditorium, which is the largest cinema theater in Europe with 2,750 seats.  Being a movie and architectural buff, I went back the next day and took the back stage tour which felt very Disneyland-esque.  This ‘self guided’ backstage tour describes the history of the theater and the movies with plenty of thrills and special effects.  Rather fun, but more for kids. The auditorium is just huge and has two balconies.  They don't make movie houses like THAT anymore.  Unfortunately, no pictures were allowed, but here's one shot of the building.

 

The Rex Theater

Being here for 2 months allowed me see a lot of the smaller lesser-known museums.  One such treasure was the Ossip Zadkine Museum near the Luxembourg Gardens.  This 20th century sculpter worked in wood, stone and metal. The small and charming house and garden were a real treat.

 View out to the garden

 Garden sculpture

 This was my favorite:  Les freres Van Gogh

(You can see the emotion between the two brothers if you enlarge the picture)

Now back to Marianne's guiding:  She offered to guide us around the Nissim de Camondo Museum where she also works.  The back story is both historic and tragic.  One of the most sumptuous private homes from the early twentieth century in Paris, Moïse de Camondo, a Parisian banker during the Belle Epoque, was a passionate collector of French furniture and art objects from the eighteenth century.  He was born in Istanbul in 1860 into a Sepharadic Jewish family that owned one of the largest banks in the Ottoman Empire, established in France in 1869. Moïse de Camondo meant to give his mansion and collection to his son Nissim, but World War I broke out, and Nissim was a pilot killed in an air battle in 1917. After this tragic loss, Moise decided to bequeath his property to the Musee des Arts Décoratifs in memory of his son. The museum opened the year after Moïse died in 1935. During World War II, his daughter, Béatrice, his son-of-law Léon Reinach and their children, Fanny and Bertrand, were killed in the Nazi camps and the Camondo family died out.

 

 Marble basin in entry way

 One of many salons

 Roll top desk with marquetry

I thought this was wood inlay, but Marianne educated me.  Marquetry is the art and craft of applying pieces of veneer to a structure to form decorative patterns, designs or pictures.  Inlay is a decorative technique of inserting pieces of contrasting, often colored materials into depressions in a base object to form patterns or pictures that normally are flush with the matrix.  Well, now I'm ready for Jeopardy!

Close-up of marquetry

 Formal dining room

Nice office!

Garden

Marianne also took me around the Musee des Arts Decoratifs, a private museum located in the Louvre with so many examples of the decorative arts from the medieval times to the present.  Absolutely overwhelming!  Here are a few highlights from old to modern:

18th century bed

 Early 20th century art nouveau

Art nouveau--this cabinet has a fish-skin veneer

 20th century bowl

View of the Louvre gardens from the Musee des Arts Decoratifs

 Ile de la Cite

So my love affair with Paris is over...till next time.  Onward to Auckland, New Zealand!!!

Special Christmas Edition!

Just like Downton Abbey, the Rubintrek blog has a Christmas special.

At the main Galleries Lafayette department store, they now have a giant upside-down Christmas tree.  As impressive as it is, it blocks the extremely beautiful Art Nouveau glass ceiling/dome. 

 Christmas tree--Galleries Lafayette

Here's another tree in front of Notre Dame:

 

Notre Dame Christmas tree

I found this crew decorating this tree outside the Palais Luxembourg in the Luxembourg Gardens.  Obviously, they take their tree decorating VERY seriously--notice the hard hats and heavy equipment.

 Christmas tree in Luxembourg Gardens

Fete Noel:  Every year along the Champs Elysees from the Grand Palais to the Place de la Concorde, there is a city of little white wooden booths set up to sell Christmas gift items and regional foods.

 

 Fete Noel crowds

It's a real treasure-trove of colors/sights/smells/sounds.  Here are some of my favorite booths:

 Little felt balls to cover light bulbs

 Crepes, waffles, churros and doughnuts

 Chocolate bark

 Gingerbread and other sweets

 Raclette sandwiches

A wedge of raclette cheese is placed under a small grill and once cooked, the cheese is scraped off and smeared onto a baguette--YUM!

 Kiddie train

 Ice skating rink

Not surprising that jelly doughnuts and latkes for Hannukah were not among the holiday delicacies!

More Visitors!

We were so happy to welcome another visitor, Marcel Schimasa, from Zurich.  I met Marcel in Auckland, NZ during our last sabbatical in 2010.  I wanted to give free English lessons there and Marcel was studying English and looking for an English tutor.  Perfect fit!  When I found out he was from Zurich, I said, "Oh, we're going to Zurich on the next leg of our sabbatical." Once we arrived there, he was a wonderful friend and he took us both on a few day trips to the mountains and beautiful villages.  He also visited us in 2012 in Haifa.  So now, we were so glad to host him here in Paris.

 Marcel and me at a farmer's market

This was Marcel's first trip to Paris so we had to hit all the "A" list places.  One such place was seeing the Eiffel Tower.  We were there during the day and also at night to see it "sparkle".  From 6pm to 1am (in the winter), 20,000 lights flash on and off during the first 5 minutes of each hour.  This picture doesn't do it justice--should have gotten a video.

Sparkly Eiffel Tower

You never know what you're going to see on a walkabout. This is the metro station Palais Royal near the Louvre:

 Palais Royal metro

On our walk along the Champs Elysees, we stopped in a side passage way and spotted this unusual sculpture.  I know Parisian women don't weigh much, but this is ridiculous!

 Sculpture

We had a quick 3 day visit with Marcel and then a few days later, Debbie and David Block-Temin from Haifa came to town. I guess you can call them "groupies" because they also came to visit us in Trento, Italy in 2010 on our last sabbatical.  Will they visit us on our NEXT sabbatical?  I sure hope so!

Us with David and Debbie

Debbie and I went together on a walking tour of Montmartre.

Sacre Coeur backdrop

We thoroughly enjoyed the many Montmartre stories the guide shared with us.  One was about a guy who had the ability to walk through walls.  Naturally, he became a bank robber.  One day, his abilities suddenly disappeared and he got stuck mid-way in the wall.

The next day the four of us went to the newly renovated Picasso Museum.  It had been closed for 5 years, so the lines were LONG.  However, our 1-hour wait was well worth it.  Picasso was extremely creative and besides numerous paintings, he did many styles of sculpture.  Here's a sample of some of our favorite pieces.

On their last trip to Paris 2 years ago, Debbie and David went on a culinary tour with an Israeli woman, Sharon, who is a pastry chef. They were so excited about what they saw and ate that they arranged with Sharon to do it again and I joined them.  And what a treat!  We visited pastry, bread, cheese and chocolate shops as well as markets.  The tastes/quality were INCREDIBLE!

This shop got 1st place as best croissant in 2012.  We tasted it and it was excellent.  Sharon also explained that every pastry chef has their own style. Here's a visual sample of unique pastries:

Ble Sucre pastry shop

Another special place was Cafe Pouchkine (Cafe Pushkin) which specializes in--what else--ultra-elegant Russian pastries.  They were pure works of art (some dusted with edible gold) and looked like Hermitage-worthy sculptures. 

Then, we were off to Marche d'Aligre, another wonderful farmer's market.  Here are a couple of unusual selections:
 

Turkeys--Sharon said they display them like this to show how fresh they are

Sea urchins

And if we hadn't had enough to eat (I didn't even mention the eclair shop and Alain Ducasse's chocolate "lab" with samples), Sharon insisted the grand finale should be at Jacques Genin's pastry and chocolate cafe/shop.  We sipped Chinese tea and enjoyed his delectable delights.  The mille feuille (square pastry on the right) was made when ordered.  Bien sur!  If it were made ahead of time it would get soggy and not be flaky.  Magnifique!!!

Yum!

We visited the Richard Lenoir market again and this time we passed this street musician.  He was so charming, singing French songs and entertaining these children.  I'm not sure what the instrument is called, but it's like a combination player piano and organ grinder.  The long string of cards has holes punched in them and he feeds them through the box by turning a handle.  So simple and so sweet.

Organ grinder?

Classic Citroen truck in the Marais neighborhood

Sadly, we had to bid Debbie and David goodbye on the 23rd. To console ourselves with our friends' departure, we were determined to have some more adventures.  We had a very interesting time visiting the Marche des puces Clignancourt (Flea Market).  The largest flea market in the world, there's everything from piles of used household items/clothing to fine antiques. 

 Vintage clothes

 Vintage hardware