Je vous remercie: Paris hospitality and adventures

In January of this year, my friend Joanne spent a night with me in my condo in Arlington, and I excitedly shared with her my plans to move to France in the summer. Equally excitedly, she told me she planned to be in Paris in September, and I said “I’ll meet you there!” And, being a woman of my word, last week I was on my way to Paris via the TGV (France’s high speed train) to meet up with Joanne.

Joanne had just spent a week in Wales at a business conference and was extending her visit to London and Paris. When she emailed me at the beginning of September, we made plans for me to join her in Paris in mid-week of her stay there with her friends Jean Yves and Olivier. She also asked if I would be interested in joining her for a visit to Brugges, Belgium for a few days. I wasn’t exactly sure why she was motivated to make that trip, but I was game to follow her. I’d never been to Belgium (that I remembered), and, hey, I was on vacation, no reason not to!
I’ll write about the Brugges trip separately, but in a quick summary, the medieval town that we visited appealed to the historian in me and was also the site of much activity in the Niccolo historical novel series by Dorothy Dunnett that Joanne was reading while we were there, and that I have read, thanks to Jan Seymour (and now, need to reread!).

Jean Yves is a former singer with the New Amsterdam Singers, a choral group in New York City with whom I have sung on and off for the past twenty-four years. He had lived in NYC in the early 90’s, a time during which I did not sing with the chorus. We had travelled together on a NAS tour to England and Wales back in 1993, but he didn’t really remember me and I had a passing remembrance of him. However, when I was visiting the conductor of the chorus, earlier this year, and told her about my plans to move to France, she gave me the Paris address and email of Jean Yves and Olivier. She and her husband had been in Paris recently and visited with them, and she encouraged me to get in touch when I was there. Since I decided to move to Nice (not Paris), I had just filed the address information for future reference.

When Joanne told me she would be staying with JY, I felt like somehow the NAS connection would be a door opener, but did not want to assume, and asked Joanne to make a formal request for me to join her in their apartment during her visit. The word back was, Of course.

So, there I was, on the TGV shooting toward Paris. I think everyone has heard about the superiority of train travel overseas, but for those of you who take Amtrak’s Acela between Washington and New York, even the best Amtrak has to offer cannot compare to the French high speed trains. First of all, the French trains are clean. Second, people are polite, and actually use the designated seats outside of the seating carriages to use their cell phones. I can’t tell you how many times I have listened to Americans carry on very personal conversations right next to me on their cell phones (in August, on a train between Richmond and Washington, a 20-something spent an hour explaining to a friend why she had posted sexy photos on herself on her Facebook site). Third, it is smooth and quiet. No shaking back and forth on the rails, no din over which you need to pump up the volume on your iPod. Fourth, the café is really nice and sells good food that people line up to eat – and, given that the café is on the second floor (en haut) of the train, you have a lovely lounge from which to watch the scenery speed by (and you don’t have to keep watch to make sure your beer doesn’t slide across the table – which I know the Brits, returning from Liverpool’s football match against Marseille, appreciated).

I didn’t hang out in the café, however, as I had brought my own cheese, bread and apple slices for the trip. We left a little late from Marseille (I took a local train from Nice to Marseille), so we were 20 minutes delayed into Paris’ Gare de Lyon. Joanne had said that she would meet me at the station, and I texted her ahead to let her know that we’d be late. (Americans my age are still quite a bit unfamiliar and uncomfortable texting, but our European contemporaries are frequent users of the medium. It’s quite a bit cheaper to text than it is to call on your cell phone here – you are only charged when you send a text, not both sides of a conversation, as in the US – which may explain the high usage. That being said, I’ve found that Americans who travel overseas are quite comfortable communicating with text messages, happily.)

We met easily on the train platform, and Joanne steered me toward the Métro – a fantastic subway system in Paris that is rivaled by the NYC Subway (but Washington’s Metro beats them all for its cleanliness, from my view). We were going to head to JY and Olivier’s apartment in the 20th arrondissement (on the 11 line, for those of you familiar with the subway system) to drop off my luggage and then do some exploring in Paris. We navigated a few different lines to get to the Jourdain stop, and then had a 10 minute walk to the apartment. I always remember Paris in grey tones, and this time, even in the bright sun of an autumn day, it still seemed grey to me. But the neighborhood of Belleville was bustling at 3 in the afternoon, and we dodged cars and people on the small sidewalks on our way past the cheese shop, the boulangerie, and the fruit and vegetable stands to our destination.

We finally arrived at the apartment, and Joanne let me in the front gate, which opened into a lovely small enclosed garden, where a table and chairs were set up in the small courtyard. The four story townhouse was a few short strides away – we walked in the front door into the sitting room; our guest bedroom was downstairs, the kitchen and eating area was on the second floor, and the bedroom was on the third floor – all connected by a lovely cast iron spiral staircase. We had the place to ourselves at that moment, and we both felt like it was a great idea to lie down on our shared sofa bed and breathe deeply for 20 minutes.

By 4:30 we headed back out into the Paris sunshine, with at least three objectives. First, we wanted to pick up our train tickets to Brugges from one of the SNCF train stations. Joanne had bought them online, and chosen the option to pick them up from a person in a station. I had made the same decision when I bought my tickets to Paris online. Unfortunately Joanne had not remembered to get the tickets while she was waiting for me at Gare de Lyon; based on my own experience picking up my tickets in a Nice SNCF storefront, we were in for a long wait in line (I had waited for almost 40 minutes!). And, in the Gare de L’Est, where we ended up, we in fact waited in line for 20 minutes to pick up the tickets. Next time, we both decided, using the automated option (meaning using the machines in the station to pick up a ticket) would be the better way to go!

The second objective, from me, was to sit in a Paris café and share a glass of wine with Joanne. She thought we should walk around a bit and find a good place, so we got back on the Métro, got off on the Chatelet stop and walked down the Rue de Rivoli – a long boulevard of department stores and familiar brand name storefronts. We walked off the main road and found a pedestrian way and an open square on Rue St. Martin. There were several cafés there on the square; we chose one and ordered up glasses of wine and spent the next 30 minutes catching up on our respective lives over the past several months.

Our third objective for the afternoon was to meet JY and Olivier in the Centre Georges Pompidou for dinner at one of their favorite restaurants, the Café Beau Bourg, at 8 p.m. (My French-English dictionary says that Beaubourg is “the name commonly used to refer to the Centre Pompidou.”) We finished our drinks in the Rue St. Martin around 6, so we decided to do some more walking around before heading in the direction of dinner. We walked to the Seine, and to the Cathédrale Notre Dame, where we took pictures with all the other tourists in the plaza in front of the cathedral. We walked back across the Seine toward the Hȏtel de Ville and wandered toward Centre Pompidou around 7:30, deciding to wait at the café and have another drink. It was quite chilly as the sun disappeared around the buildings, and we sat in the outside tables of the Beau Bourg only because there was a heater directly above us in under the awning!

Jean Yves appeared in the plaza in front of us on his bike shortly before 8; it turned out that Olivier had arrived early (must have been shortly before we did) and gone inside to have his apéritif. JY and I recognized each other immediately from our connection years ago, and we all went upstairs to meet Olivier for dinner. We had a lovely time; the food itself was not particularly memorable, but our time together was.

After dinner, JY biked back to the apartment; Olivier, Joanne and I took the Métro. It was nearly 11; but when we got back, Olivier offered up a little sip of champagne, which I accepted, and we shared the box of cookies I had brought from a patisserie in Nice. Joanne and I were going to get up at 6 to be able to get our 8 a.m train to Brugges the next morning; JY had to leave before us, at 5:30 for his 6:30 train to Grenoble for work.

Our plan was to return to Paris on Friday night, around 7 p.m.; JY would get back at 9 that same evening. I learned that another couple would be houseguests for the weekend, arriving on Friday, and that plans were for a home meal on Friday night, Olivier cooking. I had the feeling that this was something for which to look forward.

* * *

The trip back from Brugges on Friday afternoon had a moment of hypertension as we changed trains in Lille. We’d had a similar adrenalin-pumping experience on the way up, so we were somewhat prepared. We had discovered that the tickets Joanne had purchased online gave us about 6 minutes between trains. Given that Lille was a somewhat small train station, one would have thought that this would be at least “enough” time to make our “correspondance.” (Obviously the SNCF computer thought so.) But the trains were not exactly tout à l’heure, on time, that is. We were able to negotiate to our connection in Lille to Brugges with a little time to spare. But, given Joanne’s difficulty walking, it was close. On the way back, it looked like our train into Lille was going to give us enough time to make it across the voie (tracks) to the train to Paris. I kept giving updates to Joanne as we approached Lille, and we kept saying to each other, based on our experience the day before, whatever happens, happens. There were bound to be other trains to Paris if we missed ours.

The train pulled into the station and we disembarked, and the few minutes it looked like we might have had had dwindled to less than a minute! I quickly found the voie for our Paris connection on an overhead sign and encouraged Joanne to hoof it. I knew I could run and catch it; that wasn’t my concern. My concern was Joanne. And, of course, we were in a second class car, a little farther down the platform. By the time we were rushing to catch the train, there was no one left on the platform; it was about to leave. I found an open door, and found the conductor standing there inside the door; he asked me to make sure I was getting on the right train. I leaned out the door and called to Joanne; she was there, doing her best to run with her things to get onboard too. I really didn’t want to leave her behind! But it was to be, et violà, we both made the train, with literally seconds to spare. Back to Paris!

[Quick tangent – a minute is really a very long time. After several seasons of watching Alias, and the able CIA operatives in that television show dismantle bombs time after time with seconds to spare, I had done my own analysis of how long it takes to do different things. McGyver is also an instructional figure in this realm. Things like putting away one’s glasses after reading the newspaper on the Metro in the morning before needing to exit the train takes only about 5-7 seconds – about the time it takes the doors to open once the train has stopped in the station. I worked through this experiment several times in an ongoing effort to maximize my time reading the Washington Post and/or Wall St. Journal in the morning before arriving at the Tenleytown station.]

We arrived in Paris Gare de Nord on time, and resolved to take our time to getting back to the apartment, as we knew we were in no rush. We had another moment of confusion as we went through the gare, and used a Métro ticket to go through a set of turnstiles, and then several hundred yards later, found another turnstile to go through. Did we have to use another Métro ticket? This didn’t make sense! We stood there for a minute or so (it seemed much longer), watching streams of people going through the turnstiles (it was 6 p.m. on a Friday evening), before deciding to try the same cards we had just used. And they worked. Another “go figure!” moment.

Back at the apartment in Belleville, we found we were the first to arrive. Olivier returned to the house about 20 minutes later, and he had us join him in the front garden for some beverages, to catch the last rays of sun of what was a beautiful day. But as the sun disappeared, it began to get cold again, and we went back in, Joanne to pack for her trip home the next day, and Olivier and I went up to the kitchen to prepare for dinner. I had asked Olivier in the garden, Je t’aide? Could I help him with dinner? I had heard that Olivier had a reputation amongst his friends of not letting anyone do anything. But this evening he allowed that I might help him set the table. And so he did.

We set a table for six in the dining room, complete with four glasses at each setting, for water, red wine, champagne and aquavit. There were several pieces of silver at each setting as well. It was a table that Emily Post would have been proud of; in fact, I love dinner parties and enjoyed very much the preparation and the ability to help out. As he was busy setting up hors d’oeuvres, Olivier shared the “John” plan for their kitchen; I commiserated, as John had recently visited me and similarly had shared with me the perfect rebuilding plan for my kitchen. John is an interior designer, who is a central figure in the New Amsterdam Singers not only as a singer, but as the group’s Tour organizer for two decades and as its chef extraordinaire for all events requiring culinary expertise. This is a man who knows kitchens. (Short advert: John has recently put together a cookbook of his culinary creations in honor of and to benefit the group’s 40th anniversary year. Check out www.nasingers.org to buy one!)

It was nearly 9 p.m. by the time we had finished assembling appetizers and the meal preparation was complete. Olivier had us take the first course down to the sitting room to await the arrival of the new weekend guests and Jean Yves. Everyone had arrived by 9:45, Michel and Martin from another visit with friends in the city, and JY back from Grenoble. We celebrated the start of the evening with champagne, small wrapped cubes of chèvre cheese (found in French supermarkets, same as Laughing Cow cheeses), pistachio nuts, Pringles chips (really!) and a dip made with crème fraȋche, roe and chives (which reminded me of the cream cheese and chives my grandmother used to make and roll up in pieces of salami for appetizers on Sunday afternoon family gatherings).

By 10:30 or so we head upstairs to the dinner table. The second course was a wonderful homemade vegetable soup (Olivier’s creation), served with bread and white wine. This was followed by the “main course” of cold salmon, Finn Crisps (for the salmon), and Olivier’s homemade ratatouille (hot). And, of course, more baguettes. And aquavit. The Nordic fare (cold salmon, aquavit) was in honor our guests, Michel and Martin, who live in Helsinki. The conversation flowed easily as the courses continued.

Next was the cheese course. Olivier had purchased a selection of cheeses from the local fromagerie (see photo), of which I tried every single one. Delicious. Of course, with bread and now, red wine.

The fifth, and last course (as far as I can remember), was the sweets – homemade chocolate mousse and homemade fruit cake (more of Olivier’s creations), along with coffee and tea.. And everything was yummy.

No surprise, this culinary and social event went long into the night and into the next morning. We were all having a good time – except Martin, who, we later learned, was in the throes of a cold, and slept a good part of the next morning.

Joanne and I woke up around 8 a.m., as we heard JY leave for a dentist appointment. We were both feeling the effects of the late night and the endless eating and drinking, but she more than me, I believe. I had not gone to bed full, just pretty well intoxicated. But I had planned to run that morning, and had gotten from JY a few days before a suggested run. JY is training for the NYC Marathon, so I knew he would have a good running route. I dressed and stretched and went out into the Paris morning – it was about 13 degrees Celsius, just shy of 60 degrees Fahrenheit. But the sun was already well on its way up into the sky at 8:30 a.m. and I could tell it would be as nice this day as the previous day had been. I easily found my way down to the Parc des Buttes Chaumont that JY had directed me to, and found the park busy with runners and walkers on a Saturday morning.

Once inside the park’s gates and having found the road, I headed to the right. And downhill. And down more hill. Hmm, I thought, there’s going to be an uphill on the other side of this! And indeed, there was, but it was a lovely park, and the prize for my uphill climb was a beautiful view of Paris from the upper side of the Park. I looped the park another time, watched the firefighters doing their early morning exercises on the hill, and headed back to the apartment.

Joanne left that morning in a taxi at 10 a.m. from the apartment; I gave my goodbyes to Olivier and Michel (JY had not yet returned) about 10:30 and headed to the Gare de Lyon. I had decided to check my luggage there in the station while I wandered around Paris before my 1:40 train. Olivier had told me what to look for, “Consignes,” lockers where you could leave your things in the station. It didn’t take me too long to figure out the process in the Consignes, but I was indeed happy to have secured Euro coins from Olivier and Joanne, which were required for the locker payment. It was about 11:30 when I finally left the station and headed once more into the sunshine. I no longer needed the sweater under my leather jacket; it was a beautiful day. I started across the Seine to the south side, and up the Quai Saint Bernard, along which there was an outdoor art exhibit in the garden beside the river, toward the Ȋle de la Cité. I could see Notre Dame in the distance as I walked.

On the way I wandered into a familiar-looking event, a “bio” festival, with vendors lined up, offering their “organic” wares (olive oil, sausage, herbs, cheese, wine, etc.) to the folks crowding their booths. Already in France, I have been through at least two of these; organic products are increasingly popular and these open air markets are apparently common. As I walked along, I saw a long line of people waiting to receive their free bag of organic products; I decided I didn’t have the time (or inclination) to wait in line for this freebie.

I headed to the Notre Dame plaza again and across it back to the Rue de Rivoli, basically retracing the steps Joanne and I had taken a few nights before. But I forged new paths on my circular route back to the gare. I stayed on the rue St. Antoine and ended up at the Bastille (which is just a monument in a circle, kind of like Dupont Circle in DC, but the monument is a very high spire), which got me back to rue de Lyon and back to the gare. Along the way, I picked up some things for the five hour train ride back to Nice: a granny smith apple and some cheese at a local market, and then a small loaf at the next boulangerie I came across, which the young lady put through the slicer for me when I said yes to her question – another lesson (not fatal here) to make sure you know what is being asked of you before you say yes!

I retrieved my luggage from my locker in the station, and found my train with no problem, which was already boarding when I arrived – nearly thirty minutes ahead of time. That gave me time to find my seat, eat my lunch, and get ready for the ride home. Yes, now I can say that, Nice is home.

I’ll return to Paris before the year is out – this trip was short, sweet, and left me wanting to go back – to spend time with my new friends, to see the Eiffel Tower (it’s been almost thirty years since I last visited it) and maybe to see that Rodin Museum that I decided not to see on that trip with my family those many, many years ago. But I’m still certain I made the right decision; Paris was not the place I wanted to be living in France. I like Nice.