Parislog 33
August 7, 2006

Whenever I hear of names of places for vacations mentioned here, they always strike me as weird. Martinique, Guadalupe, Senegal, Algeria, Burkina Faso. Then it finally occurred to me that they were countries and islands that spoke French. It is of course only logical but it is another one of those little things that seems so different.

One very hot evening, I walked over to a local park to hear an outdoor concert. I meandered slowly so as not to get too sweaty and by the time I got there it had already started so I can hear the music as I’m walking into the park. There are people spread out on the grass under the trees and others sitting on chairs and benches. The sun is low in the sky and making long shadows on the ground. Some have little picnics and wine. The woman is playing traditional Chinese instruments that were quite haunting in their sound. There were many people but they were so very quiet that it was not the slightest bit difficult to hear. It was a very nice feeling of community.

I went to a district called Sentiers over near Montmartre. I had been there before and it is an area of wholesalers and fabricators of clothing. Some of the stores will however let you in to shop so I wanted to get better acquainted with it. It is also one of the two times of the year that France is allowed to have sales and I thought maybe I could find some nice bargains. What I found out was that the stores that let you in sell crap. I have never seen so much polyester and acrylic in one location. I mean everything felt nasty to the touch and the cuts were tiny or one size fits all. Then I started noticing that it was the same thing store after store. They all seemed to have the same articles of clothing. I believe that these stores are in fact not wholesalers and are just taking advantage of the location to sell cheap items so that people think that they are getting a deal. The shoes and jewelry are all plastic too. Yuck.

There was one store that was open only for “les soldes” and had amazingly made items with very intricate work but the prices were not exactly what I would call wholesale on sale. Blazers came in at 250 euros ($300) for example.

I then went over to another section of Sentiers in which I had yet to explore. Mind you, that was on the second day. It took 2 days to really explore it thoroughly. This part however really was wholesale. The storefronts were not really storefronts and you could look through the windows to see either stacks of clothes on racks all looking the same or people working on things. This was a real garment district. There was no individual purchasing there at all. Too bad. I did see occasional items that looked like my taste.

While walking to the metro, I happened to notice this very strange item on the other side of some bistro chairs and table. A huge chess game. It looked like a game had been started but no one was actually playing.

I did manage to go over to the richy-rich area and find a nice pair of all leather shoes at a secondhand couture store. Those made me feel a little better.

There is a huge park called La Villette, which is extremely futuristic looking but also has a lot of greenery for the neighborhood kids to play. I went there to see a show called “L’Amour, Comment Ca Va?” The title means, “Love, What is it?” The pictures looked quite interesting and it was free so why not? I came up out of the metro to a flat area paved with little square stones and it was immense and hot. The ground shimmered with the heat. I bravely crossed to find the building for the exhibit and had to walk around all 4 sides because I went the wrong way. If I had turned right instead of left at the building, I would have been directly at the entrance. Well, I got a view of the building anyway. Upon entrance, you see curtains of red and little low seats in red and white tables. Very sexy looking. Then you walk through the curtains into the first room of the exhibition. I didn’t get it. It was pictures and videos of industry and farms. Then next room was pictures and videos of unemployment and low wage jobs. If you looked above your head, you saw three screens showing a woman doing a summersault. I didn’t get the connection at all. Finally, I entered the third space and now it was about women’s lib. Well, I know how that relates to love. There were some pictures of transsexuals and of older women being pin-ups. I thought a lot of the items in the third space were interesting but the thread to the title was very tenuous.

When I got home, I read the brochure that came with the show. It said that the first exhibits were to show the things that destroyed or tainted love. Okay. And?

I had a couple of glorious visits at H*’s where we watched the first three episodes of the new season of Project Runway. Oh, how I miss stupid American TV. I must admit that the fact that it is fashion designers is a big calling card for me.

I had a nasty saleslady day. The vacuum cleaner bag was chock full and naturally I needed to buy a new one. The first time I went, I forgot to write down the info. Nice. The second time, I had the info but nothing matched what was on the shelves. Nice. I start opening boxes that look similar to see if they would work. A sales lady comes up beside me and snatches the box from my hand telling me in that nasty tone to not open the boxes. She closes the box and hands it back to me. She never says hello. She never asked what I needed. Nothing. I put the box down and left. After I left, I came up with all kinds of great lines to say. My favorite was, “Thank you so much for your help. You are incredibly kind. Good-bye.” And all of it would have been using the tutoyer. For those of you that don’t speak French, that is the form of you that you use to children or dogs unless you are friends with someone. To an older woman who I didn’t know, it would have been really insulting.

I went to another store and found the exact bags I needed and took them to the checkout. 14 euros ($18) for 7 bags. Ouch.

We have had a number of excellent storms and I actually got lucky and caught a lightening bolt with my camera.