It is Saturday night. I am settled on my couch/bed watching L’Ecole Des Fans, a cute program where children around the age of 5 get to sing a song with one of their favorite French singers. The kids are asked pretty basic questions prior to their performance (i.e. What is your name? What will you sing? What does your mom do?) which makes it a perfect program to reinforce my class work. Most of the little ones freeze up or forget the lyrics so there is a lot of camera panning to parents feverishly mouthing the words at their wilting, stage frightened children. Luckily, since all the parents are also holding video cameras, the moment is eternally caught on tape probably to be replayed at the poor child’s wedding.
I do watch a bit of the tele here in Paris…..definitely more than I do at home. But that is because at home t.v. is a time sucker, HERE it is an educational tool!! 🙂 It is a fun game for me to see how much I can understand…which is usually a word here, a phrase there. I have most of my success with the commercials. Apparently the French Ministry of Work, Employment and Health has quite the campaign going on right now to promote healthy eating, exercise and not snacking between meals. Every second commercial is a PSA requesting us, the unhealthy, stagnant, snacking viewer, to eat the required amount of veggies and fruits a day, get out and exercise and eat only during proper meal times. These disclosures are also found written at the bottom of the commercials promoting chocolates, sweets, cookies or anything else that may not make you fat! 🙂 And if you didn’t get the point from the ongoing commercials and disclosures, there is a website to visit: http://www.mangerbouger.fr/. I guess this is all just the government’s way of keeping the Frenchies svelte.
Me with some of my classmates trying to get our proper veggie intake!
We chose a Vietnamese restaurant for our first class outing. It was located in the historic Passage des Panoramas. The food was quite good, the owner was quite annoying. He made us order all our entrees and plats at one time….which seemed to go against everything I know about French dining. But since he wasn’t French, I will give him a pass.
Today my Italian classmate, Carlotta, invited a few of us over for homemade pizza at her flat that she shares with a local Parissien. For a Parisian apartment it was huge.
As you can see from the picture the entire place was stark white, the owner even owned 2 white cats. She use to work in a museum so her place had a very artistic feel. In fact in the water closet she had about 10 toilet paper roll holders mounted in different places all up and down the wall. It was clear there wasn’t much concern about running out of toilet paper…the concern was more about be able to reach it (she had some mounted close to the ceiling!).
After lunch I cut through Montmartre to go find the only vineyard left in Paris.
Wow! Tourist season must be upon us! The Sacre Couer had beaucoup, beaucoup people. I stopped to watch a puppet show on the story of Moses and observe a street performer balance on his head a bowl with 3 goldfish while he juggled and danced.
Success!
Between Rue Saint-Vincent and Rue des Saules is Clos Montmartre, the only working vineyard left in Paris! This vineyard only produces about 300 bottles a year (and from what I read and hear they aren’t the most spectacular bottles). Every year in October there is a fetes put on by the vineyard where the public gets access to the vineyard and the bottles of wine are auctioned off for charity.
Some of the delights of Montmartre!
I was discreetly trying to take a picture of these 4 older French women resting on a bench in the heart of Montmartre. They were simply adorable!
I will sign-off this Saturday night with a picture of my lunch on Wednesday. It is langoustine ravioli made by an Israeli chef who studied under Alaine Ducasse.
I pass his restaurant every day on the way to school. It is located on a quiet back street in the 9e. Ever since the moment I saw it and its blackboard menu I have been wanting to try it…..so I stopped in on my home on Wednesday.
The meal was amazing and I was given a lot of attention by said chef….so much so that he refused to take my money for my 3 course meal with wine. I think he may have a little crush on me :). Next time I go back though I must pay…I don’t want him thinking payment will end up being in the chambre.
Vive la France.
