Like, the Catacombs

When Scott and I were on our "honeymoon" backpacking trip around Europe in 1996, we overheard an American girl telling her friends, with a stereotypical Jersey Shore accent, "Oh. My. Gosh.  You haven't done the catacombs?  Like, you have GOT! to do the catacombs."  It was like she was channeling Fran Drescher.  Ever since then, when we want to be pretentious, we say, "Like, you haven't done the catacombs?"

So we did the catacombs.  Well, the girls and I did the catacombs.  Scott opted to stay above ground with the living and sit in a cafe, watching the world go by.  The rule I developed for Paris on this trip was, choose your top activity for the day and get there early, before it opens.  We didn't do that for the catacombs, because when we got off the metro, we didn't see one single person who looked like a tourist, and nobody was streaming toward anything that indicated that we should hurry and get in line.  It was 9 and the catacombs opened at 9:30, so we took a leisurely stroll down a street that had become a morning market.  Then we sauntered over to where our GPS told us to go, and - bingo! - there was the line for the catacombs, snaking around the block.  Oops.  It was a gorgeous day, and the square was in a scenic location, so we waited while Scott went off on his adventure.  As I said, we made friends with the people in front of us.  The man was speaking English to his girls, but looked quintessentially French, so I had to ask him if he was French or American.  He was English/American, and his wife was a French national.  His girls had dual citizenship and were applying for a third.  We were all green with envy at the ease with which they could navigate across languages and cultures.  Their uncle was visiting from Chevy Chase, Maryland.  The 10-year-old forgot her book, so I gave her my phone and access to my Kindle app.  She chose a book and read for an hour while the rest of us shot the breeze and the line crawled along at the pace of the dead we were waiting to see.  We didn't mind much, though, it was such a nice day.  The father of the two kids turned out to have a brother in the band Interpol.  He reminded me of Matthew Broderick, circa 1986.

Once we got into the underground tunnels, the girls and I were literally the only people there.  I don't know why they let people in at such a slow pace.  I find it hard to believe that it's intentional, so that we can all have a spookier experience, but it is unnerving to be alone in a dark tunnel, wondering if you went the wrong way.

Especially when you reach a sign that says, "Stop!  This is the empire of the dead."

I have to admit, we did take pause before we went ahead.

The Catacombs house the bones of six million Parisians.  Most were buried there due to above-ground cemeteries posing health risks within the city.

We came out of the catacombs in an entirely different place than we went it, and nobody told us where we were!  We had to reorient ourselves to find Scott, who had gone shopping for some picnic goodies.

Another elderly street musician!

Bir Hakeim metro stop is above ground, another reason it's the best way (in my opinion) to get to the Eiffel Tower.  When your train comes above ground, there is the Eiffel Tower, larger than life!

Today's picnic spot:  the vast grassy area in front of the Eiffel Tower called "Champs du Mars."  We actually ate our lunch sitting on a bench in the park between the metro stop and the tower.  There was a small band of Gypsy girls, or I should say, Roma, waiting to pounce on tourists.  I am the most soft-hearted person ever.  Have been as long as I can remember.  I mean, I used to feel sorry for the "little piggy" who didn't get any roast beef, and even the "little piggy" who stayed home when the big one went to the market.  And we're talking about toes!

But the Roma do not have my sympathy.  Their gig recently has been for a man or woman to set up blankets late at night around the city, and have one or two small children with them, supposedly sleeping on the streets.  The children are always alarmingly still.  They are always dead asleep.  In short, they are drugged.  And they are not homeless.  It's a difficult question, because the Roma are an ethnic group without a country; they are vagabonds, and as this really good article says, they operate by an entirely different code of conduct than the rest of Europe.  Their ways date back to Medieval times.  So it is difficult to judge them by our standards.  Should they integrate, at the cost of losing their heritage?  Should we make concessions for their belief system in our present-day laws?  Are we comfortable with people selling their daughters as brides or as beggars?  The Roma are.

We had a nasty encounter with the teen-age girls in the park.  They huddled together, then fanned out in two's to work the crowd.  One pretended to want you to sign a paper, then the other one's quick hands would go under the paper and steal whatever you had.  (At the Louvre the next day, a Roma woman and her child threw a ring on the ground and then pretended that they thought it was mine.  It's a common scam.  If you take the ring, they demand money for it, claiming it was theirs.  The child is there to pickpocket you while you're distracted.)  Two of these girls came over to us, rubbing their tummies and eyeing our food.  One flat-out grabbed a yogurt.  She stole it right out from under us.  A plump one rubbed her fat stomach mournfully, pointing to our oranges.  After the brazen theft of the yogurt, I didn't want to give her an orange, but she was very pushy, and the truth was, we had an extra.  I gave her one to get rid of her.  The yogurt girl threw the lid of the yogurt on the ground, and that really pissed Scott off.  We both thought she could at least act in a civil way, but the Roam aren't civil by our standards, at least those who still live within the framework of their society.  They are conditioned to get whatever they can get, at any cost.

I do feel for them, being disenfranchised as far as not having work papers, etc., but they are so pushy and deceitful, it is hard to feel sympathy for them, especially knowing that they use their children to gain money.  I don't understand them, and I made sure we didn't give money to any of the "parents" with sleeping youngsters, because frankly, I don't want that scam to be successful.  I would that those beautiful children were home in their beds at midnight, and not working the sidewalks of Paris for money.

Anyway, after our run-in with those girls, we staked out a spot on the lush grass of the Champs du Mars, in a crowded area where police keep pickpockets away.  Here, Nigerians hawk their wares, but they are working for their living.  I am happy to buy from them, even though they probably don't have permits to sell.  They are working for their families, and working hard.

We dozed on the grass for a good hour or so, happy to be right where we were.  We smugly watched the tourists queue up to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower, as we lazily enjoys its majesty from our nap spot.  Most people, having dreamed of seeing the Eiffel Tower their whole lives, don't take the time to just be there.  Vacations can be rushed affairs, especially with groups.  See the site, take a picture, get on the bus.  We were lucky to have the time to stay there.

We tried out several areas around the base of the tower.  I kept saying, tongue in cheek, "Wait!  I think THAT park over THERE is even better!"  So we would move, and take in the surroundings form a different vantage point.  We studied each of the surrounding apartment buildings, choosing carefully which one we would live in if we could.

We got a lot of mileage out of this idea, with the Eiffel Tower in the sunglasses!  ;)  It was pretty darn fun!

OK, HERE'S where I would live.

No, here.

Again waiting for Bus 72.

We had to get off the bus at Concorde because of a motorcycle rally.  Never in the States would you see hundred of hard-core bikers flying pink balloons from their rigs!

When we got to Rue du Rivoli, we said good-bye to Golda and Ruby.  We told them to "go wherever you want, do anything you want, you don't ahve to stay together, and meet us at the gelato place later."  When I was 14, I had two solid months of unlimited time to roam Paris by myself.  Every day, after my French lessons, I got to decide what to do.  I wish I could give my girls that gift, but they had to settle for one afternoon.  Golda didn't really want to go, but we forced them to.  Paris is a place you should experience on your own.  They ended up having a good time, exploring the shops, and then the greenhouses by our apartment.

Meanwhile, Scott and I set out to track down the hotel where we stayed on our backpacking trip.

We knew right where it was, but we were surprised that it had been completely remodeled!  It costs three times as much now, too!

The clerk wanted me to pose behind the desk.  Ha ha.

Much more upscale than it was back in the day.  But back then, we thought the Hotel Lyon d' Or was so great, we took my parents there in 1998.  They weren't AS impressed, but they would love it now!  It's right off Rue St. Honore, near the Opera.

I'll have to dig up the pictures we have of us sitting on these church steps back then.

If you want to get really fancy!  Scott and I, during our "free" time, sat in a cafe right here and watched Paris go by.  We tried not to feel rushed, as Americans do, but to enjoy the slow pace of the rest of the people.  I mean, how often do you have a prime spot at a sidewalk cafe in the heart of Paris?  Nobody is expecting you to be in a hurry, least of all the waiter, whose job it is to be contemptuous and basically ignore you.  Actually, our waiter was friendly because we spoke to him in French and didn't demand any special treatment.  Even Scott started using his nascent French skills!  He picked things up quickly and I was impressed by how he could communicate.

We hadn't walked around the pyramid yet, so we did that, taking in the late-afternoon light, and the cello music, coming at us from two directions.  We messaged pictures to Ari.

This isn't Ruby.  Can you believe it?!  Or maybe it is!  Ruby and her French boyfriend!  After all, we weren't with the girls at this point!  I guess we'll never know!  ;)  But it does look an awful lot like Ruby.

This was our view walking back to the left bank to meet the girls.  I just can't imagine a more beautiful landscape.  Haussmann was criticized for his vision of Paris, but if his contemporaries could have seen what he probably saw in his mind - this! - I have to think that they would have been on board.  There are always the naysayers.  Thank heavens Napoleon bought into Haussemann's plan.

These afternoons are so glorious, you don't want them to end, especially if you're walking along the Seine with the love of your life!  It's such a rare and transcendent experience, it's hard to take it in. 

Our favorite gyro place.

This is what to order, with tzaziki, in a box (en boite) because that way you get extra fries.

...followed by gelato at Amorino.

I took a walk across the lock bridge with Golda.  I don't know where Ruby and Scott were.  I'll say it again:  how could the light be so golden?  How?

This is the street our apartment was on, Rue Channoisserie.

The girls had bought this for Pierre, our host, at the greenhouses.  I told them how African violets remind me of Big Golda, because she had a carefully tended garden of them on a table in her dining room, where they could get all the light from the picture window.  Every time I visited her, she showed me which ones were blooming and which ones were about to.

Isn't the apartment cute?