capturing Paris…
“There are two kinds of travelers. There is the kind who goes to see what there is to see, and the kind who has an image in his head and goes out to accomplish it. The first visitor has an easier time, but I think the second visitor sees more.” — Adam Gopnik (Paris to the Moon)
This is from author Adam Gopnik’s original and fresh take on the American living in Paris in the late 20th century. I read this lovely book before leaving for Paris—a city overflowing with opportunity, history, charm, and maybe, just maybe…love. While Gopnik left New York City as a travel writer for the ‘New Yorker’ newspaper, corresponding with a multitude of Americans a sea away, about his new life with his wife and two children—I found myself at the dinner table of a french family I had never met on the eve of September 27th, 2008—I found myself as ‘fille au-pair’ (somewhat like a Nanny), for the Bernard family with three children in a cottage-esque home. *I would soon to find out that this cottage-esque home, was once habited by the great Victor Hugo and his ‘maitresse’ or lover…Juliette Drouet. Oo la la, only in France!
—When I arrived at Charles de Gaulle, I was greeted by Monsieur Dominique, the father of the trio I would soon be in charge of, the very first question has asked me, (after “ca va? vous allez bien? etc! etc!) was, would you like to go into Paris and see the city? Or would you prefer to unload your luggage and get settled? Jet-lagged though I was, I decided to jump start my life in ‘I’ile de France’—I was entering the parisien life—la vie en rose! My life as a “parisienne” had begun!
As my friend, Raymonda has stated upon each arrival in Paris, “Mmm. It smells like Paris”. A city, its people, its commerce—its boulangeries and patisseries…when in the city it is as if you witness and are surrounded by the past and present. The very fact that you can sit at Cafe de Flore and not feel like you have placed yourself in a tourist trap, it is that Cafe de Flore is still a part of modern Paris.
To quote Gopnik again, he poignantly writes that:
— “…the French cafe is the highest embodiment is so brisk that it disarms Nostalgia. History keeps wiping the table off and asking you, a little impatiently, what you’ll have now.”
In Paris, you can embrace history with one arm and modernity with the other….without a second thought!
Ahh j’adore Paris!
*attached photo taken at Palais de Tokyo. I hold the “JE”
