While walking back home and crossing the Seine in front of the huge “Hotel de Ville” building (the City Hall):
“So this is the Hotel de Ville”
“What a really big hotel!”

Sarah came back from Madrid for the week-end and dragged us around for shopping. we compromised on an ice-cream break on top of BHV (a huge department store located in the first arrondissement) with a nice view of the city. The top-floor “tea salon” of BHV is nothing too threatening to tiffany’s or even neiman marcus’, more like a big patch of astroturf and a few benches with an ice-cream stand in the middle. But at least it was way above car exhaust level, which is always appreciable in Paris.
Continue reading

Harold and Sarah live in le Marais, a district of Paris packed with all kind of cafes and eateries, catering to the diverse crowds traditionally inhabiting this neighbourhood: gay and lesbians on one side, orthodox jews on the other…
Continue reading

 

Arriving at Perpignan’s local airport reminded me of small African airports…
these airports where a dozen passengers exit directly on the tarmac and walk under a heavy sun to a building which looks more like an abandoned office space than a buzzing airport facility…
Continue reading

Ok, at long last, an entry on Paris…

Just when it started looking like Paris was still all about annoyingly grumpy parisians, endless strikes and rude, eternally malcontent, cab drivers (a mere thirty minutes after leaving the airport, I had my first lecture on how shuttle buses from the airport where stealing work from cabs and how he usually never picked fares at the shuttle station)…
Continue reading