Paris at my feet…

We headed out early Tuesday morning on the bullet train.  We were all able to sit together –which was great, and the kids loved the train.  Zander was a bit disappointed at how slow it went.  He thought, since it was a bullet train, we would be from Besancon to Paris in  about 5 minutes – 2.5 hours seemed way too long.  I tried to explain that it would have been 4 or more hours driving but this didn’t seem to console him at all.

We got to Gare de Lyon and purchased all our train tickets for the rest of the week.  We think, of course, since we live in France we are savvy enough to use the ticket machines (no line) but, after a few minutes of frustration and asking for help we ended up in line, just like all the other clueless tourists.  The worker was an absolute angel and helped us immensely – even gave us a great map. What patience she must have for such a career. Finally, we headed over to our apartment.  It is a great size – plenty for us 7 and the location is perfect.  Hungry for lunch, we hit La Grand Epicerie of Paris to get some groceries for the rest of the week.  Of course, I had wanted to head out and conquer Paris immediately and the kids wanted to stay in the new apartment and watch television!  Reality bites folks, the fact was that tomorrow we needed to eat breakfast at home and pack a picnic lunch, and so, out we went.  Poor us, we were forced to visit the most famous grocery store in Paris – and possibly the world.  It was only 1/2 km from our apartment- but it took us almost 1/2 an hour to locate it.  It was a huge and amazing place but to call it expensive would be an understatement!  It was ridiculously, outrageously, expensive. Particularly the produce – a bag of oranges was about 25 Euros.  A box of strawberries about 10!  It was arranged by product – like a whole island just for salt, another just for vinegar etc…. There was even a Nutella island ringed by jars of Nutella as large as Griffin.  I think you would need a delivery person just to lift the thing. We ended up buying about 4 things despite the price, of course, including the best yogurt I’ve ever had and 6 pain au chocolates which were also the best I’ve ever had.  Then we headed over to a normal store and got regular stuff.  (These 20 items cost less than the bill at the first store, naturally) We made it back to the apartment for some lunch and rest.  It was Grandma and Grandpa’s anniversary so they headed out to hit the town.The kids were so tired, I was wondering if we would make it out of the apartment at all, but they recovered after some food and playing with us. 

We first visited the Rodin Museum.  We had pre-bought Paris museum passes and they were awesome.  We didn’t have to wait on line or anything – just walked right through the door.  I was astounded by the body of work that was produced by just one artist.  Besides the Thinker and The Kiss and The Gates of Hell there were hundreds more sculptures. I mean, when a painter does a large body of work it is impressive but, I now believe that Rodin takes the cake – I mean, this is carving out of marble – and with enough detail you can see veins – you can’t just dash out one or two a day, now can you?  There is another Rodin museum in Philadelphia – it was cool to visit both.  Thanks to Zander, who took the shot of us kissing in front of The Kiss. He had a hard time getting the shot so we had to kiss for a really, really long time – what a shame!  Any readers out there remember our college days when we were accused of being stuck in ‘goo-goo, ga-ga’ land?  Happy to say we still visit now and again. I was familiar with some of Rodin’s work but discovered I really liked the sculptures that were ‘emerging’ out of the marble as well.  The museum was laid out beautifully and had mirrors placed strategically so you could more easily appreciate the sculptures.  I’m pretty sure the curators didn’t think the site would necessarily be interactive, but, as you can see – Zander and Callie were inspired to try out some of the contortions Rodin sculpted. Perhaps they will have a future in modeling.  It started out rainy but by the time we headed outside to the gardens it had cleared up so we could appreciate The Gates of Hell and The Three Shades, along with tons of others. The kids were wondering why Rodin would have made 3 of almost the same statue and also wonder what order he created them.  

On the way out, the kids stuck their admittance stickers on a nearby electrical pole (as had thousands before them)  Some had managed to get them up so high they must have stood on their parents shoulders.  Here you have it folks – is it an evolving work of art, or litter?

Next we were going over to Les Invalides.  Passing by the gardens next door we caught our first glimpse of the Eiffel Tower.  Underwhelmed, Zander insisted it was just an electrical tower.  Les Invalides is a former military halfway house sort of thing where, back in the day, tragically injured soldiers could live out the remainder of their days doing useful work  with their food and housing provided by the state.   So, if you lost a limb or eye or half your head and somehow survived back then – you were sent to Les Invalides.  I can just imagine the doctor breaking the news.  “I’m terribly sorry Jacques – we weren’t able to save the leg.  But take heart. All is not lost, really! There is a place for people like you.  It’s a lovely building, right in the heart of Paris. Not that you will be wandering out and about in the city, oh no!  You wouldn’t want to mix with society.  But, you will get to live in peace and harmony with all the other limbless or eyeless freaks.  I mean, we wouldn’t want you out there scaring little children or demonstrating the darker side of war, now would we?”  Well, for whatever reason, this lovely refuge was eventually shut down and they turned it into a museum of war.  As an aside, in France there is no such thing as “differently abled” or even “physically disabled”.  The word they use is handicapped – and that’s final.

The entire outside of the museum was ringed with cannons – all different kinds and all pointing outward as if in defense of the building.  The kids LOVED the cannons and spent a long time just climbing on and around them – Zander was particularly interested in the one pictured 3rd.  Notice how it was hit by a cannon ball in some long ago battle.  He wondered if it would still work. I was impressed by how elaborate and ornate the cannons were.  Having kids along for the ride really helps me slow down and notice details such as this.

        

We headed inside…. This is a huge museum and we only visited 2 wings out of about 6.  The first was full of armor, swords etc….  it put the display of medieval weaponry in the Philadelphia Museum of Art (for those of you who know it) to shame.  I often miss my family when I’m in places I think they would love.  While here, I was really missing my father. He loves history, especially anything having to do with wars and also swords, weapons etc…..  He would have LOVED this museum.

      

Callie is pictured standing in front of a cannon-like device with the largest calibre shot known to have been made – what a hole that would have made!  The next shot is of some Asian era medieval knight with a cannon resembling the muzzle of a machine gun – not many of this model were made since it didn’t work too well and took too long to load!  Callie got sick of this place very quickly – war is not her favorite thing. It makes her belly hurt. We tell her we hope she grows up knowing how bad war is and fights to stop it.  Here we are hugging next to a cannon – believe it or not the handles of the cannon feature intertwined lovers – that’s right, sex and war, hand in hand!  I loved the helmet pictured – it has a sphinx on top with a dragon on top of that – mythological creatures, unite – and kick some ass!  I took a shot of this armor to show how much they had – that was just one window in a room with about 6-10 windows full.  The handles on the swords pictured are gorgeous – I wished I could have gotten one for my father.

Then we went over to the WWI and WWII section of the museum – we walked faster since the museum was closing at 6 and we were going to meet one of Daddie’s co-workers for dinner.  We saw a model of “Big Bertha”,  a howitzer used in WW1.  It was named Big Bertha after the daughter of the creator.  Thanks Dad!  You can read more about Big Bertha at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bertha_(howitzer).  The name Bertha has always meant not just ugly, but also fat and mean. I guess it is because of this?  I remember my sisters and I playing this little 78 rpm record that my Aunt Pat had given us. She gave us a whole bunch and we used to play them all the time – I loved Sweet Caroline – Neil Diamond.  But this other record, I don’t know the name, but it had this scene and one part was Howard Cosell…. I can’t remember much – but I do remember this scene

Gutteral voice (GV): “I’m lookin’ for Bertha”

Regular voice (RV): “Bertha who?”

GV: Bertha Butt

RV: Who’s she?

GV: One of the Butt sisters (crazy drum music)   

We used to play this over and over and over and laugh hysterically. Why, I have no idea.  Poor Bertha…..  OK readers, take a look at these recruitment posters – did these actually work???  The idea of being powerful instead of weak in a time of danger. The idea that we can somehow get rid of the ‘bad’ guys. It’s all just an illusion, isn’t it?

    

Then we headed over to the tomb of Napoleon.  He wasn’t initially buried there but was interred later. The casket, or whatever you want to call it, was in the center of the building and was huge.  At least 20 people could easily have fit inside the thing. It was a big as a delivery truck!  You always hear about Napoleon overcompensating for his slight stature - well, his tomb continues this tradition. Here we discovered a small machine that, for 2 Euros, you could buy a commemorative coin.  We let the kids each have one and they were so excited – this was to become ‘the’ souvenir for our Paris vacation. Andre’ did some research on Napoleon and he only ruled most of Europe for about 10 years – but I guess that’s better than anybody else around, right?

We headed over to Pont Alexandre III.  There we met up with Andre’s Paris based co-worker, Emmanuel.  He and his spouse, Claire, took us to a local restaurant called Hippopotamus.  They had kids meals, balloons, crayons etc… – all great for our munchkins, and the food was delicious as well.  I had chevre on toast, some foie gras and steak tartar – yum!!!!  We got to the restaurant soon after opening,  but had to leave before dessert, since it was past 9pm and the kids were, understandably, falling asleep in their chairs.  I was proud of all of them for behaving so well for so long. They even let Andre’ and I had adult conversation most of the time.  Claire and Emmanuel were very nice and spoke excellent English – they plan on living abroad as well, someday.  Maybe they’ll come to Philly when we go back there.  On the way home in the taxi Griffin fell asleep.  You can’t blame him - we had been up since 5am!!! Sometimes I wish I could be the one carried to bed!

While we were hitting the museums and eating with friends, Grandma and Grandpa visited the Eiffel Tower, Rodin and Napoleon’s tomb. I include a few of their shots since they had such a great view.  I love the rainbow ending at Napoleon’s tomb.  I wonder if we were in there when they were taking the picture?  Happy 8th Anniversary guys!

  

Walks with the grandparents

Sunday afternoon, Grandma and Grandpa wanted to see where the kids go to school, but Zander was too tired to go and Rebecca decided to start packing for Paris.  So Callie, Griffin, Grandma, Grandpa and I headed out instead.  Callie was really excited to show the hillside in front of her school, so we detoured through the woods on top of the train tunnel.  A neighborhood kid followed us in, disturbingly close on our heels, but I ignored him and soon he took another branch of the trail.  It’s a bit of a stretch to call these 2 acres woods, since they’re really just abandoned land in a steep gully that surrounds train tracks, but it’s still a fun way to kill half an hour with the kids.  The entire parcel is surrounded by fences, anywhere from 6 feet tall to 30 feet near the soccer fields.  We get access in a secret spot where the fence is broken, and it is a bit of a treacherous path in spots, with up to 50 foot drops if we were to fall.  Anyway, Callie proceeds to tell us that her school class comes in here some times—WHAT???  I always felt a bit nervous taking my 3 kids, but 20 or more?  Are they crazy?  Then I began to hear a muffled “help” and my short-term auditory memory pulled out what I’d been misunderstanding before—a series of “au secours” cries for the last 5 minutes.  I couldn’t help but think that perhaps the kid that had followed us in was dangling from a tree branch over the gully or something…  Well, it turns out this was just a prank, but I was so mad I told the kid to go home, and escorted him out of the area.  We showed Grandma and Grandpa the playground at Callie’s school and then at Zander’s school and on the way home Grandpa carried Callie.

Monday evening was our last chance to take Grandma and Grandpa out to the ruins of Mont Faucon.  I actually haven’t ever driven to the spot before and got lost a couple of times… and then I found out, upon arrival, that we’re not even allowed to drive all the way down the trail—we’re supposed to do a 90 minute hike.  We decided to go for it, and it was a fun, easy trip.  Still, I didn’t take pictures of anything but these amazing, huge, escargots.

     

The Aliens Have Landed!

Hooray!  Grandma and Grandpa are here!  They got in from their amazing adventures Friday evening.  They had a great time in Rome, Florence, Venice, Pisa, Zurich and at the top of the world in the Alps – near Mont Blanc (I think that’s the right big mountain – it could have been Kilimanjaro or something…).  They saw castles, monuments, waterfalls and lots and lots of other stuff and had great adventures.  It was really fun to see their photos and hear all about their adventures.  Of course, now we want to go there as well!

On Saturday morning, we went over to the fort/thrift store. They were amazed at all the beautiful furniture one could buy for only 40 or 50 Euros.  Here is a shot of us wandering around in the store.  Grandma found some fun souvenirs and we got a push mower for the back yard and a beautiful hand-blown, purple carafe.  We hit some snags as we were checking out.  First, there was a problem with the cash register – no one seemed to know how to change the tape, resulting in about 5 people coming over for consultation.  Then, as the great tape debate raged on,  a truck loaded with cheap furniture that was backing out ran into the little booth where the debaters and the poor customers were standing.  Luckily it was a minor blow and no one was damaged (permanently).  They decided to give up on changing the tape and simply write it down by hand and then, of course, realized they couldn’t even open the drawer to give change!   Luckily I had exact change or we might still be standing there.  As it was, it took 25 minutes to pay.  Welcome to France!

Then, we were off to the Citadelle. We haven’t been there for a long time. The flowers were so beautiful.  I love the tulips here, and so does Griffin as you can tell!  Zander has taken a violent dislike to picture taking – here Grandpa was trying to get a shot of him and he was trying to escape – I snuck in a shot – gotcha!      

We walked around and spent a long time looking at the baboons. They had tons of babies and were very active.  We also saw, in the bird cage, that the flamingos were nesting – we could even see their giant eggs.   Then, after lunch, André and I went into the Résistance museum – we hadn’t been able to go before since it is not recommended for children (thanks, Grandma and Grandpa!).  It traced the history of the rise of the 3rd Reich and then the arrival of the war to France and the history of the resistance here.  Very interesting – but also depressing.  The time it took to build up the war machine was incredible.  Hitler started indoctrinating the youth and it wasn’t until they had grown up in the right climate that he was able to wage such a war. One particularly disturbing quote from Mein Kampf said something like - “We don’t want our children to be educated, or enlightened – we just want them to be obedient” Remember that parents, the next time your kids won’t listen – mindlessly obedient drones are the same types that worked as guards in the death camps. 

Then we walked up around the ramparts. Griffin and Zander were ahead of everyone.  They are strong and fast, as you can tell.  The grownups are those little dots along the wall.  In the third shot you can see the ring of trees lining the Doubs – this river is the natural barrier of the city.  Then we headed down the hill to visit the Cathedral and the Roman ruins nearby.  Debbie and Dave went to see the clock as well.

 

We walked around the city a bit – showing the visitors such exciting things as Grand Rue, Place Huit Septembre (where the kids rode the carousel) and the 2 Euro store.  Then we had some yummy Greek for dinner and walked along the Doubs before heading home.  We talked about the plan for Paris – turns out May 1st is a holiday so lots of the museums are closed that day.  Disney will probably be an absolute mob scene, but it  should still be fun. The next morning (after snuggle time, of course!) Debbie and Dave went to church and we spent some special time with the kids – I also spent time digging through the trash looking for our Disney tickets – turns out I almost recycled them!  Spent the afternoon hanging around the house. They did take a walk around the neighborhood to see the kids’ schools – the lilacs in our neighborhood are gorgeous and Callie conned Grandpa into giving her a piggyback.

Monday morning we ordered a St. Honore’ for breakfast – it was fabulous.  Then I took them over to the local grocery store where they stocked up on cheap, yet delicious, chocolates and sausage to bring back home to the Utah family. Then we headed out for a hike up to Fort Chaudanne.  Apparently the Germans occupied this Fort during WWII and the American forces liberated it.  There was a monument in honor of the Americans who fought and died for France

         

Unfortunately, it was a kind of gloomy day and chilly – we headed down the hill with whiney and cold kids!  They perked up when we got to the abandoned powder magazine.  We had been meaning to come back with flashlights ever since we saw it on the bird walk in the winter.

It was pretty large inside.  There were 2 large rooms within another room – there was a corridor wrapping around the large rooms – like a double layer.  There was a stairwell going down that was filled in with broken roofing tiles.  It was really fun and scary to go in there.

We headed down the hill.  For whatever reason, Griffin was not in the mood to hike today and Daddie had to help him out.  Down at the river we saw a mama duck with about 10 ducklings – how many will make it?

Then we went and tossed rocks in the river (of course).  Callie, our discoverer, found a dead fish as well as some sort of bug carapace on the side of the river.  We headed for home, passing an exciting ad for EuroDisney, which we will visit Friday. On the way home we left Zander’s jacket on the bus so we ended our day at the thrift store buying him a replacement for Paris.