New York Fashion Week

Fashion Week is here.  No harm in some creative advertising to the hoards of hungry fashionistas.  

La Toilette

The subject for today is toilets.  There will be no photos.

OK.

I am a bit confused (but certainly have been and shall continue to be accepting - given no choice, there is truly no need for discussion on the subject, but it is curious to this American).  Here are the, I believe, contradictory facts.  But perhaps they're not, and I just don't have the full cultural history to understand completely.

1.   Even the smallest apartment (like mine in Paris, for example), if it has its own bathroom facilities, separates the "loo" from the bathing/sink area.  Yes, of course in the U.S., in fancier hotel chains such as Four Seasons, and in some upscale private residences, there may be a door that separates the toilet from the rest of the bathroom, but that isn't what I mean.  In Paris homes, the toilet is a separate room, distant from the bathing area, and most often even without a sink to wash hands afterward.  I've had to seek out a nearby kitchen for an available sink on several occasions.  I find this inconvenient for all (and perhaps even discourages contemporary hygienic practice).  After getting past the lack-of-sink-near-the-toilet issue, I began to think how "civilized" it is, to remove toilets from the rest of the house, just to stick it in its own "closet," basically.  How private, how refined, how solo this practice is.

BUT - 

2.  Many cafés, schools, museums and other public spaces do not divide the bathroom facilities by gender.  La toilette, c'est pour tout!  The stalls may be individual (though I've sometimes found unenclosed urinals in the same environment but luckily have not found them in use), but the door to the general environment of the stalls and sinks is used by all...or there may not even be a door - just a tiny winding spiral staircase at the bottom of which are one or two sinks and one or two doors behind each of which is a toilet.

Is this really a major culture discovery?  No.  But is it a bit contradictory?  Perhaps, but maybe just to us puritanical Americans.  Here goes - there is no need to divide the sexes in this basic human function (this is a country that bares the female breast in the media and on beaches with ease); let them all use the same bathroom.  It saves all kinds of resources and space.  And, as for the function itself, in the home, put it as far from the other aesthetic niceties as possible, as there's nothing aesthetic about it - a simple toilet in a tiny empty closet to be segregated from the rest of the home.

And there's France in a nutshell.  Aesthetics rule.  Gender privacy, not so much.

Paris Cop-Out

No time for much of a thoughtful post (too busy conjugating and trying to agree verbs with subjects, objects and keep myself from throwing things across the room in frustration), so I'm just going to post some really pretty pictures.  I'll do a better job next time, maybe.

Well, after looking at all those nice things, I don't mind having to go back to conjugating verbs after all. 

One Parisian's Daily List

I spotted this on the wall of a paper boutique.  I don't know if it will help sales, but perhaps that's not even the point.

Wow!  I can even do #11!  I might have to work on a few of the others, perhaps this weekend.

Seen at Café de Flore

I know I'm new to Paris and there's still a lot that I've not yet seen.  But I could have spent years here and never seen this, so I must share.  It's just simply too cute. 

 

This little guy was in his perch on his master's motorbike parked on the sidewalk of Boulevard Saint Germain right in front of the Café de Flore (whose history is described so completely and creatively on its website).  Isn't he just the épitomé of Parisian doggie style, nonchalance and je-ne-sais-quoi? 

Even jaded Parisians who've seen it all were laughing and taking pictures from their own perch at the prime café tables of the Flore.

Traditions Slightly Askew

We all know Halloween in the U.S.  I certainly don't need to explain.  I won't be there this year, and I wonder what, if anything, it'll be here in Paris.  However, until I saw this at the Monop grocery store today, I hadn't given Halloween a second thought, or even a first thought.

"Soup of the Month - pumpkin, red pepper and paprika"

Would anyone really be tempted to buy a black container of soup with a tombstone on it?  What marketing genius thought of that?  And why?  And who could the target audience possibly be? Fill it with candy, take it off the top shelf of the refrigerated case, put it on the lower shelves of any aisle, and then you'd have an audience - kids (assuming they know anything about Halloween). 

A Pretty Good Idea

I'd heard and read that the doggie poopy problem in Paris is so much worse than in New York or elsewhere in an urban American city.  Thus far, I haven't found that to be the case.  In fact, I've seen far fewer dogs walking about than I do in New York (or maybe it's that Parisian dogs are smaller than the really large dogs living in New York apartments these days).  

Even so, the Luxembourg Gardens suggest that you don't even have to bring your own baggies when you walk the dog there.  Along with the baggies that dispense from the bottom of the kiosk, they provide directions by photo, just in case you're not sure of the most hygenic method with which to handle this messy matter.

Livin' the Life

It's a kick and also an energy sapper.  I'm talking about every single daily thing that is encountered.  I do love it, though.  Each experience is a lesson in language and culture, and I also enjoy the dual challenges of accomplishing the bureaucratic intricacies to success and doing so in French.  If I wasn't going to love it, then why do this at my age?  For example, trying to buy shoe inserts to cover the areas  of the shoe that are causing blisters was an interesting exercise in pantomime.  Buying laundry detergent, trash can liners, and most toiletries required more specific vocabulary than I have, so smiling, pointing and using really long explanatory phrases (which is my nature as a lawyer anyway) really went a long way.  I'm quite proud of the end results.  

Living the reality of Paris residency in the first few days is like moving into a new apartment anywhere in the western world.  I have visited the neighborhood hardware store, the neighborhood grocery stores  and the neighborhood drugstores three times each already.  And let's not forget the cellphone store.  I have visited no museums.  This is the major difference from every single one of my many prior visits to Paris.  And that's just fine. 

However, dealing with a seriously leaking valve on the toilet in my apartment and ensuing flood of the bathroom floor all night last night wasn't quite the "reality of living in Paris" that I had in mind for my fourth night here.  Ugh, getting up every couple of hours to bail out a full bucket of leaked water wasn't helping the jet lag recovery.  

But, last night was last night.  And today, I got to stand in line for an hour and a half to get a Navigo card for the métro.  Will I need it?  I'm not at all sure.  Could I have just gotten individual tickets or a Navigo Découverte card for tourists?  Yes, I suppose so.  But, all this is part of the immersion.  I'm stubborn that way.  Anyway, during that time spent in line, watching probably thousands of travelers with luggage pass by me at Gare Montparnasse (or pass through me - I noticed that personal space wasn't respected much around there) on a Friday afternoon, I got to imagine where they were headed - a country house, the suburbs, another country?  All by train!  So exciting (yes, I still suffer from extreme naiveté and excitement over the most minor things).  When it was my turn, I was over-ready, with passport, apartment lease and student ID card.  I've found that being over-ready is what works.  Being under-prepared and you lose in this game.

I am very excited about my Navigo card!

To which I can now add a Vélib subscription!  At least that's done online, until I have to activate it (en français, bien sûr) at a Vélib kiosk when I'm ready to take my first ride in Paris traffic.  And like the Paris American (or American Parisienne) that I am, I'll be the one wearing a bicycle helmet.

I took a lot of math, but...

... never have I seen such an equation!  It was great fun to watch these two guys (right arm of the other painter - resting or bored, presumably - is at lower left) hand-painting this billboard, slowly and in real time, over a parking lot at the corner of Crosby and Broome in Soho.

It's not so common to see billboard painters these days, especially in a get-up like that one - suspenders and hat!  

And it's not just an ad using the idea of a complex mathematical equation, as I thought when I watched it being written up there.  It's in fact an actual formula with a "solution."  See this link for a better look at the problem, the solutions to the various component parts and the overall solution itself.  Very clever.  I love the idea of using math and historical events like that to scratch the brain. 

Another "Ah, New York!" moment.

Paris vs. New York

Since I began writing this blog, I have followed a few others.  The ones I read often are listed on my profile page.  A new one called Paris Versus New York, a tally of two cities came to my attention today (thank you, God, I Love Paris).

It's obvious what's going on here.  The graphics are clever, as are the concepts and cultural difference that are being visually compared. 

It's just a bit of fun, for a lover of both cities.  In this contest, there are no losers, only two winners, though what would we do if we couldn't compare and contrast, brag and whine?

Such Heat!

Global warming it is then!  Or perhaps not.  One could argue the point, but who has the energy?  It's just too darn hot.  So, I went out on a hunt for just what one can do in such heat, if one strangely chooses to leave the confines of an air-conditioned space and spend time outdoors, as I attempted yesterday (all in the name of research, as I often say, but this research, alas, didn't involve any calories).

I think this little girl running through the sprinkler in the Union Square playground fountain has the best idea, and certainly won the prize for Appearing to Most Enjoy the Heat (she's not crying, believe me, and watching her dash around in and through that sprinkler with abandon was a riot):

Most everyone else just seemed to slow down, find some shade and do what they would ordinarily do, but with as little movement as possible:

playing chess

playing with toys

wearing costumes and performing childrens' theater, really

finding the shade and grass and just lying there

eating lunch

reading under umbrella

Kindle and iced coffee

And then there were those in great numbers who just didn't seem to understand that it was 95 degrees.  But when you're a tourist, you have to play with the cards you're dealt, and if you really want to see a Broadway show, then you really want to see a Broadway show (and I don't blame them).  I would have been happy to explain the online option for discount tickets if anyone had wanted to listen:

crowd and hours long line at the TKTS booth in Times Square - no shade at all

In the end, who did I most wish to emulate yesterday?  This mom:

back to the water...

Why should only the kids get to have fun while staying cool?

Free Hugs

I'm all in favor of sharing good will toward man (and woman), really.  But this one I just couldn't see my way to steer towards.

On a hot, sticky Saturday in July at Union Square, hurtling towards the subway station with other things on my mind, two pairs of new hiking boots and walking sticks in a large Paragon bag hanging at the end of one arm and a large bag of fresh peaches from the Union Square Greenmarket hanging off the other,  the thought of stopping to get a hug from a total stranger was so far down the list, in fact it wasn't even on the list.  Besides, as my walking companion ventured (he being 21 and honest), "eh, no one looks interesting to hug anyway."  Yikes!

And that was that.  Have a great weekend, all.  Hugs!

le quatorze juillet

 

What's the story on this New York City building's choice of paint, I wonder?  En tous cas, bonne fête, mes amis, even if I am in the wrong country today (which is something I can say is not the case for my son, lucky guy, who may just be watching a parade on the Champs-Élysée as I write.... youth is SO wasted on the young).

Of course, it could also be a Netherlands flag, if the building were turned on its side....

New Dog, New Tricks

My Little Paris for iPad from mylittleparis on Vimeo.

(ooh, my first copy/paste of a video into a blog post!)  I love how this old dog is still learning new tricks.  And speaking of which, the reason for the video is my new "toy" - the ipad.   I'm still trying to figure out truly useful things to do with it that I can't already do between my iphone and a laptop.  At home, it's still easier to grab one of those than to fiddle with the ipad.  

However, when traveling, I'm still hoping the ipad is the way to go (but if someone really understands how to blog from an ipad, please let me know; I don't think they've really gotten a good app for that yet).

In the meantime, I believe the ipad is mostly for fun, reading newpapers and magazines online, in a print size we mature folks can read, and writing (with a new app I'm also playing with called iA Writer).  That said, it's imperative to also have a keyboard if you don't want to deal with the onscreen keyboard for big writing projects (or even long emails).  I bought the bluetooth version apple is selling, and so far so good.

I moved all my iphone apps over to the ipad at the start.  Then, using itunes, if I could find an ipad-specific app for that function, I deleted the iphone app (they're smaller, using only iphone-sized partial screen) from the ipad and installed its counterpart ipad app.  

The France Inter radio app (which is the same for iphone and ipad) is still my favorite for both.  I am able to listen to French radio in real time from seven stations, from the same app.  It's incredibly user-friendly.  To me, it's a prime example of how, as one of my sons likes to say, we "live in the future."

And, back to the video above, the app shown (which just came out today) is really as clever, goofy and fun as it looks.  Who wouldn't want to have an ipad, or fly off to Paris, or both, after watching it?

Double-take

These signs had me doing a double-take and, as intended I suppose, got me to wondering.  You'll see what I mean -

sign in front of vegan café - wonder how that worked out

Perhaps there was good reason for their previous departure

 

Really pretty sure we didn't even need to know that much

Now here's one I can relate to...all but the millenials part

le subjonctif

 

So, I'm just minding my own business, trying like hell to study the French subjunctive "mood"  (not a tense, oh no).  Anyway, I get to this line in the grammar book - 

"On utilise l'indicatif après les verbes "de la tête" (penser, supposer, etc.) et le subjonctif après les verbes "du coeur" (désirer, souhaiter, craindre, etc.)."   

This basically indicates that there's a difference in how one expresses verbs "of the head" and verbs "of the heart."

Can you even imagine an English grammar teacher or book making such a distinction, with a straight face?

I just adore these little cultural differences I learn (which really aren't so little) as I torture myself with French grammar.  Makes it all worthwhile.

(Or maybe I'll just use The Subjunctivator!!  I'll definitely be Bookmarking that link.)

Just What We Don't Need

Really!  We need ATMs in the middle of Central Park?  Really?

They're already on every possible corner and in every mid-block storefront all over the city, appearing to take over every new lease that opens up (from space previously occupied by an obviously useless dry cleaner, or grocer, or drug store, or restaurant), because you just can't have too many banks.  And who wants to have to walk another ten steps to the next one down the block?

But, in the park?!?  Really?  It's not possible to take your cash with you?  And what exactly are you going to buy in the park, a pigeon?

Lucky for me I don't have to take time out of my busy day to try to answer these (inane) questions, because these "pop-up" ATMs (in fact, there were two  placed within feet of each other, confirming my theory that they only travel in packs) are only in the park for a couple of days (one hopes), in connection with a large rock concert on the Great Lawn scheduled for tonight.  And yet, this still raises the question of what one was going to need an ATM for during a free rock concert in Central Park.