Paris Day 2

On Sunday we met Bobbie in the Marais section of Paris, where she took us out to a restaurant called "Breakfast in America." It was opened by an entrepreneur from Connecticut, and it offers an American diner experience. Our waitress was from Indiana, and all the waiters and waitresses spoke unaccented American english. It was crowded with ex-pats and Parisians alike.



After breakfast, we met up with Bobbie's friend Rachel DeCuir from Louisiana, and walked around the Marais district a bit. In a development laid out by King Henri IV we saw the home of VIctor Hugo. Worth a photo, natch.



The girls had to go back to Bobbie's dorm, and Marilyn and I kept exploring. We found a cool backstreet market on a crooked lane. This part of the Marais district is also Paris's traditional Jewish district, and it was filled with Kosher Pizza shops, falafel places (with very long lines), delis and butcher shops. Interspersed among these were high-end boutiques and other intersting stores. My favorite was a palce named "Disasporama"



Marilyn eventually went back to the hotel for a nap, and I took a walk to the Louvre. It was a beautiful day, and there were zillions of people walking down in the Tuilleries. Hard to believe it was February.



We had a nice dinner not far from the Opera, and then to bed.

Saturday Feb 23: Paris

Inspired by Bobbie's lengthy (and,let me add, often fascinating) blog entries on her journeys, I thought I would try my hand at travel blogging, as a way of letting you follow along with us. The focus will be on pictures (as opposed to witty text.) Here it goes...

This was our first full day in Paris. Marilyn felt better after napping away the morning, so we had lunch with Bobbie (watching cross country ski racing on television) and then visited the famous cemetery Pere Lachaise. It is the largest cemetery in Paris, and going through it is like walking through a city of graves. Huge numbers of famous people are buried here, and people are still
being buried here even today.



Despite the fact that such luminaries as Chopin, Moliere, and Balzac are buried here, one of the most famous and popular graves belongs to Jim Morrison of the Doors. It is surroundd by barriers to fend people off, and it is covered with flowers and cigarettes!







The oldest residents of the cemetery are undoubtedly Heloise et Ableard, the frustrated (and in one case castrated) lovers who died more than 900 years ago, and are alledgedly reunited in this tomb.












The tomb of Oscar Wilde (below) is utterly unique and amazing. (It also seems quite modern, and I suspect it is.) It is covered with lipstick kisses (Bobbie and Marilyn added a couple.) and notes to him. Quite the rock star, Oscar! On the day we were there, he had more admirers than Jim!








There were many more fascinating sites, including a monument to some of the leaders of the Paris Commune who were shot up against the wall of the cemetery (tres convenient for burying.). the After our cemetery tour, Bobbie went back to her dorm to do laundry, while Marilyn and I had dinner across the street from the Opera. And then to bed.