Sunny side of the street...

Recently France has suffered a lot of strong storms and Paris made no exception. But like we say in French: "après la pluie vient le beau temps" (after the rain, comes the sun), which is a metaphoric way of saying: things always get better. Who knows, even our legendary pessimism will turn into wild optimism... In the meantime, I thought this photo - that I took very quickly from my scooter yesterday in front of Les Galeries Lafayette ! - was pretty nice. 

The Pereire perspective...

There is a long, well known boulevard in Paris called le Boulevard Pereire (after the name of the Pereire brothers two businessmen of Portuguese origin - their actual name was Pereira - who were very famous and influencial around 1850). Among many things in Paris, they built several train lines and one of each would go from les Batignolles area to the Porte d'Auteuil, partly along this boulevard. Since then, it has been covered (and obviously turned into gardens) but the train tracks are still there underneath; they are now used by the RER, our suburban metro. 

Winter is (really) coming...

No I did not steal the title of this post from The game of Thrones series, but from reality... As of today (Monday) winter is really coming to Paris (and France in general). According to forecasts the temperature will be as low as -4° C (25° F) tomorrow morning and it might even snow ;-) As for me, I spent the whole weekend in bed because of a nasty cold! Nothing serious, though ;-) I'll probably be able to go out again and take more photos tomorrow.

It crossed my mind...

I must be obsessed with traffic lights at the moment LOL. The thing is that I was thinking today of the little daily things that are typical of the place where you live: the way tables are dressed in a restaurant, the type of shoes people wear... and the street furniture - that often originates from a local manufacturer. French traffic lights are among those (and of course the Invalides dome in the background, but that is not a "little daily thing" LOL!). FYI, there are 13,993 traffic lights in Paris and 18,441 of these pedestrian signs that we don't really pay attention to ;-) How do I know? Well I counted them all, just for you!

Morning traffic

This morning I had to wake up very early and guess what... It was still pouring! I tool this photo while crossing the street... Not fascinating I agree, but I still like it, I don't know why! I'm going to stop taking rainy photos though, because I have the feeling I'll bore you LOL! Still, just so that I can rant on a little more; have a look at the weather forecasts for this week! And to think it's a long weekend...

Sun, sun and more sun!

I guess the song is going to have to be changed to "March in Paris" LOL, for it's the second year in a row that "March is the new April, or even May or June LOL". Look at the weather forecast for the coming days... Plus 8 degres C on average, compared to a "normal" year. FYI, I took this photo at rue Montorgueil, a very famous pedestrian street located in the 2nd arrondissement. Have a good weekend everyone.

Sotto Sopra

With this photo, I feel like I'm going back in time; this is the typical type of shot I would post when I started PDP! (Remember this one?). I found these chairs at Sotto Sopra, an Italian restaurant located at 74, rue des Archives, in the Marais. Nothing extraordinary, expect that I loved their color and the way they are set on the sidewalk. BTW, if you happen to visit the Salon de la photo in Paris, I'll be talking about PDP -and its secrets! - on Sunday October 9 at 16:00 pm at stand E15, from l'Agora du Net.

Cleaning Paris

Paris is a big city, with plenty of - sometimes - careless people, pollution, dogs(!), etc. and it needs to be cleaned regularly. For this, the Paris town hall uses an army of  sweepers and cleaning vans, like this one that I photographed  at 8 o'clock at rue Doudeauville , while the sun was still low (hence the reflexion on the sidewalk...). About 1 500 km of streets are cleaned every week (2 400 km are swept everyday); a never ending story.

New bike Lanes

Paris is not Amsterdam, but there is no doubt that there are more and more bikes in our streets. And not only because of the Velib experiment (which is actually more than an experiment now!), but also because more and more Parisians own a bike. To protect them, there are now new bike lanes, like this one. But if you pay attention you'll see that these lanes are in the opposite way of the car traffic! Now, all one way streets have a bike lane like this. Which is a bit puzzling at first, of course ;-)

It says no bikes!

This could be seen as a provocation: a bike attached to a street sign that says explicitly: no bikes! And though, nobody really cares... In every country there is a certain room around the law and people know from experience what's OK and what is not. When you're a foreigner, it's always tricky to adjust to the local rules. That's also part of the fun when you travel, isn't it?

Ticket Please

It always pains me to snap photos of people in despair, but I found the irony of the McDonald's cup and request for a "TK Restaurant" ("ticket" restaurant coupon) meriting a mention here. In Paris, it is estimated that there are 100,000 homeless people. A situation that no doubt will get worse with the current financial crisis.

Reflecting on things

Taken in front of Fauchon, this juxtaposition of images and reflections really caught my eye. Not much more to say except that when I see someone thinking, I always wonder what she or he is thinking ;) ! Talking about thinking, thanks a million for thinking of me with your nice wishes yesterday - and emails too. I did not have the time to see them all, but I will. Shame there is no Internet access on board Air France planes... Stay tuned, I'll be checking in regularly.

Stormy weather

We are going through a period of very unstable weather here in Paris - and in France in general - at the moment. Here is what I photographed tonight right outside my office. Needless to say I had to wait a little bit before riding my scooter! A few days ago a large storm struk a village in the north of France causing a lot of damage and yesterday a young girl was killed by a tree that fell because of a storm. Don't worry, Paris has not turned into Venice yet, though! Once again, let me offer you the soundtrack of this photo ;)

Walking Cello!

A very Parisian scene today and... a very odd way of carrying such a music instrument through the streets of Paris! I took this shot rue Montmartre (2nd arrondissement) while I was having a drink with friends on a terrace. Of course, I found out later that this lady did not just happen to carry her cello (is it really a cello?)... She was actually playing it in front of each café, to collect a few euros - (of course, I contributed ;).

Not so "square" Roland!

Things are pretty rough at the moment on my side so I went back to Montmartre for a walk around the vineyards (it's the green part, in the background) and I came across this little square, named after Roland Dorgelès, a French journalist and writer who became famous after a hoax: he attached a brush to the tail of a donkey, made it paint "something", called the painting "Sunset over the Adriatic" signed it by the donkey's name anagram Boronali (first name Joachim-Raphaël!) and managed to exhibit the "masterpiece" at an art show in 1910! It sold for 400 francs (1 400 of today's euros) apparently.

Le Parcours Saint Germain

Every year in the Saint Germain area (Saint Germain is a famous quarter of Paris known for its intellectual background) they have an exhibition called "Le parcours Saint Germain - the Saint Germain route). This year's theme is "once upon a time" and most pieces of art are inspired by childhood memories. Hence this huge statue, made by a group of artists of various nationalities called Le Collectif 6bis which is supposed to show how "the city can turn into a huge playground". OK, your turn to comment now ;~) - PS: sorry for the delay in publishing, it's entirely my fault, I made a mistake using the new post scheduling function of Blogger!

Sunny shopping day

The weather is still pretty nice in Paris and despite the unstable economical situation, people still go shopping, like this lady. Not sure she'll go for the sexy outfit though... Have a nice Sunday everyone. It's a voting day for us.

Paris street sign

It's been a while since I've shown you a typical Paris street sign. Here is the one of Rue des Dames (this street used to lead to L'Abbaye des Dames - the women Abbey - which was located up in Montmartre not far from where I took this photo). Before 1728 there were no street signs (or very rarely) but it became compulsory for the owners of the first and the last house of each street to engrave its name on the walls. In 1806 Napoleon passed a law demanding the names should no longer be engraved but painted and in 1847 the authorities turned to enamel...

Grey mood

It may look a little provocative to post a photo of a place called Le passage d'Enfer (literally translated “passage from hell”) right after a Catholic holiday (yesterday - Thursday - was the "Ascension"), but this photo illustrates perfectly what Paris looks like at the moment: grey, cold and... rainy!. This Passage d'Enfer is located in the 14th arrondissement, off the boulevard Raspail and not far from the boulevard Saint Michel and, apparently, it's name originates from a time - long ago - when it was a bad neighborhood.

Street Lamp

I love the old Paris street lamps. They give this special 19th century flavor to the city that makes it so romantic. I took this photo on the rue de Rivoli where they installed the first street lamps back in 1830 or so. At that time, of course, they were gas powered and every night a guy (un allumeur de réverbères) would have to "turn them on". Now, and since the 1920s, Paris street lamps are electric and nowadays you can count 82 000 of them (good thing nobody has to light them one by one anymore!!)