Where there is smoke...

... There is not necessarily fire but sometimes steam! Like in this restaurant called "à toute vapeur" located near the Gare Saint Lazare in which ALL food is cooked in one of these giant ovens. I owe the idea of visiting this place to Serina, a visitor to PDP, who works for Goosta, a site dedicated to Paris restaurants - not yet in English ;~(. She says the food there is really good and healthy. I did not get the chance to taste it, but one thing I can tell you, it was not easy to come up with a nice photo!

Stock Market

The stock Markets crashed quite a lot today in most places and this made me think of a photo I took recently in Le Palais Brongniart (after the name of the architect who built it) precisely located on the Place de la Bourse ("Bourse" means stock exchange in French). It is now more a historical place than a financial one for, since the early 80s all transactions are computer based. What you can see in this photo (the "corbeille" in the foreground, where stock brokers used to trade stocks by yelling "I buy" or "I sell" and the large board in the backboard where they would write the price of stocks with a choke chalk) is just there for the memories and for visitors, for now the place is used for conferences only.

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!

Farewell Monsieur Saint Laurent

Do I really need to remind you who Yves Saint Laurent was? For us, French, he's definitely part of our culture. He is also one of the most famous fashion designers in the world, one of the few that contributed to France's reputation for Haute Couture. He died on June 1st and will be buried a funeral service will be held today (Thursday) in Eglise Saint Roch, near the Louvre. I went to one of "his" stores, on Place Saint Sulpice to take a photo that would represent his talent best, but I finally found the shot I really wanted, in the Passage Verdeau - in a superb black and white photographs gallery...

Weird Grave

I found this incredible grave in the Cimetière Montparnasse. At first I could not really believe my eyes... But yes, this guy had his grave turned into a sort of bed where he and his wife are dressed in their day outfits and look like they are gently talking. I investigated a bit more and found out that it belongs to Charles Pigeon, the inventor of a famous non-exploding gas/oil lamp (patented in1884). He probably had a lot of money then (enough to have this grave built anyway!)

Details on Place des Vosges

I've always heard the expression "the Devil is in the details" until yesterday, in a television series I heard one of the characters say "God is in the details". And when I saw this photo - that I took at Place des Vosges on Sunday - I could not help but think of it. Well figuratively of course, because on this occasion God is French Sculptor Jean-Pierre Cortot (1787 - 1843) who designed the 4 fountains that you can see on this unforgettable place.
BTW, I had a message from CNN who thanks you all very much. Non US based people who are interested in the France coverage can tune in to CNN International throughout the week and US based people, who I believe don't have access to CNN International can check www.cnn.com/france.

Food and thoughts

I did a little compilation of your contributions [thank you very much for that] for the CNN survey and it was really interesting to see how, for most of you, what best defines France's reputation is... food! I then could not help but posting what I had for lunch today when I met Elisabeth - one of the earliest visitors to PDP - who is currently in Paris at the moment (see a photo of her with Michael on the making of). Yes people, in Paris, on the Place des Vosges, at La Guirlande de Julie's, red snapper is served with its head! I did not eat the latter, but enjoyed the dish very much. Have a nice week.