Michael à Paris

Nous ne sommes pas a Paris ... malheureusement

2009-08-04T17:51:00.000-07:00

nope ... we're not in Paris ... unfortunately

we're not even in the same city but are living thousands of kilometres apart on the opposite ends of a huge continent, waiting to see where we set up base next

i'm currently settling back into the house in Perth whilst searching for work in Perth and Brisbane ... we are both as good as unemployed. i quit my job to live in Paris for 4.5 months and E's uni contract terminates within the month ... she is cooped up in Fortitude Valley closer to the uni writing her second book ... and we are both now a long way away from Paris

and i have so much more to show and tell about Paris, so there will be the occasional post-Paris adventure post here and there

it will help me to relive the fun of the adventure too and help forget about returning to the limiting structures of a life at work ...

Such is life ... All things come to an end

2009-07-21T15:23:00.000-07:00

But Paris Plage is in full swing and the weather is lovely ... and we still have the best part of two days remaining in Paris

It's all good

2009-07-18T23:35:00.000-07:00

Sadly this time in Paris is coming to an end, but I have hardly touched on the things we have done here in this blog.

And I am too busy doing such things to want to spend the time online.

It is the small things I have most enjoyed ... fresh baguettes from Julien Boulangerie in Beaubourg, breaking off the end and eating that on the short walk home, and especially on a cool day when the baguette is warm ...

walks along the seine and amongst the numerous gardens ... eating a few different tarts every week ... visiting the museums ... trying some different cheeses, especially the extra old mimolette and roquefort ...

checking out the dozens of beautiful and interesting old churches ... the fresh produce from the markets and shops ... visiting well known and especially the more obscure monuments ... picnics in the squares and parks ...

the falafels from L'as ... just walking amongst the architecture and looking up, always looking up and just wandering the streets, with no particular destination in mind, walking along whichever street looks the most interesting.

We have watched the seasons change from late winter through to early summer and have experienced freezing cold days, a mini heatwave (by french standards), driving rain and many lovely sunny days to just wander the streets, and experienced these in every month we have been in Paris. Some of the days in March were as sunny as they have been in July, if slightly cooler.

There has been music and theatre and art and culture.

I'll miss hanging out with Jean-Pierre for our french lessons and especially our french/english conversations, which often involved walking around somewhere in Paris. Also the guitar lessons with Jean-Pierre's son Kajetan who after 8 lessons can now play a handful of tunes on guitar and can play and understand all of the basic chords as well as how to find and read guitar tab.

It was fun trying to speak french, especially with strangers on the streets or in the shops. There were times when someone would ask me something on the streets ... usually where is such and such a place ... and I could answer them in french and they would understand ... these brought feelings of achievement. But then I would confuse the simple words or numbers, or just trip over my tongue, in what should have been a simple conversation, and feel like an idiot.

As always there have been annoying moments which I have tended not to talk about, it can be hard travelling for such an extended period of time, living amongst a foreign culture with only a suitcase worth of your own stuff. But I shan't dwell any further on this.

Most of all, I will just miss Paris. It's a beautiful, friendly, charming, relaxed city which I have found very easy to live in.

I plan to continue writing more posts once I have returned to Australia, further documenting our experiences in Paris and hopefully providing information to anyone who plans to visit, or just wants to get a feel for this gorgeous city.

It's going to be hard returning to Perth, the most isolated city in the world, but I am looking forward to seeing my family and friends again.

And in the meantime, we still have a few days left in Paris ... the city of love indeed!

le quatorze juillet (Bastille Day)

2009-07-16T01:22:00.000-07:00

Bastille Day, or le quatorze juillet("14 July"), is celebrated in France on July 14th each year.

It commemerates the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille fortress-prison in Paris in 1789. The Bastille was a symbol of the absolute and arbitrary power of Louis the 16th's Ancient Regime and capturing the Bastille was the beginning of the French Revolution.

This uprising led to the creation of the modern nation of France, and of the reconciliation of all the French.

It is celebrated with a presentation of many of the armed forces on a march along the Champs-Élysées avenue in Paris, with aircraft also flying overhead.

There follows a day of demonstrations and exhibitions of the armed forces, with tanks, helicopters, boats and all sorts of military paraphanalia on display and available for everyone to look at and often climb into.

We celebrated with some friends at Invalides, which had the largest amount of displays including helicopters, tanks, gliders, various trucks and machinery, gymnasts and especially parachutists landing nearby.

Then we wandered amongst the displays and watched the parachutists descend from above, landing on a small patch of grass nearby.

Some descended with some speed and skidded across the grass as they landed and one parachutist even had a dog strapped to him.

And there were even free speed boat rides along the Seine.

That night there was a free concert at the Eiffel Tower with Johnny Halliday, but we aren't big fans and the crowds would have been massive, so we gave it a miss. It would have been cool to see the fireworks though.

During the day they had managed to fall to earth, but no one at Invalides managed to fly, despite their best attempts.

Furia Sound Festival

2009-07-06T10:11:00.000-07:00

The Furia Sound Festival was held on the weekend on the outskirts of Paris and we attended the ROCK 'N' ROLL (in the small tent in the corner) day on Sunday.

It was a very strange festival because in one little corner, in an old circus tent, there were some influential and rocking bands playing, which I will discuss soon, but on the two main stages there were some very wimpy and boring folk and pop bands ... it was nothing in comparison to the musical consistency one tends to get with the festivals in Australia such as Splendour In The Grass and The Big Day Out or even Homebake.

But any festival which features Mogwai (who were the only decent band to be presented on either of the main stages) and Mono can't be all bad, so we bought our tickets a month or so in advance and made the 40 minute train ride from the centre of Paris to the festival site outside of Paris in Cergy-Pontoise.

Unfortunately we spent the morning checking out the Elles exhibition at Georges Pompidou Centre, it being the first Sunday of the month and the galleries across Paris open for free, so we arrived too late to catch the set by Torche.

As we arrived Mono were starting their sound check, which gave me time to buy some tickets for beer, and beer, and to secure a place not too far from the stage.

We last saw Mono in Paris only a few months ago, only a few weeks after we first arrived, so it seemed appropriate that we should again see Mono only a few weeks before leaving Paris. This set was similar to the show at Glazart, with many tracks from their new album Hymn to the Immortal Wind, which they are still touring, but the set at Furia was much shorter at about 50 minutes.

Mono play classical influenced Post Rock and don't stray far from this genre, but especially in the live setting they are a formidable experience. It was strange to see (and hear) the band play live it a circus tent on a hot and sweaty Sunday afternoon with the summer sun streaming in behind us.

And what is it about Mono that attracts people chatting noisily and inanely and cheering at the wrong moments? I'm not sure if they don't understand the music or just have low attention spans? Either way, Mono opened the festival (for us) on a high and even though their set was short, it was still strong. As usual, there was no crowd interaction from the band, but the music spoke volumes.

There was some time until the next band we were interested in seeing came on, so we went for a walk around the festival site to see and hear what was happening. I have decided not to discuss the groups which I didn't like ... as my grandmother always told me "if you can't say anything nice about someone, then don't say anything at all". Needless to say, there was a lot of music that didn't ring my bell, so i'm not saying anything at all.

Isis aren't a band I was familar with, but I really enjoyed their set which was an interesting mix of metal and hard rock, with some shouty vocals thrown in. The Isis quintet often provided a brutal assault of three heavily distorted guitars along with their heavy rhythm section.

I particularly liked the aluminium guitar one of them was using ... and can only assume the sustain such a guitar would create helped produce the huge sound the band achieved ... and further research, and the similarity between the guitar headstocks, suggests they were all playing Electrical Guitar Company guitars. Either way, they were well cool!!

There were even some nice melodic moments amongst the mayhem of the music, although I think the group of lads in front of us preferred it when the band went off, especially during the particularly shouty moments, which they played quite often.

One of the guys was shifting between guitar and keyboards, so there were some shifts in the sound with some psychedelic undertones helping to add flavour to the metal main course.

I really enjoyed Isis, it's always great to find new music to listen to, especially at a festival. Sadly we had another wait until any decent music was due to play.

So we wandered off in search of beer and food. The french are particularly useless at providing food for vegetarians at the best of times, but we thought "this is a music festival, surely there will be a few options for vegies?". Nope! There were chips, which had already sold out. There was a baked potato with butter, but the queue was huge, probably full of veggies looking for something to eat, and they were hell expensive. That was it!!?? No felafel!? No cheese crepes!? No cheese panini!? No nothin'!

At similar types of festivals in Australia there are copious amounts of choice for veggies. France lived up to its reputation here. Luckily there was still beer, albeit in small plastic cups. "It's all going in my blogg" I complained as I continued the vain search for food ... and now it has.

Next time we will take our own food, that explains why there were so many people picnicing there.

After the vain search for food, we were torn between watching Suicidal Tendencies in the ROCK! tent or Gossip on the main stage.

We decided to see what the Gossip hoohah was all about, but whilst waiting on the hill for Gossip to start, they were the only band to come on late throughout the day, we heard an almighty hardcore racquet from our favourite corner of the festival and decided to check that out.

We found Dillinger Escape Plan were playing early and caught a few songs from their very energetic set. These guys were constantly moving around the stage, up on the monitors, bouncing around each other, even crowd surfing and playing guitar at the same time and were very hardcore.

But Gossip were also meant to be playing, and they have been getting a lot of press here in Paris recently. Also I like what they stand for, they're a queer band, screwing with people's perceptions of body image, playing a mix of rock and disco ....

Sadly the hype didn't live up to the reality. They were playing what to my ears was a bland mix of disco and soul. Sure, Beth Ditto has a strong voice, but so does Mariah Carey, it doesn't make her any less boring. A local french magazine Snatch featured an article on the band where they were compared to Christina Aguilera ... and I think I agree with him.

And why do Gossip have a fourth member (the bass player) who is never represented in their media coverage? It was time to wander back to catch the end of the set by Dillinger Escape Plan, much more fun!

The moment Dillinger Escape Plan ended we rushed over to the second main stage for the band we had been most anticipating, Mogwai. It has been far too many years since we have been in the same city as Mogwai, the last time was in Sydney in October 2002! That night they played with ... and You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead ... man! that was some gig! And way before I even started this blog, which seems to have existed forever.

This time we were second row!!

Mogwai opened with Auto Rock from their kick ass Mr Beast album. From there they just took everything a notch higher. The sound from Mogwai is always huge, but they also have almost silent moments ... at one stage the only sound was from Stuart Braithwait gently caressing the neck of his guitar, producing a gentle bowing sound not too dissimilar to an ebow. The rest of the band were silent. The entire crowd was silent, as if holding its breath. I whispered to Elizabeth to look at how he was playing the guitar to create this sound ... suddenly the band burst back into life, louder than ever before! What a moment!

Mogwai are considered by many to be at the fore of the Post Rock movement, but to my ears they manage to continue to evolve whilst remaining primarily within the instrumental genre. Their set tonight was too short to prove this point, the band finished with Batcat from their latest album The Hawk Is Howling ... again they were only on stage for 50 minutes and the time flew by far too quickly.

But while trying to take a photo of the stage after their set finished I managed to score one of the band's plectrums, which will be an appropriate memento of a guitar based group I have admired for over 11 years now, being lucky enough to stumble across their track Tracy on the January 1998 issue of Total Guitar magazine.

Suicidal Tendencies were playing in the corner circus tent, but sadly by this stage it was time to join the queue for the navette back to the train station and on to the (after) midnight train back to Paris.

It was a friendly festival, great fun in one corner of the festival, fairly well organised apart from the complete lack of veggie food. I got my "Furia" plastic beer cup and Mogwai plectrum momentos for the day, and lots of good memories.

Free things to do in Paris everyday ... have a picnic

2009-07-03T11:28:00.000-07:00

There are always numerous free activities across Paris which one can enjoy every day (or night) of the week.

Now that summer has finally arrived we are getting out and about much more with walks along the Seine and all throughout Paris. Although we have been doing just this for the whole time we have been in Paris, since the chilly winter of early March ... it all seems so long ago now, and the end of our lovely holiday in Paris is slowly coming to an end.

Often in conjunction with our walks, we have a little picnic. With a bag or two full of baguette, cheese, salad, fruit, beer, wine ... we choose a location and head in that direction. On other occasions we might just make up a baguette at home and take that to a park for a mini picnic. After our picnic we tend to take a constitutional walk.

And there are now many, many more people out enjoying the warm weather with us, particularly in the evenings.

It isn't quite as comfortable to sit on the cobblestone paved paths which run along the edge of the Seine and the canals, but that doesn't stop the crowds who flock there. And there are all of the parks and gardens, some of which I discussed in an earlier post.

Sometimes we will go somewhere close by such as along the Seine or up to the Luxembourg Gardens or The Tuilleries near the Louvre, and others we will travel up to places such as Butte Chaumont or even as far as Bois De Boulogne or also Pere Lachaise Cemetary for my birthday.

We have even been known to have a picnic in a hotel room.

But no matter where we have our picnic, it is always an interesting location surrounded by water or gardens and sometimes works of art or with views, and it is always an enjoyable and free experience in Paris.

Paris Gay Pride Parade

2009-06-28T12:45:00.000-07:00

The 2009 Paris Gay Pride Parade drew an estimated 700,000 people out on a warm summers day to celebrate and recognise the rights of all gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. France’s first gay pride march was held in 1981, and had an immediate impact as homosexuality was decriminalised the following year.

The theme of this year’s event was the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall riots in New York and included a very special guest in Liza Minelli.

Not only is Liza Minelli an obviously well loved icon of the gay community but she was a particularly relevant choice because it is generally considered that Liza Minelli's mother Judy Garland was an inspiration for the gay community and the Stonewall riots, which occured on the day of the Judy Garland's funeral.

Either way, Liza Minelli was a good choice for helping to start the parade, which slithered its way from Montparnasse (where we gathered to watch the start of the parade) along Boulevard St Germaine and Boulevard St Michel and ending up at the Bastille. It was basically the same route as for the May Day parade.

We've also attended the Mardi Gras in Sydney and the parade in Paris is much more overtly political, with most of the floats having a political message or perspective.

The Sydney parade is much more about the participants dressing up in extravagent costumes, checking each other out and just having a good time and in the time honoured aussie tradition, any political message will be dripping in satire.

That's not to say that the floats in Paris and the particpants were all staid and only considering their political position ... there were a lot of people dressed extravagantly and most of the floats were overflowing with people dancing and celebrating and I'm sure looking forward to a long day and a longer, harder night.

The floats seemed to go on forever, with their booming music and gyrating bodies ... and messages regarding the rights of gay people in the workplace, safe sex, the discrimination of gay people in France and overseas, the rights of same sex parents, the ever present AIDS concerns ...

Like the Mardi Gras in Sydney there were people lining the streets for the length of the parade, cheering and supporting the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community of Paris.

And I'm sure they partied long into the night ... there were certainly many people from the parade celebrating in the Marais throughout the night as well.

And if you want to see many, many more interesting photographs from the Paris Gay Pride Parade, check out my friend Jean-Pierre's Paris Gay Pride Parade photograph page

La Fête de la Musique

2009-06-26T10:41:00.000-07:00

After the intrusion of the anarchist riot and the overt police presence in our quartier, which continued thorughout the night for many, many hours after the rioters had left, the annual La Fête de la Musique in Beaubourg finally got under way.

I had searched the web site and discovered that many of the bands playing my preferred styles of music were based around the Marais and Beaubourg, so we decided just to wander the streets here and see what would unfold.

The first group we stumbled across were in the oi punk vein, there was audience participation (or a friend of the band got up to sing a song as we arrived) and they played the genre rather well, we only caught four songs but they were fun and well played.

We continued wandering around the streets of The Marais and I bought myself a street beer. We found a few very popular areas where apartments were surrounded by people listening to the music booming from the upper levels. They were just straight dj'ing, no mixing or anything fancy, just playing songs loudly, like a juke box ... and they were the most popular? We left them to it.

Further ambling led us to a square with a cool young group playing cover versions of popular indie bands, such as The Strokes and The Arctic Monkeys, as well as some tunes in french ... I am hoping they were originals. They weren't too bad, although the lead guitarist could have used a distortion (or fuzz or overdrive or something similar) effect pedal for his guitar solos ... they sort of disappeared in the sound of the band.

We continued our walk and in the distance heard a familiar tune commencing ... lo and behold Darren Hanlon was playing! We arrived to hear his final tune, Punks Not Dead ... sadly wishing we had arrived earlier (this hadn't been advertised, so we didn't know ... WE DIDN'T KNOW!!!) ...

Elizabeth and I continued our ambling but found only doof heads and disco queens in large groups, standing on the street listening to music booming from apartments that could be played on the radio, if the radio was turned up loudly enough ... not really what I expected from a day celebrating music?

By this stage Elizabeth had had enough, so I walked her home and grabbed a cold beer from the fridge - there's always cold beer in the fridge wherever I am living - and headed out again, through Beaubourg and towards Chatalet this time.

Chatalet was full of world music acts, which isn't really my thing, but on the walk back I found another young band, again playing cover versions. They were very cute, with a few little mistakes here and there, but were very well supported by the growing crowd.

This was one of the things I really enjoyed about La Fête de la Musique, it was supporting many young bands, giving them a venue and a new audience to play to and the experience of playing live.

I continued back to the Marais and just over the road from our apartment I found the band I most enjoyed on the evening The Arkitekts. A three piece with Tom Bass working very hard on bass guitar and keyboards, Vortex on drums and with their main man on guitars and vocals David Law.

They played an interesting mix of slightly goth, slightly grunge, slightly epic guitar rock ... maybe think The Doors meet Bauhaus downstairs at a avante-blues jams in a prog rock squat. I enjoyed their set thoroughly and probably spent an hour of the evening enjoying their tunes ... I even bought the CD.

After the sun had finally set I decided to take my CD home, and collect another beer before one final wander through The Marais in search of some tunes. The Arkitekts were still playing, so I enjoyed a few more of their tunes and off I wandered.

There was music at The Lizard Lounge where Darren Hanlon had played earlier, but it didn't really ring my bell. I found another band playing punk tunes, to a very appreciative sing-a-long audience, but their set ended too soon after I arrived.

After that it was pretty much just dj music with lots of seventies and eighties music (not even disco). This group above here were grooving to The Boys Town Gang version of Can't Take My Eyes Off Of You and then You're The One That I Want from Grease, which was my cue to escape.

By the time I wandered past the Cox Bar in The Marais it was well and truly disco hour, which most everyone else seemed happy about ... the streets were still packed.

But the rivers on the streets were urine and it was time for this guitar lover to head home. But it had been an enjoyable night, if a bit light on for rock music.

There's a riot going on

2009-06-22T05:04:00.000-07:00

The annual La Fête de la Musique in Paris is a celebration of all things musical, but at least in our neighbourhood of Beaubourg it started out as something completely different.

Created in 1982 and running every year since, La Fête de la Musique is a free event, open to amateur or professional musicians. It contains participants from all musical genres and as such is aimed at a large audience, working to popularise musical practice for young and not so young people from all social backgrounds.

The musical events were scheduled to commenced at 3pm, so a friend of mine, Jean-Pierre, and I arranged to meet up at that time at a venue in Beaubourg which was meant to have bands commencing at that time. Sadly they were a few hours behind schedule (even though the day hadn’t even begun) and even the DJ hadn’t been set up.

Another reason Jean-Pierre and I arranged to meet early was to conduct our weekly French-English conversation. Jean-Pierre is holidaying with his family in New York soon and wants to improve his English and obviously I want to improve my French language skills.

So we decided to wander around the Centre Georges Pompidou and the nearby streets, drinking a café at the always very popular Café Beaubourg, watching the street performers and basically watching the world go by. Jean-Pierre is also a very talented photographer, you can see some of his work here, so he was also taking the opportunity to capture some moments.

As we wandered around we could hear loud bangs and see wisps of smoke from the direction of Chatalet. About 10 minutes later a group of several hundred (700 according to the police) demonstrators made their way past us towards Rue de Renard. They were travelling with flares and smoke grenades, which made for an interesting spectacle, but we certainly weren’t expecting what was to come.

After the excitement of the demonstration, Jean-Pierre and I decided to go and listen to some music and headed back to the alleyway where the bands were meant to be playing. There was a dj in action, so we hung around there listening to the tunes and waiting for Jean-Pierre’s family who were planning to join us on our walk through the musical world of La Fête de la Musique.

In the meantime I had received a text from Elizabeth telling me that there was now a riot going on outside our apartment, with a government building being attacked by the demonstrators.

Elizabeth was safely tucked away in our apartment watching the show and Jean-Pierre was looking for his family.

By this time there was a helicopter hovering above, although we couldn’t hear any noise above the sound of the dj. By the time Jean-Pierre’s family arrived, only minutes later, the demonstrators were hurtling their way through the alley where we were gathered.

I caught a small amount of this on video, but they were lighting fires and knocking over everything in their path on the way down the street, so I thought it prudent to put my camera away.

After the demonstrators had rushed through, and we all had stood around a little flabbergasted and comparing opinions on what had happened, we were suddenly surrounded by the riot police, who were of the mistaken belief that we were the rioters they were searching for.

It took them several minutes of being scoffed at by our group, who were obviously gathered to enjoy the music, before they stormed off, leaving the fires and minor devastation left in the alleyway by the anarchists to be managed by the organisers of the music event.

As we made our way back towards my apartment we could see some of the devastation left after the riot and were constantly blocked and redirected by the police and realised that there wasn’t going to be any music in our little corner of Paris for some time yet.

After the demonstration was well and truly over and all of the participants had scattered to various parts of Paris there remained a high police presence in the area

... too late one thinks.

But the damage assessors were on the job very soon afterwards. By this stage I still hadn't seen any live music.

And as I post this blog entry it is almost 24 hours later and none of the smashed windows have been repaired yet.

Free things to do in Paris everyday ... visit the parks and gardens

2009-06-20T08:10:00.000-07:00

There are always numerous free things to do in Paris, some organised as one-off events such as the annual Nuits des Musees or the free entry to select museums on the first Sunday of each month.

But there are also a large number of free activities across Paris which one can enjoy every day of the week.

One of my favourites is a visit to the many parks and gardens for a walk amongst the flowers or a read, a nap or a play of the guitar on the lawn. Take along a picnic lunch or dinner and you can pass many enjoyable hours for next to nothing.

The only trouble with the latter is that many of the lawns in Paris are not for sitting on, they are only for looking at. You will see the signs, "Pelouse Interdite" or "Keep off the Grass" as we know it in english.

But there are also some grassed areas where one can sit, such as this one at Luxembourg Gardens right next to the "forbidden" area. I'm sure people would pay attention to the signs even if there weren't security regularly patrolling the area.

It seems bizarre to have a long stretch of lawn dotted through a park of "white chalk" paths strewn with the occassional spare metal chair and to have the grass forbidden.

But there are many parks where one can enjoy a little sit on the grass, such as the large parks on the periphery of Paris, Bois de Boulogne and Bois de Vincennes; the park in the middle of the square at Place des Voges; Champ de Mars beneath the Tour Eiffel; Parc des Buttes-Chaumont; a section on the edge of the Tuileries near the Louvre; on the hill in front of Sacre Coeur; behind Chatelet near the beautiful church Saint Eustache, the Square du Vert-Galant on the edge of the Ile de la Cite ...

There are also numerous paved (or cemented) areas along the Seine or the Canal St Martin where one can relax as the water flows nearby. It's not quite as comfortable as lounging on the grass, but it is always nice to watch the ebb and flow of the Seine.

But if the concrete is too hard and the grassey spaces too infrequent, there are the numerous benches and chairs in the Luxembourg Gardens, the Tuileries, the Square du Vert-Galant on the Louvre end of the Ile de la Cite.

Not to mention the dozens of tiny green spaces which are dotted across Paris, all inviting in the warmer summer months.

But if you do decide to relax on the lawn, just watch out to make sure a dog (or more correctly, its owner) haven't left behind a small gift on the grass.

You too can speak French, in one easy blog post

2009-06-18T08:33:00.000-07:00

I spent a few hours today wandering around the ever more heavily touristed streets of central Paris. Ostensibly, I was in search of traces of Roman Paris, and sadly few of these exist today, but that is the subject of a future blog post. Either way, simply wandering around Paris on foot is always an enjoyable experience.

I found myself in the Ile de la Cite, around Cathedrale Notre-Dame de Paris, and also in the Left Bank around Boulevard St Germain and Boulevard St Michel and was a bit surprised (and frankly a bit disgusted) to hear several groups saying, in rather loud american accents "like, they can speak english, you know. They do it on purpose!".

Don't just assume that everyone throughout the world speaks english. You will be amazed how easy it is to make some minimal effort to learn some of the language ... the locals will appreciate it, and even if they still can't communicate with you in english, at least they can tell you as much, and you can understand, in their native language.

When travelling you are in a foreign country, after all, that includes a foreign language as well as foreign cultures, and surely that experience is a large part of the joy of and reason for travelling.

I firmly believe that anyone who has sufficient education to work and save enough money to travel to France (or have a rich enough daddy or mommy to pay for them to travel) can learn a small handful of phrases in french (or for that matter to learn some basic phrases for any country they travel to) which will make the stay that much easier and more enjoyable for everyone involved.

It's really not that hard to learn a few key phrases in the french language and to show some basic manners (such as being friendly) when travelling. I am continually amazed how rude some tourists can be.

As such, I have decided to post some key words and phrases here to help anyone considering visiting France but who has no french language skills.

Here you have a word or phrase in english; the equivalent word or phrase in french; and the phonetic spelling (i.e. how it is pronounced) in french:-

english = can you speak english?
french = parlez vous anglais?
sounds like = parley voo onglay?

english = thank you (very much)
french = merci (beaucoup)
sounds like = maresea (bokoo)

english = please
french = s'il vous plaît
sounds like = silvoo play

english = hello (daytime)
french = bonjour
sounds like = boenjooh (barely pronounce the "n")

english = hello (evening)
french = bonsoir
sounds like = boenswa (barely pronounce the "n")

english = goodbye
french = au revoir
sounds like = orvwa

english = excuse me
french = pardon
sounds like = pardonh (barely pronounce the "n")

english = yes
french = oui
sounds like = we

english = no
french = non
sounds like = non (barely pronounce the final "n")

english = can you repeat that (more slowly)(please)
french = pouvez vous repeter (plus lentiment)(si'l vous plaît)
sounds like = poovay voo repetay (ploo larnteemont)(sil voo play)

I hope those ten words and phrases are of some assistance to someone ... anyone.

A visit to Paris at least once in your life is quite an experience and one which I highly recommend.

Just try to learn the smallest amount of language before you do, or at least don't assume everyone speaks english.

Champagne and Reims

2009-06-15T11:54:00.000-07:00

Sunday was our 12th wedding anniversary, so it provided us with an excellent excuse (not that we really needed one) to spend a weekend in the largest town of the champagne region of France, Reims (pronounced to sound like France).
Reims is only a 40 minute TGV ride from Gare Paris Est and we spent over two days in the area travelling only by foot, walking around the town centre and to the two caves we visited, plus visiting several other tourist sites and enjoying the ambience of the town.

We arrived after 2pm on a very warm Saturday afternoon to find our hotel room, at the Best Western Paix Hotel in the centre of town, not yet available. They offered to store our two small bags in the interim and we ventured out to get a feel for the town. We quickly found ourselves gazing upon one of the most famous of the Gothic cathedrals of the Middle Ages, the glorious 13th century constructed Cathedral of Notre-Dame de Reims.

The cathedral itself is built upon another church built in the 5th century and recently roman ruins have been uncovered. It has suffered at the hands of man and nature, suffering immense damage at the hands of the Germans in the opening days of the first World War, it was also neglected for some time and has suffered several fires and natural disasters.

We slowly wandered through the cathedral and then made our way back to the hotel to finally check-in to our room, which had a lovely view towards the cathedral and over much of the town.

It was then time to walk up to Mumm for our first cellar cave visit and degustation. Because my french language skills are quite average, we decided to opt for the english tour of the Mumm caves.

This meant that we were treated to a couple of short videos in english (one at the beginning and yet another during the tour in the caves) and a guide who took us rather quickly, but certainly not impolitely, through some of the corridors of the Mumm cellars. It was a rather warm day and so the 30-odd minute walk through (only some) of the 25-odd kilometres in the chilly limestone caves at a depth of around 15 metres was rather enjoyable.

There was an interesting and informative overview of the process of making champagne, from grape variety and selection, what makes a Grand Cru or a vintage, through to the various aging options and requirements and the lengthy process of maturation and extraction of the sediment, followed by further fermentation until the champagne is eventually made available to the public.

This was our cue to make a beeline for the degustation room to taste two very nice Mumm champagnes, the Cordon Rouge and Cordon Rouge Vintage. We both prefered the vintage champagne and it gave us a nice little head-spin for our sunny early evening walk around Reims, visiting some of the roman ruins and enjoying the architecture and the ambience.

Sunday was our 12th wedding anniversary and the day we decided to visit the Pommery cellars. As we had already taken a tour in english the previous day, this time we requested a tour of the cellars and caves in french.

The french tour was lengthier, with no boring video to sit through. We wandered through the chilly caves for an hour or so. The Pommery cellars are also filled with contemporary art, which provided an interesting adjunct to the tour, which consisted of much of the same information as the tour the day before.

This time we were even deeper in the limestone subsoil beneath Reims at almost 30 metres and wandered through some of the 18 kilometres of caves, including some gallo-roman chalk pits.

Once again we were treated to a degustation at the end of the tour and this time chose and shared four different champagnes, "Blanc de Blancs", "Blanc de Noirs", "Brut Rosé" and the "Grand Cru".

We were also chatting with our tour guide and when we mentioned it was our 12th wedding anniversary that day she also gave us each a glass of their "Cuvée Louise" made from the vineyards of the jewels in the Champagne region and described as "an absolutely pure wine which quintessentially conveys the wine-making expertise of the Pommery champagne house".

They were all very nice indeed and after purchasing a bottle of their "Wintertime" / "Blanc de Noirs" we happily ambled through the streets of Reims, slowly making our way back to the hotel for a late afternoon swim.

This is a short video of one of the galley's contemporary art exhibitions which caught my attention, a room full of Les Paul guitars, Marshall amps, Electro Harmonix "Big Muff" distortion effects and lots of birds (and, sadly, lots of bird poo). But how cool!

Foucault's Pendulum at Musée des Arts et Métiers

2009-06-12T01:34:00.000-07:00

Foucault's Pendulum was was the first proof of the rotation of the earth, at a time when to say such things was still almost considered heresy, as the church historically believed that the earth sat at the centre of the universe.

The first public exhibition of a Foucault pendulum occured in February 1851 in the Meridian Room of the Paris Observatory.

It is named after the French physicist Léon Foucault, who conceived it as an experiment to visibly demonstrate the rotation of the Earth. The direction along which the pendulum swings rotates with time because of Earth's daily rotation.

In the short video I took at Musée des Arts et Métiers you can see the "wobble" as the pendulum swings.

Foucault's Pendulum is also the name of a very entertaining and educational novel by Umberto Eco which features the pendulum and also the old priory of Saint-Martin-des-Champs which is now part of the museum and is where the pendulum resides.

Free things to do in Paris (once a month)

2009-06-07T09:06:00.000-07:00

On the first Sunday of every month, many of the museums of Paris are open to the public for free ... what a great way to get a quick (or slow, if that's your fancy) hit of culture on the weekend.

So today we bundled ourselves out of doors beneath grey skies and wandered around The Marais for a bite of lunch followed by a taste of art and science.

As would be expected, we started with a L'as Du Fallafel ... bizarrely enough there wasn't a huge queue today, and they were as hot and yummy as always.

As we ate our vegetarian delicacy, we wandered slowly through the cordonned-off streets of The Marais up towards the Picasso Museum.

Every Sunday some of the central streets of many of the areas in Paris, such as The Marais, are blocked off to traffic so that pedestrians can freely wander the streets without fear of being run down. So we could eat our food and walk along the winding streets of the Marais only having to dodge the other people also walking around.

Musée Picasso houses a very interesting selection of the works created by Pablo Picasso, representing the projection of his career very well with many of the styles and mediums he worked with, including some of his more well known surrealist and cubist creations.

The building in which the Musée Picasso collection resides is a seventeenth-century hotel, the Hôtel Salé, built in 1656 and contains 203 paintings, 191 sculptures, 85 ceramics, and over 3000 drawings, engravings, and manuscripts in the museum. Even the building itself contained it's own majestic beauty.

We spent an hour or more wandering through these amazing creations. It is interesting to see just how many mediums Picasso worked in, including some pieces containing hessian cloth, or found objects, or sand sculptures, and just how many different ideas he had.

After that small taste of art culture we decided to wander up the road to the Musée des Arts et Métiers for a taste of science history.

I have been to this museum twice before, on previous visits to Paris, so the prospect of a free hour or two wandering through the museum with Elizabeth on a gently raining Sunday afternoon was a nice thought.

The Musée des Arts et Métiers resides in the old priory of Saint-Martin-des-Champs on rue Réaumur in the 3rd arrondissement only a short walk north of The Marais.

The museum contains over 40,000 objects including an original version of Foucault's Pendulum.

But it also contains the earliest scientific tools such as astrolabes; numerous weights and measures; the evolution of computers (from the abacus to Cray supercomputers and on to the first IBM and Apple desktop computers and smaller models), the evolution of the science of transport (from bikes to cars to satellites and mars landers); a history of communications and construction and much, much more ... all very interesting.

Perhaps the science nerdiness got too much for Elizabeth towards the end, plus she had some work waiting for her back at the apartment, but we both (well, maybe especially me) had an enjoyable afternoon. It was a fun, and virtually free, way to spend an overcast day.

Deerhoof V's Dan Deacon @ Villette Sonique

2009-06-06T07:48:00.000-07:00

We were out of Paris on another side trip to the UK for a few days and as a consequence missed most of the Villette Sonique festival, but we were back in Paris in time to catch the last day and to attended a couple of the sets of free music in the park.

We arrived on a warm spring afternoon to the guitar groove of Deerhoof skimming across the waters of Canal de l’Ourcq as we walked along the path between the canal and the Parc de la Villette.

It was a fun and uptempo set from Deerhoof which greeted us, but sadly it was also a very short performance, not helped by our long walk from the centre of the city following Canal St Martin up to Parc de la Villette on the outskirts of the north-east arrondissements of Paris. But we only missed the first 10 or 15 minutes of their set and it still seemed rather short. There was also a very large crowd, perhaps larger than expected? The PA was rattling as it tried to project the sound of Deerhoof across the audience and into the park below and behind us.

The spaces within Parc de la Villette were full of groups of friends and families enjoying the lovely warm day and listening to the sounds emanating from the various corners of the park. As I watched Deerhoof I could see a small group of men practicing martial arts on a park below, another couple were playing badminton, two children were playing soccer, numerous groups were stretched out on the grass (away from the performance but still within earshot) enjoying their food and drinks … it was all very nice.

As were Deerhoof. They did their best to advise the local punters, in French, when and where their next gig in France would be and they played a well received set with a couple of encores requested. They even played a cover version of Canned Heat's "Going Up The Country" which was a fun treat.

Dan Deacon was in many ways the opposite of this experience. The band were still setting up and doing their sound check, on a separate stage to Deerhoof, even after Deerhoof had played several encores and the audience had made the five or so minute walk between the two stages. I even had time to queue for a beer, and the queues were long and slow, although much better than the 30-40 minutes (literally) it took to buy a beer at the Jesus Lizard gig.

When the Dan Deacon ensemble sound check was finally completed, and we had made it closer to the stage, there were still long and specific requirements from Dan Deacon … all spoken unapologetically in English … for the audience to:-
i. all raise their hands
ii. all walk towards the tallest person in the audience
iii. all place their hands on the head of the person in front of them
iv. all turn to face the stage and walk towards it
v. all do something else very specific which had nothing to do with the band playing any music.

This was before they had even played their first song proper. It was a bit like being in kindergarten.

We were eventually treated to a very small number of quite fun tunes when all too soon it was time for Dan Deacon to get the audience (again, all in English, he even made a joke about the inabilities of Americans to converse in any language other than English) to:-
i. form a circle
ii. step back 5 steps to make the space within the circle bigger
iii. now step back 3 more steps to make it bigger still
iv. he chose two audience members
v. who were required to name their “dance team”

Finally the band started up again, and again it was a collection of fun, uptempo and dance based tunes which Elizabeth and I and the audience around us all enjoyed thoroughly.

Dan Deacon has a table full of some very cool toys and he seems to have fun playing with them. He is constantly manipulating his voice with some sort of vocoder, has a theremin-esque effect which squeaks and squeals, a number of delay and chorus effects … all very cool. He also has a huge band, who also seem to have a fun time. Plus there are two drummers, which is always a powerful live experience. In some ways it reminded me of Caribou.

But then it was time for a second dance contest … again there were intricate requirements:-
i. the audience had to form an obtuse triangle
ii. while standing only on their right foot
iii. unless they were on the right hand side of the stage, in which case they had to hop on their left foot
iv. while humming le Marseille
v. in the key of B# (not in the key of C)
vi. but if they were at the back of the crowd they had to stand on their head
vii. while whistling the keyboard refrain from Je T’aime Moi Non Plus

… I’d stopped paying attention to these overly specific and foolish directions by this stage … again all spoken in English, and again the audience seemed to take this in their stride, although there were ever growing cries to hear some more music.

Dan Deacon and his dozen dudes should have just played their fun tunes.

I started to wonder why the Deerhoof set was so short in comparison. They just played, tried to speak to the locals, and had a fun time. I’m sure Dan Deacon spent the same amount of time setting up and demanding the audience play kindergarten games (in machine gun fire English) as Deerfhoof were playing for.

But it was great fun to see some cool music on a warm spring afternoon in a park on the far edge of Paris.

We walked home along the canals which lead back to the centre of Paris and the Seine, watching the hundreds of people along the path enjoying their picnic dinners in groups large and small.

The weather is certainly getting better all the time.

Joyeux Anniversaire à Moi

2009-06-05T07:53:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was my birthday, celebrating 47 years of mostly enjoyable life experiences with only the occasional poignant moments, and also celebrating 22 years (almost to the day) since I started travelling the world.

For various reasons … accrued long service leave; a habit of converting all overtime into holidays rather than being paid in cash (and I work in IT, with mainframe computers, so there is lots of on-call and overtime to be worked, at times when everyone else is asleep or enjoying their weekends); regularly leaving jobs and taking extended periods of time off work; following my brilliant research academic wife on her research and conference tours of Europe and the USA … I have been leaving Australia and adventuring overseas for about two months every two years on average since I first got a taste of life overseas.

And it is this which I think is important in life and what I like to celebrate; seeing new people and places; experiencing (to some extent) other cultures; hopefully making new friends … I also love meeting old friends in other countries; seeing life from another perspective; wandering through different markets or architecture. So I like to travel and do so as often as I can.

It has been even better in recent years. This particular trip we are in Paris for 4.5 months and no longer have a permanent home in Australia. Last year we were in Los Angeles for 6 weeks, with the occasional side trip to Vancouver, Las Vegas or the Grand Canyon. We spent three months of the “summer” of 2007 (wetter than any of our winters in Australia) in Exeter which also included many side trips to Europe. Anyhoo, I digress.

So, what did I do to celebrate the (to others perhaps very scary) milestone of 47 years on this planet? I believe one should celebrate their birthdays, not necessarily with gifts or expenses, but with a joy de vivre and a search for experiences. But what did I do, you (the solitary reader of this blog) ask yet again? I went to the third largest “green space” (i.e. the third most heavily wooded, I would stop short of calling it a “park”) in Paris, which also happens to be a place for the dead … Père Lachaise cemetery.

Don’t read anything into my visiting a cemetery to celebrate my birthday, I have visited many cemeteries around the world, including the three main cemeteries in Paris (Père Lachaise, Montparnasse and Montmartre) and still plan to revisit Montparnasse Cemetery where Serge Gainsbourg (amongst one or two others) is buried. I enjoy wandering through and looking at many of the ancient structures these cemeteries offer. Père Lachaise particularly contains some very gothic tombs and statuary.

We started the day with a late breakfast of a half bottle of very fancy French champagne, a selection of patisseries and some lovely fresh fruit. Our journey across Paris was on foot, we walked the few kilometres from the 4th arrondissement in the centre of Paris where we live, through the 11th arrondissement which contains the Bastille and up to the 20th arrondissement which Père Lachaise dominates.

Père Lachaise cemetery was created in 1803 and contains 47 hectares of hillside consisting of trees, tombs, wreaths, roses, gravestones, gravel, cobbled paths and crows. It contains the remains (or tombs) of personages such as the famous doomed lovers Héloise & Abélard (currently under repair); artists such as Amedeo Modigliani, Max Ernst, Camille Pissaro and Eugène Delacroix; performers including Edith Piaf, Frédéric Chopin, Sarah Bernhardt, Maria Callas; the writers Marcel Proust, Molière, Honore de Balzac, Colette … and for the English speakers amongst the ruins, the remains of Oscar Wilde and Jim Morrison.

I first visited Père Lachaise on my first visit to Paris in 1987. At that time my best mate and I were driving across Europe and we met up in Paris for a few days with two of our closest friends, who were on a separate world tour. Together the four of us celebrated our world travels with a picnic lunch in a quiet corner of the cemetery with Dr Ant Ritti.

Today I was celebrating with my darling wife, and as fate often decrees with the coincidences of life, on our wanderings off the cobble-stoned paths (as is my want) we stumbled across an area which was vaguely familiar and contained the remains of Dr Ant Ritti. An interesting coincidence indeed considering the fact that Père Lachaise cemetery shelters the remains of some 70,000 “people”.

The cemetery is still in use today, and apart from the groups of mourners attending to their own recently departed, the largest number of visitors in any one location were tourists who flocked to the (now fenced off) grave of Jim Morrison.

I had a wonderful warm spring day ambling through the ancient tombs, many decorated with rose bushes wafting sweet scents. Five hours later we walked home through Paris again, taking a different route this time, stopping for a very nice millefeuille at one of the nicest patisseries in Paris, Lenòtre.

They are two of my favourite things to do in Paris, taste the patisseries and bread products and to just walk the streets of Paris … and always along a different path.

The Jesus Lizard V's Sunn O))) V's Men Without Pants @ Villette Sonique

2009-05-31T04:08:00.000-07:00

Villette Sonique is an annual music event in Paris aimed showcasing new and old Rock, Pop and Electro artists ... this blurb is from their website

Will Future in music pass by a return to primitive instincts? These days, everybody speaks about tribalism, tropicalism and the new sound sensations quest. Villette Sonique 2009 takes place right in this mutation with a line up out of the usual musical boundaries. Following a breathtaking 2008 edition with rare bands performing amazing concerts (Devo, Shellac, Throbbing Gristle), this year’s leitmotiv is an unstoppable metronome.

We caught the opening night in the Grand Halle which was a bit of a rock all-sorts evening.

Men Without Pants were playing as we arrived, purported to be a "supergroup" composed of Dan The Automater (Gorillaz) and Russel Simmins (Jon Spencer Blues Explosion).

The live band only featured Russel Simmins. I love JSBX, they are a favourite live experience (especially when Jon Spencer is on fire with his "Elvis meets Jerry Lee via the bastard soul of a satanically possessed southern preacher man" persona) but Men Without Pants had none of that attitude. Simmins is a great drummer, but there were only a few interesting songs, and there was little interaction with the crowd. Russel Simins just walked off stage as soon as he had finished drumming for the last track without even acknowledging the crowd, or the rest of the group who were still doing their thing. They certainly weren't a supergroup, go and see Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.

I have seen Sunn O))) before and know what to expect from their performance ... lots of extremely distorted, slowly strummed, heavily sustained chords, lots of smoke and the sartorial splendour of a medieval monk. That was exactly what we got.

Tonight SUNN O))) were performing The GrimmRobe Demos, but to my ears it wasn't that different to the gig I saw in Brisbane when they were touring Altar, an album they recorded and toured with Boris.

There was much smoke, much raised fists and slow punching of the air, much slow sustained, distorted chords, much more smoke, much holding guitars aloft to increase the grace bestowed upon them by their god of sustained, distorted chords, much more smoke ... and robes with hoods.

Sunn O))) are a bit of a joke for me ... a Jim Carrey type of joke with only one facet; he pulls "funny" faces; they play slowly strummed, heavily sustained, majorly distorted chords. I get it. It is a physical as well as aural experience. I get it.

If you haven't seen Sunn O))) before, here's a short video which will give you some idea (apart from the volume level and it's physical impact ... that sort of crapped out on my small digital camera).

I like their guitar sound but after 15 minutes it gets a bit repetitive. And they have the stage presence of watching a fire without the flame. There was even some booing after the set finished, although there were many fans with fists aloft at the front of the stage who seemed (un)happy enough.

Then The Jesus Lizard took to the stage as a part of their current reunion tour. Opening with a diatribe on the crappiness of the first two bands, they proceeded to tear the venue apart.

There was much stage diving, crowd surfing and spitting, and that was just from front man David Yow ... the audience joined in too. The power and energy from the stage was palpable.

Microphones were destroyed, kids kept invading the stage, sweat, spit and beer covered the stage, bodies leapt and were passed over one another, and still the music threatened and pounded.

The Jesus Lizard were the saving band of the night. Go and see them on their reunion tour.

Pierre Henry @ Théâtre de la Cité Internationale

2009-05-24T11:59:00.000-07:00

Almost a month ago we were lucky enough to see one of the elder statesmen of electronic and experimental music in France, Pierre Henry, performing live at a six night spectacular of music and dance celebrating his amazing creations at Théâtre de la Cité Internationale.

Pierre Henry was possibly the first formally educated musician to devote his energies to the (then) newly evolving electronic medium. He was a member of the first group responsible for the development of musique concrète, one which often utilises "found sounds" and "synthesised sounds" rather than traditional instruments or voices and it does not necessarily contain elements traditionally thought of as 'musical', such as melody, harmony or rhythm.

At the event there were two dance performances using music created by Pierre Henry, but I'm not a big fan of dance so won't say very much about this. The man himself, assisted by Bernadete Mangin, played pieces which - over the six nights - spanned his career from 1950 until 2006.

For his performance, Pierre Henry was assisted to the front row of the audience, also facing the stage. On the dark stage there were a large collection of different speakers all facing towards the artist and the audience.

The room was darkened and (for our night) found sounds, creaking doors and windows, entered from the speakers on stage and surrounding the audience. We were then treated to an hour of electronic squeeks and belches, found sounds and synthesised stabs. It was great fun to see such a master at work.

Among his best known works is the experimental 1967 album Messe pour le temps présent, one of several co-operations with choreographer Maurice Béjart, which features the popular track "Psyché Rock."

But I can safely say that Pierre Henry's best-known influence on contemporary popular culture is via the theme song of the TV series Futurama . The tune is inspired by / a tribute to / ripped off from (choose your own position) Henry's 1967 composition "Psyché Rock".

Il Fait Beau

2009-05-22T13:29:00.000-07:00

It seems to have been months in coming, but the last few days in Paris have been lovely. The sun is constantly shining, and even warm. In fact there has been lots of sunshine all day long.

Not that even the cooler or wet days (of which there have been plenty since we arrived in March) would keep me inside for too long, most days I like to just wander around Paris for at least a few hours (as I have already mentioned). And many days would have a few fine hours here and there, you just had to choose your moments and occasionally travel with an umbrella.

But now that the weather is improving we are also able to sit out on the grass (without getting wet bums from the aforementioned rain).

So there are now more nice locations to do my french study in .. in the absence of the language school I've been enrolled in providing any quality tuition lately ... but that's another story which I hope has a happier ending than the one which currently seems to be suggested.

And with daylight savings implemented even the nights are still day.

On the daylight savings front, I was very disappointed to see that a recent referendum in my home state of Western Australia voted against implementing daylight savings, yet again. It seems most people in WA want to live in the past.

Anyhoo ... daylight savings in Paris has enabled us to spend much time outside into the evening.

So we can take our meals outside, and with a short stroll from the apartment down to the Seine we can join the hundreds of others eating, drinking, chatting and singing along the waters edge.

I'm sure as spring morphs into summer over the remaining two months we have left in Paris that there will be much more of this. Woo Hoo!

La Nuit Des Musees

2009-05-19T10:33:00.000-07:00

This post could also be titled "Free things to do in Paris once a year".

Saturday night was La Nuits Des Musees when most of the museums of Paris, and museums in many other european cities, open their doors for free from 7pm until midnight or 1am.

Unfortunately we also had a friend in town that weekend, so it was a balance between spending some time with them (as you do, there's nothing quite like spending time with friends in foreign cities) and visiting some museums.

We all met up at a bar in Beauborg and walked along the Seine to the Musee D'Orsay, a former train station in Paris.

Musee D'Orsay is a relatively small museum which we hoped wouldn't have too many people queued up to enter, and it also contains a good mix of (mainly french) art created between 1848 and 1914. But unfortunately our friend began tiring quite early, so after an hour or so we wandered off to dinner.

After dinner we left our friend to head home and we wandered off to see something a bit different at Musée du Moyen Âge which houses a collection of important medieval artifacts including sculptures, works of gold, ivory, tapestries (including the The Lady and the Unicorn tapestries), antique furnishings, and illuminated manuscripts.

It was interesting and very welcome to be queueing at 11pm at night, surrounded by a large number of 20-something year olds all seemingly excited about visiting the museum. In Australia I can only imagine such queues for a sporting event, and at 11pm one would expect such people to be queuing for a night club.

The building which houses the collection is the Hôtel de Cluny, constructed around 1334 (on the remains of Gallo-Roman baths dating from the third century) and the former town house (hôtel) of the abbots of Cluny. It is quite possibly the finest example still standing of medieval architecture in Paris.

I was also wanting to visit the Musée des arts et métiers to witness Foucault's Pendulum doing it's thing at midnight in the room made famous in Umberto Eco's novel called Foucault's Pendulum, but sadly we ran out of time.

But what a great idea, keeping museums open until (after) midnight, and for free!

Je Suis Un Flâneur

2009-05-18T09:45:00.000-07:00

I love walking around Paris, it is undoubtedly one of my favourite things to do here, especially when there is so much time to just enjoy the sights; the architecture, the people, the markets, the gardens, the public buildings, the churches and museums ... the history and culture.

Many days I will spend anywhere between 3 and 6 hours simply walking around Paris, the time just flies. As such I could be considered a flâneur.

One of the advantages of living in the 4th arrondissement is that one is in the centre of Paris, and because Paris is such a flat city it is very easy to walk everywhere within the peripherique.

Along the Seine is a favourite destination, starting near Hotel De Ville, walking along the Seine, where in many places you can get right down next to the water or stay up on the streets with the bouquinistes, past the Louvre and back to the Jardin des Plantes and finally back home.

There is a tourist boat which traverses a similar route, but I don't know how much it costs and I really don't know why domestic and international tourists want to be herded like sheep (i.e. both crammed in and blindly led) ... and charged for the "pleasure", especially along a route they can easily walk?

I also enjoy a gentle stroll along the tamer waters of Canal St Martin, and again there is a slow boat through the same waters, spending much time waiting at each of the locks.

But it is just as much fun to blindly wander the streets of Paris with no destination in mind, turning down whichever street interests me and seeing where that leads.

Recently on just such an amble with Elizabeth we wandered into the the Jardins du Palais-Royal where we stumbled across the public exhibition Mur De Berlin celebrating the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.

We also spent some time listening to a talented orchestra playing many of the classics on the square at Place Colette.

I have recently started having some english <> french conversations with Elizabeth's french tutor Jean-Pierre. Jean-Pierre wants to improve his english for an upcoming holiday in New York and I obviously want to improve my french, so it is a win <> win situation for us both.

Some of these language exchanges are conducted sitting around in the small apartment Elizabeth has rented for our 4.5 months in Paris, but for others Jean-Piere and I wander the streets chatting in both english and french to help improve our skills. The other day we wandered through the streets of Belleville.

Jean-Pierre is also a talented and avid photographer and you can see his impressions of our wanderings here. Jean-Pierre has taken many very interesting photos, so take a good look around this site for some of his creations.

Paris V's London

2009-05-10T09:02:00.001-07:00

It seems a little unfair to try to compare these two very disparate cities, but I can comment on my different experiences on this trip.

First up, in this modern day and age of travel, is the availability of wifi. When we began travelling with laptops in 2000 there was no wifi available in either Paris or London, but at least there were a large number of internet cafes in London. It was seemingly impossible to find an internet cafe in Paris then, with only a handful scattered through the city.

But as time moved on the availability of wifi in Paris has escalated dramatically, both "unprotected" wifi floating out of apartments as well as official free wifi sites around the city. There is very good wifi available at Centre Georges Pompidou, at several parks along the seine and throughout the city of Paris.

London, on the other hand, still has plenty of internet cafes available, and the occasional unprotected wifi connection available throughout the city or in some coffee houses, but London has very little in the way of official, free wifi apart from in the British Library. Even many of the cafes which "provide" wifi do so at exhorbitant prices.

Go Paris! I am even writing this blog entry using the free wifi at the Centre George Pompidou.

Next up I will look at museums and galleries. Both cities have very famous museums and galleries, much filled during their rampant years raping and pillaging other countries in the name of power and colonisation. Both have amazing collections from over the centuries and millenia, at times when the two "countries" were little more than a small collection of villages, if even that.

The museums in Paris are open to the public for free on the first Sunday of every month, whereas many of the museums in London are open for free, or for a nominal "donation", every day of the week. In London this means one can spend only an hour or two walking around looking at amazing history or art, in between visits to the pub, or the shops, or whatever else takes your fancy.

Go London, I especially like the Tate Modern Gallery and the British Museum.

Next up is pub/cafe culture, and this one especially comes down to my personal preference. The cafes of Paris are usually filled from morning to night with people drinking coffee, pastis, wine, beer .... it seems to be a part of their culture, and very civilised at that.

In London many of the cafes are the usual chains seen around the world, with people drinking milkshake sized (and tasting?) coffees from paper cups ... it makes me shudder. But London has some of the best beers in the world. I have a preference for their "hand pulled" real ales and no day when I am in the UK goes by without me indulging in one or two, and often many more, pints of real ale. Usually with some stodgy food thrown in.

But I must say that in the last 10 or so years the quality of food in British pubs has improved immensely. And the prices in London are much cheaper in general than those in Paris.

As far as food for vegetarians goes, French food has (always had) very little in the way of choice whereas in London there is a (slowly) growing amount of options, especially the vegie sausages available in many of the pubs over recent years. But Paris does provide an amazing selection of good quality fresh fruit and vegetables in their various markets and supermarkets.

Both cities have very interesting and enjoyable river walks, with both the Thames and the Seine flanked by colossal buildings celebrating the might and power of their nations, with a number of bridges dedicated to the pedestrian. With the Thames winding through historic old London and the Seine constantly moving around several islands in the inner city of old Paris I am unable to choose a preference here, enjoying the river walks in both cities.

As far as canal walks go, I much prefer strolling along the Canal St Martin than the occasionally difficult to find Regents Canal in London, which is often a bit more "industrial".

The architecture is unique in both cities, especially a walk around the old areas with their tiny winding roads and small buildings. And I like the fact that both cities have not been inundated with skyscrapers, although the introduction of new laws in Paris may see that change in the (not too distant?) future.

Paris recently introduced the velib, bicycles available on the street to all with a credit card and a few euros. Although the bike paths could be greatly improved, it is dangerous riding on the Paris strets with drivers not looking what they are doing, but it is still a wonderful initiative to see and it is soon to spread outside of the city. There are a number of these located outside our apartment and most days there are technicians checking the bikes are in the best possible condition, and with the Voie Georges Pompidou street along the Seine open to the public every Sunday, there are always hundreds of people using the velibs.

So it looks like I will have to be comfortable on the fence and agree that there are many aspects of both cities that I enjoy.

Hommage to Alvin Lucier @ Saint Merry

2009-05-08T05:57:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday there was a very interesting music/performance/science experiment at Saint Merri, this time celebrating Alvin Lucier.

Two pieces were presented, Music for Solo Performer (from 1965) which is a performance for enormously amplified brain waves and percussion and Music on a Long Thin Wire (from 1977) which is a sound installation for audio oscillator and electronic monochord.

Alvin Lucier was an american composer and music professor who was most famous for his more experimental compositions. His performances were sonic science experiments as much as musical experiences, often creating relatively simple sounds and allowing them to forge a life of their own within the performance space.

The prelude to Music for Solo Performer was as entertaining, and almost as long, as the performance itself. The audience arrived for the scheduled start of the evening's performance and were treated to the artists still preparing the event, with a selection of percussion instruments spread across the stage.

Each of these was to be triggered by EEG electrodes attached to an artist's scalp (which we also witnessed being applied). The EEG machine (lent to the performers for the evening by a local hospital) detected bursts of alpha waves generated when the wired artist achieves a meditative, non-visual brain state. These alpha waves are then amplified and the resulting electrical signal is used to vibrate the various percussion instruments distributed around the performance space.

It really was as much a piece of science and theatre as a musical performance, with the rattling of plastic, metal, wood and water attached to or spread across the other end of the EEG machine creating something more akin to a clatter than anything resembling rhythm or melody, but it was a much appreciated and very entertaining performance which I enjoyed immensely.

It was then time for the artists to clear the percussion instruments and EEG machine from the stage and to set up the next piece. But this provided an opportunity to wander through Saint Merry, with only the distant glow of the lights from the stage and the nearby candles with the early evening light filtering through the stained glass windows.

For the performance of Music on a Long Thin Wire a 50(?) foot length of wire was strung across a section of the church and activated by an amplified oscillator and magnets on either end, producing changing overtones and sounds. The wave of the tone created was changing quite subtley during the performance and as we moved around the cavernous space of Saint Merry the quality of the sounds changed further.

As the artist adjusted the modulation settings on his effect pedal, and also fully stabilised the slightly off-balance table to which one end of the wire was attached, this in turn impacted the tonal quality of the single note being generated. This note continued to feed off itself within the various cavernous areas of the large church.

It was another very interesting performance at the beautiful Saint Merry, but sadly we had a very early start the next morning as we had to catch the eurostar to London.

May Day

2009-05-03T11:29:00.000-07:00

Friday was May Day in Paris, considered to be one of France's most important public holidays, it is a time to celebrate the worker and to stand up for their rights. This is especially pertinent during the current global "crisis" ... when many people are losing their jobs across France and the Sarkozy government is trying to force through many unpopular reforms.

Across France on May Day 2009 there were estimated to be more than one million people protesting, whereas last year May Day marches across France only drew an estimated 100 000 - 200 000 people.

The rallies in France followed months of protests and strikes, including the ongoing strike at Hotel de Ville, and even a couple of "boss-nappings" where workers angry over job cuts held some managers hostage in an attempt to win concessions.

The atmosphere for the May Day march in Paris was a mix of celebration and seriousness. There were children in prams, parents, professors and pensioners protesting. The closest comparison I could think of to this type of congregation in Australia is the Sydney Mardi Gras (although much, much bigger, both in terms of the number of people taking part as well as in what they are saying).

Many of the streets which are often full of international and domestic tourists were full of people shouting and carrying placards.

Also sometimes it was difficult to work out which people were the protestors taking part in the demonstration and which were those on the streets supporting them.

Not all of the protestors represented local politics, there were also representatives from other countries supporting the cause.

We joined the march for a section of the walk in solidarity for what the were marching for and in our conern for what is happening to the average worker across the world.

There were many people wearing stickers labelled "Rêve Gènèrale", a play on the french word "grève" which is to strike, and "rêve", which is to dream. May their dreams and the dreams of all of the workers become a sustainable reality.

La ronde des obstinés tourne toujours!

2009-04-28T13:48:00.000-07:00

There has been an ongoing protest outside the Hôtel de Ville by the universities of Paris, a circular march being undertaken 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, since late February. Often there are only a handful of marchers present, always walking in their circle, but they are always there, undertaking their unique form of protest.

There have also been several other strikes in protest of the Sarkozy government’s planned reforms, specifically to the universities and hospitals.

Today there were widespread protests by students and lectures and the hospitals.

There is an article and some interesting comments from the Guardian here.

Today, as I walked home in the rain, I followed a group of marchers who made their way across the Ile De La Cite (which contains many of Paris' government buildings) to the Hôtel de Ville, where they joined the largest group of protestors I have seen there.

Within only a few minutes the first van loads of police arrived, perhaps a dozen or more vans in a loud convoy, and surrounded the square outside Hôtel de Ville. The protestors had spread and the circle was taking up much of the square. More police vans were seen to circle to other areas very close by.

As I observed what was happening a researcher from one of the universities who was walking in the circle started to explain why they were protesting and asked me to join them.

He explained, as we walked in the growing circle, that the circular protest of the stubborn, the "La ronde des obstinés" was in response to the reforms which are being forced upon the universities and hospitals.

Some of the universities were no longer holding classes, although at the university where he worked they were still holding classes and grading the student’s papers, but not providing that information to the university administration. However, his monologue was repeatedly broken by the ever growing presence of the police.

He also explained that there had been several occasions in recent times when police had detained protestors, although not yet in Paris. Apparently this is the most unsettled the university system ... this includes students, teachers, researchers and the administrative staff ... have been since the infamous May 1968 riots.

Eventually the police presence grew too much for him and the researcher decided to break from the circle to ask the police why they were there.

I remained walking in the circle for a short while longer then also broke to take some more photographs. At this time the riot squad turned up with their perspex shields and tear gas. The police presence now almost equalled the protestors, but everyone maintained their place, the protestors walking their eternal circle around the square, the police in line surrounding it and all was relatively peaceful apart from the occasional jeer from the protestors.

Eventually the police who arrived initially withdrew, leaving only the riot police surrounding the square. After an hour and a half I also withdrew and continued my journey home.

This is one of the things I like about the French, they stand up for what they believe in, day and night if necessary. The last public action in Brisbane which I participated in was to protest the invasion of Iraq and the war which followed. The first protest was attended by approximately ten thousand people, but the Australian government chose to send troops regardless of public opinion. The next public protest in Brisbane was attended by only several hundred.

As the La ronde des obstinés tourne toujours, I’m sure they will be there tomorrow. If you want to see them in action, you can watch on this web cam

Music at Saint Merri, Beaubourg

2009-04-26T11:58:00.001-07:00

Saint Merri is a beautiful Gothic church less than a minutes walk from our apartment.

The current church was built between 1500 and 1550, although it stands on the site of a church built in the 13th century. In fact the bell tower houses the oldest bell in Paris, cast in 1331 which survived the destruction wrought upon Paris during the French Revolution.

But not only is this a beautiful church to wander through and wonder at, it also provides numerous, regular musical performances within its Gothic architecture. This weekend I attended two very different performances.

Friday night saw Ensemble La Balcon perform a number of interesting and experimental pieces using traditional instruments (violin, piano) and mixing the natural music, via the use of synthesised effects, with treated sounds. The set included an original composition and interpretations of pieces by Arturo Corrales, Arnold Schoenberg and Karlheinz Stockhausen. It was a very interesting and enjoyable performance.

Today I was treated to a wonderful performance of Bach's Suite Number 1 for Unaccompanied Cello by Delphine Biron. The timbre of the cello echoed throughout the spacious, and well attended, church. It was very haunting and appropriate for the space.

It is one of the many nice things about living in the centre of Paris that such wonderful cultural experiences are literally just a few steps away.

Kandinksy and Calder @ Centre Georges Pompidou

2009-04-19T12:53:00.000-07:00

It was a wet and cold afternoon, not a great day for wandering the streets of Paris, and it had also been a couple of weeks since we last visited an art gallery ... so, seeing as it is only a stones throw away from the apartment, we made a dash into the always interesting Centre Georges Pompidou.

The Pompidou Centre itself is a glorious postmodern structure, most famously recognised by the structures, escalaters and colour-coded pipes which are mounted on the exterior of the building. It also has a huge open area in the front which is often filled with people watching the various buskers, or the other people.

As well as presenting live theatre and music, and housing a huge library and cinemas, the Pompidou Centre also has two amazing permanent collections. Although the contemporary collection is closed until the end of May the modern collection is still open and it features artists such as Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque, Vassili Kandinsky, Francis Picabia, Marcel Duchamp, Salvador Dalí, Max Ernst, René Magritte, Alberto Giacometti, Andy Warhol .... and many, many more.

But our visit was to see two of the "temporary" exhibitions, Alexander Calder and Vassili Kandinsky

The Vassili Kandinsky exhibition is a joint project between the Centre Pompidou, the Städtische Galerie in Lenbachhaus in Munich and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, which hold the largest collections of the artist's works.

It presents a hundred of Kandinsky's finished (and two unfinished) paintings and provides an interesting overview of an artist considered to be one of the 20th century's key figures; both a celebrated painter and a published art theorist, Kandinsky is credited with painting the first modern abstract works.

Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky was born in Moscow in 1866 under the Czar, received a doctorate in law in Moscow then moved to Munich to study art. He returned to Moscow in 1914 and was in Russia during World War I and the Russian Revolution. Kandinksy returned to Germany in 1921 where he taught at the Bauhaus school of art and architecture when it opened in 1922 until the Nazis closed it in 1933. He then moved to France where he lived the rest of his life, he died in 1944 in Neuilly-sur Seine.

From his early watercolours and impressionistic works, not worlds away from the well known works of Claude Monet, through to the Russian-influenced folk art, celebrating his childhood and heartland and the creation and development of his abstract style, it was a very interesting and enjoyable exhibition with many large paintings.

Many of the works, especially the earlier ones created during the development of his abstract style, have meaningless titles such as "Improvisation" (Kandinsky's spontaneous paintings) and "Compositions" (his more elaborate works). For me this lack of definition only added to the abstractness of the pieces. It was a most enjoyable couple of hours, many of the pieces were like jazz music ... wild, with structure but also freedom; colours and space; busy and loose; complex and simple.

At a completely different level, the exhibition Alexander Calder Les années parisiennes (The Parisian years), 1926-1933, was much lighter and playful.

A "transatlantic" artist, Alexander "Sandy" Calder was born in America in 1898 and this exhibition concentrated on his "wire art" creations, including works depicting animals and the heads (and in a couple of instances the entire bodies) of famous personalities of the period (including 4 representations of Josephine Baker); his home made circus, including animals and performers, and also presents Calder's development of the mobile; it was a whimsical exhibition.

Calder is best known in France for the large mobiles and stabiles of painted metal exhibited in French cities and parks.

The exhibition presented many original works (no longer in motion) but in conjunction also presented many films and photographs showing the objects (in most cases circus performers and animals he created, often from found and recycled objects) being operated by Calder himself. As Elizabeth whispered to me during one of the film screenings, it was a bit "Miss Haversham-esque" to see a man, by the time the films were recorded more than 20 years later, playing with a toy circus he had created so many years earlier.

Calder created numerous little animals of bent metal, clowns and acrobats, ingeneous home made toys ... he is being celebrated as an artist as an inspired DIYer. A man who took base materials and primitive mechanisms and transformed them into true sculpture.

It was a much less cerebal exhibition than Kandinksy. After these two visits we spent an hour or so wandering through the amazing collection of modern art, but 5 or so hours later our heads were overflowing with amazing abstract art and it was time to leave.

I may even be tempted to put up with the huge crowds on a first Sunday of the month, when most of the museums in Paris, including the Georges Pompidou Centre, are open to the public free of charge, to wander through Kandinsky's amazing representation of the world one more time.

Comme un lapin dans des phares de voiture

2009-04-18T07:32:00.000-07:00

That means "like a rabbit in the car headlights" and that is what it can often be like living in a foreign city.

Every now and again I feel comfortable with my language (in)abilities. I can usually negotiate the day to day activities ... buying baguette; visiting the supermarket; going to galleries; looking around the various music stores ... where the questions and responses tend to be the same ... one of your traditional baguettes please, and also a citron tart; i would like to buy these supplies; two tickets please; no thanks, i'm just looking ...

There are also those "just too late" moments when you realise, having walked out of an establishment .... "Oh, that's what they said to me". These are all learning moments and the next time (or perhaps the time after) when that phrase is presented I have heard it before and know the correct (or at least a) response.

But every now and again something happens and I fell like a rabbit staring into the headlights of an oncoming vehicle ... unable to understand what is happening, unable to respond or move. After all, I am meant to be an adult. Surely adults can converse with one another.

Apparently not in all cases.

This happened in class last week. It isn't quite tourist season yet and at Lutece Langue, the school where I am studying french, they placed me in a class which was above my level of knowledge and experience and in which I managed to understand and speak in during the first week. This was certainly preferable to starting with others with no french language experience. At least I've studied some french, albeit only for a year, in Australia, 5 years ago.

Unfortunately the second week was a completely different matter, they jumped into passe compose (not particularly difficult, but like anything you must learn it to know it) and the other students had already learnt these rules. Even after hearing the taped conversation played through twice ... and the tutor and the other students read out the text ... I still didn't know what was happening. I didn't know the rules to write down the correct answers. My eyes grew wider, my head grew ever more confused and then it seemed to just shut down.

The school were really good about this and we found a solution where I dropped into a lower class with a level of french more suited to my experience. This class started this week, as more students are slowly arriving, and I am finding it easier to understand while still learning lots of french. The school is also meant to be holding free conversation classes, but again due to the limited number of students this hasn't started yet. Hopefully next week, and I am looking forward to these sessions which will enable me to converse in and listen more to the french language.

And hopefully next time when someone says something to me in a format I haven't heard before, I may just have enough knowledge to understand, respond appropriately, and maybe even continue the conversation somewhat.

But I won't get too far ahead of myself just yet. Hopefully far enough to stay out of the way of moving traffic though.

Joyeuses Pâques

2009-04-12T10:51:00.000-07:00

Today is easter Sunday, so in the french manner I wish everyone a "Joyeuses Pâques".

It was another lovely day in Paris, not yet warm but not too cold, sort of short sleeve shirt with jacket on / jacket off weather, as we took our walk along the Seine as we do every Sunday. It is particularly nice because Voie Georges Pompidou, which runs parrallel to the river, is closed to traffic on Sundays and is open for pedestrians, joggers, cyclists and skaters. It is a lovely walk right beside the Seine and today, while families across Paris were celebrating at home together, it seemed as if we had the road to ourselves.

In Paris for the last couple of weeks there have been amazing displays in the chocolatier's shop front windows celebrating easter. Along with the tradition, shared across the globe, of chocolate eggs, chickens and rabbits, there are also chocolate fish, bells, ducks ... all in numerous shapes, sizes and varieties of chocolate (dark, milk, white, orange and with such a variety of fillings and centres in the chocolate) ... it's all so good.

When we went for our walk it was surprising to see that the large amount of chocolates available for sale yesterday were already gone. There was still enough for our requirements though. There are also a large variety of cakes available for easter.

Easter is also the traditional time for celebrating the start of spring, so we spent some time wandering along Rue Du Rivoli buying chocolate and lovely, fresh spring vegetables for our evening meal. Asparagus are becoming more plentiful and are fat and rich in flavour, we bought some plump broad beans and peas and the tomatoes come in so many varieties and colours it's always hard to choose.

The chocolate we bought from several shops, wanting to taste the variety, but we bought all of the vegies from Primeur du Marais, our favourite verger in Paris. Not only do they have a large selection of always fresh and ripe fruit and vegetables, some which we've never seen before, but they include the little things in their service, like paying attention when they're packing and ensuring the tender vegetables aren't squashed. Sometimes it's the little things that count.

We also bought a bottle of Bourgogne, so have our own little feast this evening.

Is it time for dessert yet?

I love the taste of fallafel in the afternoon

2009-04-11T09:58:00.000-07:00

One of the (numerous) nice things i like about where we are living in Paris is the proximity to Rue Des Rosiers in the Marais, which is only a 5-10 minute leisurely stroll away. This street, in a Jewish corner of the Marais, contains a large number of very nice take away (and eat in) cafe/restaurants with a heavy eastern european influence.

L'as Du Fallafel is undoubtedly my a favourite eatery on Rue Des Rosiers, I've had a fallafel from there every week since arriving. There is always a queue of people on the street outside, with ticket in hand, waiting for their take away meal and on weekends I don't even bother, the queues are so huge, spilling all over the (virtualy pedestrian) street. I'm on holidays, so can go there any time during the week.

It is quite a culinary experience ... pita bread over-loaded with grated lightly pickled red cabbage, freshly deep fried garlicky chickpea balls (and lots of them), warm fried eggplant, creamy hummus ... and don't forget the sauce piquant. The pita is so full of these edible goodies that you are required to eat at least half of it with a plastic fork before attempting to eat the remainder with the bread. MMMMMM .... thinking about this makes me want one RIGHT NOW!!!

But I had already become a creature of habit, to only eat fallafel from the same eatery every week. So last week I decided to try fallafel from another cafe, Chez Marianne.

Chez Marianne is a well respected restaurant in the Marais which we intended visiting for a meal one evening. Everything looked the same as at L'as Du Fallafel, the grated salad, the eggplant, the chickpea balls ... but what went wrong??

To start with ... the service, which made the always brisk (but also always busy) service at L'as Du Fallafel seem Michelin-starred in comparison. Then everything including the fried eggplant and chickpea balls was COLD?! It all tasted wrong, the salad even seemed soggy and was so bad we both threw most of it away rather than eat it. It seemed like such a waste, but it was that bad!

Needless to say we no longer intend visiting the restaurant at Chez Marianne, if they can't even make fallafel I don't want to try any of their more adventurous dishes.

And next week I will be getting my fellafel fix where I know the food is good, L'as Du Fallafel.

Bruxelles Sonic 2009 @ la Maison des métallos

2009-04-10T08:56:00.001-07:00

Bruxelles Sonic 2009 was billed as a night celebrating the Belgian electronique and Post-Rock music scene.

We arrived at la Maison des métallos early enough to wander around listening to the "environment sonore" created by Jerome Deuson, which was on a constant loop for the entire evening, and to wander around the various spaces of the venue.

The event proper began with The Aktivistv and Natalia De Mello, an audiovisual performance par excellence. The stage was completely darkened and an off key banjo/guitar sample skewed and slewed through the darkened room. A light clicked on a desk, and in turn on the screen behind the stage, and we were introduced to the audiovisual component of the set.

In real-time (apart from some minutes of pre-recorded video) Natalia De Mello manipulated her collection of items on the table including magnets and metal objects, compact discs, pen and paper to create stunning images which were projected onto the screen behind them. The accompanying soundscape was an interesting blend of organic samples and subtle electronica and the music and visuals worked very well together.

It was a mesmerising experience, childlike yet evocative. Undoubtedly the highlight of the evening. Bravo!

Next up was Christophe Bailleau who played a very dance-based set slightly reminiscent of Fuck Buttons but without being quite so manic and without their groovy old suitcase of toys.

With a DVD of his own images playing on the screen behind him, Christophe worked with a repeated layer of techno beat over which he manipulated sounds from what appeared to be an ipod, and something which sounded like a theremin, messing with the frequencies and throwing in additional sampled sounds to augment the underlying dance beat. Great fun even if no one in the audience was dancing.

The last band for the evening were aMute, which I expected to be the post-rock segment of the evening, as the first two acts fell firmly into the electronic genre. But the band leant more towards bland euro-indie and nowhere near post-rock, with no instrumental tracks. Their sound also didn't really suit the first two performances.

They also seemed to have sound troubles, with lots of feedback early in the set which never helps. But some were their own problems, such as not switching on the effect manipulating the vocals. If you're gonna have a lot of toys you need to know how to use them guys. It was kind of distracting.

So sadly it really wasn't my thing, a little bit psychadelic, a little bit melodramatic, and there seemed to be some wierd dynamics between the band members. The set included some nice guitar work, a great drummer, but a little too much posturing without the substance to back it. Although they can obviously play, I'm use to Aussie bands who, when they rock out, they really kick some ass. But aMute are apparently very sucessful, so kudos to them.

For me, the night belonged to The Aktivistv and Natalia De Mello.

La Pyramide du Louvre a 20 ans

2009-04-09T14:22:00.000-07:00

This week the Louvre are celebrating the 20th anniversary of the infamous glass pyramid designed by I.M. Pei.

I spent an hour or so tonight at the free public exhibition by american conceptual artist Jenny Holzer, who created Xenon projections of texts by the artist to light up the pyramid and the Louvre’s facade.

If you're in Paris at the moment, tomorrow night (Friday April 10th) is your last chance to see this work on such a grand canvas.

Mono and One Second Riot at Glazart

2009-04-06T09:41:00.001-07:00

Glaz’art is a groovy music space in the 19th arrondissement (north east corner of Paris) which features all types of music but on Friday March 27 it presented a night of Post Rock and Noise. It is a small and skinny venue, and was very crowded on this cold Parisien evening, so securing a standing position with a view of the stage was very difficult.

One Second Riot are a two piece from Lyon, France who create one hell of a fun noise, consisting of drums and bass/vocals/synthesizer, plus a nice collection of movie soundtrack samples. They played a great collection of songs occasionally leaning towards the post rock, instrumental direction but with their sound more rooted in noise and punk. Quite disconcertingly, and unexpectedly, most tracks had english lyrics, as were the filmtrack samples which were played to complement the music.

With the bass player mixing it up between creating looped sounds from his (often distorted) Rickenbacker bass and creating blips and washes from his synth (or visa versa) and screaming and singing, it was a noisy, uptempo set and a great first rock band to see in Paris.

I enjoyed One Second Riot enough to buy their CD.

Mono are a favourite band who we last caught in Brisbane. They have been in hibernation for the last year working on the new album which they have just released and are currently touring in support of, Hymn to the Immortal Wind. Much of the set came from this album.

It was a tough gig for the band and for some of the audience. Unlike the event we attended at 104, which was very civilized, Glaz’art is a music venue not too dissimilar to the pubs I usually see bands in back home, and this can encourage all sorts of people.

Tonight there was a growing babble of noise from the bar at the back of the venue and a group of dickheads were constantly talking loudly throughout the entire gig, while standing quite close to the stage, and despite everyone around them trying to shush them, they didn’t give a shit and even seemed to enjoy this fact.

I don’t know if the band were aware of this, if they were they ignored it and put on a huge and long show.

When I last saw Mono in Brisbane in August 2007 it was a very *rock* performance with much (albeit controlled) posturing and gesturing, but tonight the boys playing guitar spent most of the evening seated. I’m not sure if this was because they were in the early phases of playing the new album and found this more comfortable, or to enable access to their effect pedals to tweak the delayed and sustained sounds, or what. But in the confined space of Glaz’art it made the difficult viewing even harder.

But luckily Mono are all about the music, and what cavernous music they played. Moving from moments of gentle guitar or piano so subtle they couldn’t be heard over the inane chatter of the dickheads nearby to thunderous delay on delay on delayed guitar with riotous drum and bass creating a sound to wake the gods.

After playing a number of new tracks the boys arose to play a few older tunes, to the huge approval of the crowd, and some rock posturing and gesturing ensued.

The gig seemed to end far too early, although it must have been close to a two hour set, and as is my want I bought the Mono t-shirt in celebration of my first favourite gig in Paris.

Then it was back onto the metro and back to Chatelet and our apartment, on the journey watching the Friday night revellers stagger around the metro stations en route or through the streets surrounding Tour St Jacques and around our neighbourhood.

Je Ne Parle Pas Beaucoup Francais

2009-04-04T10:28:00.000-07:00

In an attempt to converse that much better (or, in fact, at all) with the locals, I started french lessons this week. I'm studying at Lutece Langue, a school aimed more at adults than many of the other language schools in Paris, which seem to be directed towards college students. Plus it's also only a couple of minutes walk from our apartment.

I last studied french in Brisbane about 5 years ago, for about a year, and much (most?) of that tuition was conducted in english. As one would expect, the best way to learn french is to only speak french and that is how the school is operating here. As such I am experiencing many "rabbit in the headlights" type moments, the ears are hearing sounds which the brain expects to be able to understand, but it's not quite there yet, some form of mild *panic* sets in ... the brain continues to whirl and the eyes grow ever wider.

There are only 4 other students in the group, from Japan, the USA and Australia and we're all at various levels of "beginner" and can only improve. The school also runs conversational groups which will be investigated soon in an attempt to speak (and understand) more and more french.

The weather in Paris is also starting to improve and so I spent some time during the week studying in the sun in the courtyard of the Centre Georges Pompidou. I hadn't realised just how many groups of tourists congregated in this space, along with the domestic tourists, although the prevalence of buskers does imply this fact At least I was only hit up for money once during my private study session in the sun.

It was also an attempt to get some sun to help kill off the lurgy which has been haunting me since I arrived. 5 hour walks in the chill air along the Canal St Martin or the Seine wearing inappropriate clothing are a nice way to pass 3 or 4 hours, but they obviously don't help to get rid of colds. Neither does standing in a chill wind blowing through an open doorway of a hot music venue so we can see Mono play (more on that gig soon).

But daylight savings has started here, so the days are getting *longer*, and the weather is improving every week.

All we have to look forward to is spring time in Paris (printemps à Paris ... c'est bon!).

Giorgio De Chirico

2009-04-02T09:37:00.000-07:00

We've made our first gallery visit, spending a couple of hours wandering through the 170 paintings, sculptures and graphic works which represent some of the life work of Giorgio de Chirico. The exhibition "La Fabrique des Rêves" is being shown at the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris.

De Chirico is best known for the paintings he produced in the earliest stages of his career, between 1909 and 1919, known as his metaphysical period. This was undoubtedly my favourite part of the exhibition. This period screams loneliness, isolation, confusion.

There are empty squares in late afternoon sun, populated only by reclining sculptures, or occasionally tiny silhouetted figures in the distance with shadows stretching languidly, dominated by slightly askew architecture and arches while steam trains or sailboats move silently in the distance. Some of these later metaphysical paintings also included faceless mannequins, also occasionally located in lonely piazzas.

During this phase de Chirico was a darling of the surrealists, but not too long after WWI his style followed more classical influences and he fell out of favour with the surrealists and was even loudly ridiculed by some of them.

If you're interested in seeing some of de Chirico's art, check it out here.

Something I found interesting about de Chirico's later period was his willingness to revisit and repaint the famous themes, even straight out reproductions, of his earliest, most celebrated works. This was years before Andy Warhol, a spoken admirer, would recreate his own works repeatedly. There is also a Warhol retrospective currently running in Paris, although we caught the wonderful Warhol exhibition at GOMA in Brisbane last year.

These Giorgio de Chirico "reproductions" made up the majority of the paintings exhibited in the last room (along with a collection of rather bizarre self portraits, many in period costumes) and you could sense that there was no passion on these later reproduced works ... less despair, more haste. De Chirico was said to become a self-quoter, repainting his early works repeatedly, sometimes containing inaccurate dates, and shamelessly announcing at one point that money was his aim. I'm sure Dali also would have been proud.

This is the first Giorgio de Chirico retrospective in Paris in more than 25 years, and it was a fun way to spend an afternoon, wandering through "dreamlike metaphysical fantasies, with their eerily empty city squares and faceless mannequins ... precursors of the Surrealist movement of the early 1920s."

Nous Somme Ici

2009-04-01T11:24:00.000-07:00

I thought as good a place as any to start blogging about this Paris adventure is to show where we're living, which is only a few minutes walk to either the Centre Georges Pompidou which always has interesting temporary exhibitions and a permanent exhibition which we haven't yet revisited; the administrative life of Hôtel de Ville with it's regularly changing public events in the square out the front; the huge metro and RER station and shops of Châtelet; the antiquity and the gaeity of the Marais and to the Seine where we have already spent many hours walking.

Look for the A on the map above and you'll get an idea of where our district of Beauborg is located.

Due to the time it has taken to get the internet set up at our apartment, the next week or two's worth of posts will be travelling back and forwards in time as I fill in the gaps of what has happened and what is happening.

We have already started finding our old and discovering new favourite places to shop for fresh produce and to experience life here and this will be discussed further in future posts.

à bientôt

Philip Jeck and KK Null @ 104

2009-03-30T12:14:00.000-07:00

This blog is ostensibly an alternative to my music blogg Something Old, Something New which will provide me with a space to discuss my likes, thoughts and experiences while living in Paris for 4 and a half months.

But one of the things I enjoy doing anywhere is attending music events, which is one of the very first things we did upon arriving in Paris, so without any further delay here's my first post on this new blog.

104 (centre quatre) was built in 1894 and for a hundred years was used as a funeral house in the north east of Paris. In a rather well publicised redevelopment the building was converted into a public art space in the 19eme and now consists of numerous studios and performance halls which opened in 2008.

Only a day after arriving in Paris we discovered that Philip Jeck and KK Null, amongst others, were to play free gigs there as a part of the Présences électronique 2009 festival.

First up on a late Friday afternoon was a “Concert couché” with Philip Jeck. It was a fun and slightly wierd set with much vinyl sampling and manipulating mixed with a collection of electronic washes, blips and scrapes. From our viewing position on the floor in the dark there was little to see, but that was the idea and the sounds created a world of their own.

Philip Jeck works with old turntables, a couple of Casio SK1’s, mixers, delay effect pedals and more to create his unique sonic spaces.

We arrived too late on the Sunday night to gain admittance to the hall for prolific noise artist KK Null’s performance, not knowing seats could be reserved on the internet, nor even having internet access, but we could still sit outside the performance space and watch the man at work on the video screen.

KK Null has released over 100 albums in the last quarter of a century, propelling him to the forefront of experimental music around the world.

Unlike the laptop based performances by which preceded it, by KK Null used a couple of mini synthesisers (I couldn’t tell what they were from the video projection) to create his wall of noise and mayhem. Even outside via the smaller speakers in the space where we viewed the show you could sense the power of the music.

Both shows were a great introduction to our visit to Paris and we look forward to many more musical performances over the next few months.

If you are in Paris and are aware of any shows we may want to attend (check out Something Old, Something New to see what interests me), please leave a comment and let us know.