Le Weekend

 You might think that people on holidays would cease to make any distinctions between weekdays and weekends, and that might be true on a cruise ship or resort, but if you want to move with the vibes of the culture to which you hope to become enculturated, you have to note 'la différence'. And so, on Saturday morning, nous avons fait la grasse matinée (sleep-ins in France sound so much more elegant), and started our day by wandering down to one of our two favourite boulangeries to indulge in our favourite patisseries.

You may recognize the Bonne Maman jam!

My chosen butter-chocolate-and-sugar bomb is the cruffin (top right). Believe it or not, like Butter Chicken's relationship to India , this delicacy was not created in France or even a former French colony, and certainly not by a French pastry chef. Oh la la! It took an Australian with a very English name, Kate Reid (who did actually study croissant making en France) who took the croissant dough and shaped it like a muffin and then, the pièce de résistance, filled it with a sinfully rich chocolate filling. It is to die for, and will likely speed me in that direction.

So having had a thoroughly French Saturday morning, we decided to go where French people are bound to be happy. And on a sunny day, that is either in a park or along the Seine. We chose the latter, but not before getting a better perspective on perhaps the most famous French icon in the world.

Views never before captured on camera!

Well, at least these two are unique

Having seen the Eiffel Tower from every which way but the top (we climbed it in 2005 - my knees have a long memory), we then wandered along the left bank of the Seine as far as the Musée d'Orsay before jumping on a bus to take us home for a welcome rest, and then headed out to catch the action at our local cemetery.

Sartre and Beauvoir attract a lot of loving graffiti 

(much of it Korean, it seems)

After much humming and hawing about what church to attend the next day we went with the big guns and took in a stirring organ concert by  (check out this excerpt: video - a croissant to anyone who can name the tune) at Saint Sulpice at 10 am followed by the mass. 

While digging around in the various chapels of the church, I happened upon a poster advertising a free symphony concert at a church just up the street from us featuring Beethoven's 5th - talk about iconic.  Although Catherine's facial expression suggested to me that she had misgivings about the quality of the ensemble (she has a nose (ear?) for such things), I couldn't resist the economical virtues of the event and, after all, you can't go wrong with Beethoven.  What's more, it would add a further church to our growing roster of churches visited.

The church hosting the concert was Notre Dame du Travail, and as it name suggests, it was built for the industrial workers who made up the majority of the population of Plaisance, the name given to the area around Gare de l'Ouest (renamed Gare Montparnasse). Interestingly, it was being built at the same time as preparations were being made for the Paris Exposition in 1900 (including, if you remember from my last blog entry, the Gare Orleans, Quai d'Orsay). What is distinctive about the structure of the church is the use of a steel framework to support the roof. The concert was enjoyable for the enthusiasm of the performers, featuring a talented young tympanist and a squeaking French horn.

As the sun was still shining when we emerged - humming dun dun dun DUN - we decided to faire un promenade which took us back through the cemetery, where I spotted a few unique grave markers, and then happened upon a tiny park named after artist Yves Klein. Klein is partly famous as the inventor of the colour International Klein Blue, which raises the philosophical question - Sartre might have helped me with this one - of whether one can truly invent a colour. Not only were the benches blue, but so was the flowering tree.  

Trying to understand Sartre, no doubt

Will the real Klein Blue please stand up

We ended up approaching our favourite park, le Jardin du Luxembourg, this time from the south, where there is a slew of statues, which didn't slow down the game of football the children were playing on the grass.

A version of this one is prominently displayed at the Musée d'Orsay (sans les chevaux)

I couldn't figure out whether the statue was the goal or merely the goal post

Good to see Canada represented on the pond, 

but our boat  progressed slowly, perhaps weighed down by tariffs

As the sun began to dip behind the blooming chestnut trees that predominate in the park, we reluctantly tore ourselves from our pondside seats and made our way back to our apartment, with our heads metaphorically turned au jardin, wishing le weekend, and Paris, would never end.