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April 14, 2008
Paris: Episode Five
In this episode the Paris Chroniclers will take you through Père Lachaise cemetery, and Tim’s risking of life and limb to take that one perfect picture.
Joanna: Père Lachaise—what atmosphere! A haunting place. So many of the monuments and crypts were works of art unto themselves.
A panorama of moss-covered stone everywhere you looked. The sun would shine on the ironwork on a tomb and create strange shadows on the graves next to it. Little paths and nooks to explore, a gothic feeling emanating from the rows of tombs, mysterious epitaphs and inscriptions on the graves, ornate ironwork, weaving and criss-crossing, and best of all—more amazing stained glass!
Stained glass and iron and stone in such a variety of designs.
We visited graves of some of our favorite musicians and writers, like the novelist Marcel Proust, singer Edith Piaf, composers Frederic Chopin and Georges Bizet (Carmen), playwright Oscar Wilde, and Medieval-love-letter-writers Abelard and Heloise.
Ironically, some of those graves were among the more plain and ordinary ones! Of course we saw Jim Morrison’s grave. We came across a British Doors fan with long hair and Jim’s face plastered on his T-shirt. He and his “da” were walking with a map impatiently trying to find The Grave.
We followed him and soon saw a crowd of Doors fans gawking at the small gravestone. Not all that much to see. We ended our visit by stopping at Chopin’s grave to have a little picnic.
Tim: Now for the more juicy part. Guess what?!? I got my ears boxed by a fuzzy freak! We found a long street market on Rue Menilmontant near the Menilmontant Metro station and started exploring it. Talk about an international street fair! We saw everyone and everything! And close up! It was so crowded that it was impossible to walk without constantly bumping into people. We passed fishmongers, fruitmongers, spicemongers (and every other kind of monger), clothing of all styles, incense, you name it.
Things were going along just fine until I saw a café called “Le Metro” with a cool sign. Little did I know that this would cause me some considerable trouble. As I stopped to take a photo of the café, this large, swarthy man took an interest in me. Before I knew it, he was yelling in my face, shaking me by the collar and venting a copious amount of spleen and displeasure at me. In my confused state, I said “I don’t speak English!” when I meant to say “I don’t speak French!”. Silly me. Soon another guy came between us and the fuzzy, freaky guy started to calm down. He sent me on my way with a friendly neighborhood shove and I gathered up Joanna and got out of there. Whew! I was so thankful it wasn’t worse. He was big enough to pulverize me if he wanted to!
Anyway, we got out of there and ducked into the Belleville Metro station. Yikes! Egad! Sacre bleu!
Paris , Paris Chronicles , adventures & travels | By Tim and Jo | 11:52 AM
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