Parisians Shop in Their Underwear (Not Online!)

A couple of days ago, the French sales started.  The French sales.  Apparently, vendors are only allowed to have sales between the end of June and mid-August, approximately.  I'm not going to attempt to fathom the "reason" behind this rule, law, or whatever it is.  This is a huge deal here on the news, like Black Friday in America, with news channels showing people in line waiting for the big sale.  I  actually saw more people than normal walking home with lots of shopping bags that day.  

So, what does shopping in your underwear have to do with all this?  And I don't mean online shopping.  One store here had a brilliant marketing plan: the first 100 customers who come to the store wearing only underwear will get free clothes, and admission to an exclusive "underwear party" to be held Saturday night on a boat on the Seine.  You can imagine how much free publicity they got.

http://www.metronews.fr/conso/soldes-2013-tous-a-poil-pour-desigual/mmfz!dnAtPjMk18qU/

French Smokers Don't...

When French smokers finish a cigarette, they toss them on the ground, and they don't step on them to put them out.  They just toss burning butts aside without a thought.  This is completely normal here and happens all the time.  Little smoking cigarettes butts lying on the ground a while after the smoker has walked away.  As an American, I can't help but think "What would Smokey the Bear say?"

 

Quick Hop to Vienna

Jennifer had to go to Vienna for work, so we added the weekend before as a quick trip.  We had some great 'eis caffe' - tall glass of cold coffee with two small scoops of vanilla ice cream in the coffee, and whipped cream on top.  Wish they had those in Paris!

Another delight we had was a lychee prosecco that the Bangkok Thai Restaurant gave us at the end of our meal.  I've never tasted anything quite like it.  Although I generally don't appreciate champagne or prosecco, I loved this.  I'm not sure if it was a cocktail they mixed up there, or came in a bottle.  I should have asked!

A few pics from random doorways around town.

This style of a column in the shape of a person (a caryatid) is all over Vienna.  This is one of the best in my opinion (actually one of a pair).  Most of the others are very muscular and nearly naked men, which made me wonder about the orientation of the emperor or emperors.

And now for something strange and gross.  A forty foot tall fountain monument in the middle of one of the main pedestrian roads of the old town commemorates the end of a plague.  This little scene is center front of the whole monument.  Look carefully, it's very strange.   Have you ever seen a cherub committing murder before?  Or sagging, wrinkled breasts on a sculpture?

View of Stephansdom, the cathedral of Vienna.  The black is from a hundred years of burning coal.  They're gradually sandblasting it back to its original white color, section by section.  

We had to get a workout to get this photo.  Up about 180 feet in a tiny spiral stone stairwell with few windows.  And then you're only about half of the way to the top of the biggest tower.  So, you can imagine how tall this tower is.  Stephansdom is famous for this tile pattern on the roof.  

Interior of one of the many baroque churches in Vienna.

Below is Votivekirche.  I love the two matching towers of pure white stone.  The front of this church would be the best photo angle, but it's obscured by a 75-foot tall Samsung 4S advertisement.  The massive advertisement covers up the scaffolds put in place to scour off the soot.  I'd love to come back and see Votivekirch when it's all white.  It's my favorite, despite Stephansdom being more famous, bigger, and more important.

More Silliness Speaking French

Another miserably failed attempt at speaking French the other night at our neighborhood Taiwanese restaurant.  Around 9 on a Friday evening, plenty of light still in the sky, we were sitting at a nice outside table and we'd ordered our entrees and received our wine.  Our waiter was a slight, middle-aged bumbler who seemed like he might be the husband, filling in for a waiter that called in sick.  He seemed nervous and confused.

When we'd ordered, we'd asked for a carafe d'eau (carafe of water), but there was no carafe when he brought the wine.  The next time we saw him, we asked again.  This time, he brought the carafe, but no glasses.  We thought this was kind of funny.

He clearly didn't speak any English, so, I summoned up some classic Rosetta Stone French - "Nous avons besoin de"  ('We have need of', or just 'We need'), but then neither of us could think of the word for glass.  So, I got the sentence all prepared in my head.  Next time he came by, I said "Nous avons besoin de 'glasses'", pronouncing the "glasses" with an exaggerated a-sound, like in cat or bat, and with a bit of a question mark on it to indicate I knew it wasn't the right word.  About ten minutes later, the waiter came by with no glasses for our water, but he did bring us a bowl with ice cubes in it.  We were a bit puzzled, but we thanked him.  By then, we'd remembered that "glass" is "verre", so we told him we needed glasses again, using the correct word this time.  As he walked away, our attention went back to the bowl of ice.  No other French restaurants had brought us a bowl of ice cubes.  We wondered why he would bring us this bowl.  Finally it dawned on us, when I said we need "glasses", he heard we need "glaces", i.e., ''ices."

Weird smoker thing

I was sitting at one of only two tables of the little boulangerie (bakery) down the block from our apartment, having my poulet (chicken curry) sandwich and typing away on my computer, when a guy walked up to the shop door right in front of me, bent over and put something on the ground, then stepped into the shop.  My laptop screen and a chair blocked my view, so I thought he was throwing something away.  A few minutes later, the guy walks out of the shop and down the street with a bag in his hand.  Anyway, about 30 seconds later, he comes back, leans over, and picks something up from the same spot.  It had actually been on the edge of the marble floor of the shop, just a few inches above street level.  It was his lit cigarette, which he promptly put in his mouth.

The question is, would you consider this to be thrifty and resourceful, or just gross?

Luxembourg and Trier, Germany

Last weekend, we did a quick tour around Luxembourg and Trier, Germany.  The trip got off to a rough start.  This will be humor at my expense, so be kind!  I had to get the train by myself.  First time since we've been living here.  Well, I had to get up at 6 AM to get there in time, so I was already not in my right mind!  One of many excuses.  Anyway, I took the two metro lines and got off at the train station, Gare de L'Est, and headed to my train.  My ticket said Luxembourg, 8:40, car 13, seat 52.  So, I needed to find the track number.  I looked on the screen and saw track 4, headed over there, where there was one train waiting, found my car and my seat and sat down.  I happily emailed Jennifer from my phone: 'On the train!' A little while later, as the train started moving, I looked at my phone's clock.  8:25.  I instantly knew something was terribly wrong.  A train never leaves 15 minutes early!  So, I asked to guy next to me "Luxembourg!?", and he sort of nodded, then said, "Strausbourg."  !@#$&%  Holy #*$*$ !   So, I hopped over him, grabbed my bag and started making my way up the train.

In the very next car were two nice rail officials sitting in a sort of office-cabin thing.  I breathlessly showed the young woman my ticket and said 'I'm on the wrong train!'  She took a look at my ticket, raised her eyebrows, grinned, and said, 'Yes.'  'Are there any stops?!' , 'No', 'How can I get to Luxembourg from Strausbourg?'  She pulled out her special pocket train computer and figured a route in less than a minute. 'You'll take a train to Metz and change to a train to Luxembourg.  You'll get in four hours later and it will cost 37 euros.'  Ah, well, worse things could happen than having a 2 hour trip turn into a 6 hour trip!

My only guess as to how I managed to mess this up is that every platform has two sides, and there was only one train on this platform.  Maybe my train wasn't even there yet?  Who knows.  :)  Anyway, I used the mobile phone most of the way, and was able to read and write email, as well as read my copy of Don Quixote, so I was relatively content.  (Oh yeah, did I mention that I'm reading Don Quixote on my mobile phone?!  I highly recommend reading books on smart phones and reading Don Quixote, which is totally hilarious.  Amazing humor can travel that far in time.)

Here's a picture of the train station I was never supposed to see.  It's cool how they've added this modern exterior glass and steel shell to the old train station building.

It's kinda grey and dim because, as it has been almost every day for the last several weeks, it was raining.

The next morning, we hit the road with our rental car and drove north from Luxembourg City in sunny (!), cool weather, through lush green hills, farm land with fields of solid bright yellow, and quaint little towns.

Our destination was a huge restored castle called Vianden.  It was used by the Counts of Vianden for about 500 years, built up from around 1100 to 1600, then fell apart for a few centuries when castles went out of style.  In the 70's and 80's, used drawings from those years to restore it in the 70's and 80's.  Now, it's where they take all the visiting dignitaries, and film some movies.  There was one made by John Malkovich and one with Patrick Swayze.

Some cool armor in the castle.  Must have been a pretty rich and powerful owner.  

Queen of the castle.

'

Later that day, we passed through the Ardennes and stopped at a museum about World War II.  It had a lot of interesting stuff, including tobacco cans, rifles, maps, tank shells, photos of all the officers on both sides for the Battle of the Bulge, and manikins with every variety of  American and German uniform.   There was one spooky thing that really caught my eye:

The name on the box is "Gasbettchen", which means "Gas Crib", in German.

Next day, it was off to Trier, Germany.  This was the center of power for the entire western half of the Roman empire around 250-300.  That included what is now France, Spain, and Germany.  And that was only the western half!  They left behind an incredibly highly sophisticated city, of which only a little is preserved.  That 'little' includes a five story high city gate, a reception hall about 250 feet long by 80 feet wide by 100 feet tall, an amphitheater, and a massive barracks for 1000 troops and their horses.  There's a model in the museum that shows how the city was when it was at its peak: surrounded by a wall with four huge gates and hundreds of two-story stone and plaster houses with courtyards on straight roads laid out in a grid.  Incredibly modern looking.

After lunch at a cafe, we also went to the Trier museum, which has one of the best collections of huge Roman mosaics.  They have several that are about 20' x 20'.  I think they used to be floors of wealthy Roman's houses.  This one and some others used a motif of different colored ropes twisted together.  Love it.

The facial features are a little crude, but it's pieces of stone, what do you expect!?

This one is a masterpiece.  It's about 20 feet high.  It's mesmerizing.  

They also have "recently-built" churches in Trier (only 500 years ago or so).

We were able to make it back to Luxembourg City from Trier in under an hour and hop our TGV home to Paris that night.  This time, Jennifer made sure I got on the right train.  :)

Bob L'eponge

We stopped off at a cafe for a drink and just to sit down, after walking around for an hour or so.  We'd picked up a free magazine from FUSAC ( originally France USA Contacts).  Inside, Jennifer found a puzzle.  The challenge was to map names of characters from American culture to the names they are known as in France.  In France, Spongebob Squarepants is called Bob L'eponge', pronounced  "Bob Lay-poange."  We couldn't stop laughing and saying "Bob lay-poange! Bob lay-poange!"