Day 7: Monday, April 28, Paris

Remember pizza and kebabs from Australia/NZ? Guess what we found today.

This morning we got a fresh baguette. We had gotten them regularly, but usually in the evening to eat with dinner. This one was soft and perfect. I’ve decided that baguettes are sort of like manna – we tried to keep one over night and the next day it was so hard that giving it to the birds would be cruel.

Today we started at… a department store. It was the first department store in Paris, winning market share with a very “high volume, low price” proposition (sound familiar?). Today, however, it was a home to every name brand (including some that I hadn’t seen in person, such as Zegna and Hermes). Parisian women must take their handbags seriously, because about a quarter of a floor was devoted to Prada, Louis Vuitton, and other bag-heavy labels. In the men’s section you could even by expensive brand-name helmets for your Vespa. Next door is a grocery that goes along with the department store. It’s like a Central Market, but fancier and more expensive. Everything epicurean is housed here, including “Bling H20” for E23 per 400 ml bottle.

Modernity isn't always better than antiquity.

Next we went back to the Louvre to see a smattering of what we had missed. They had a display of modern art by a Dutch guy going on in the middle of the Dutch 1600’s art. In the rooms of old and generally dark paintings they had the most bizarre displays of skulls, body parts sprouting eyes, etc. all in vivid and clashing colors. It was quite ugly, but it provided a great comparison/contrast to the old art next to it.

Iff the picture isn't strange enough, the odd thing about this picture is not the dog poo, it's the fact that someone bothered to thoroughly put out their cigarette.

I feel very sorry for the dogs in Paris. Lots of people have dogs, but Paris has almost no green space outside of designated parks. Even trees have little grates over their roots. The result is that you have to watch your step because you regularly have to dodge dog do. There are also very few public restrooms and almost zero drinking fountains (even in museums, etc.)