Bon Weekend Parisienne

There is nothing like spending a weekend with old friends like Monet, Raphael, DaVinci, Caravaggio and Praxiteles and new friends like Laurel Rory Mitchell. This weekend commenced Friday morning with a rendez-vous in the Marais with Sunni and Laurel to get falafels and explore. Suffice to say, best falafels of my life...see explanation below. After a long walk along rue de Rivoli past the Hotel de Ville, the Louvre and Notre Dame in the distance, we wandered into Musée de l'Orangerie. Knowing in advance that it housed Monet's "Water Lilies" I enjoyed their glory and was wonderfully calmed by their presence, but one of the best things about Paris? There is always a famous piece of art lurking around the corner. We continued to explore the museum further and found that it houses the majority of the high impressionist painters like Renoir, Matisse, Cezanne, Picasso the list goes on and on. Among them, one of my favorite impressionist works, "Deux Filles au Piano" by Renoir


After a wonderful day of culture, I joined Laurel and her visiting parents that evening for dinner at La Gare. A train station turned restaurant located in the 16th Arrondissment of Paris. The building itself was a joy to behold. In the summer, the ceiling opens up so the patrons can dine "en pleine aire". The food was delicious as well.

Saturday poured rain all day long without stopping. Thus, I started the day off with a gym visit, some shopping and then lazing around the house. Helene has commenced to calling me one of three things: the most common is "la grande sportive" considering I am the only one of the two of us who works out. The next to are interchangeable: cuckoo or ma belle. I like ma belle, but I cannot speak to the reason for cuckoo.

Sunday, I woke up and headed to the Louvre toute-seule. The bus that stops right outside of our apartment goes straight to the Louvre so it is a very easy trip. My French student ID gets me into virtually any museum for free so I just spent my morning exploring the first of three wings of the Louvre. I could never have imagined the immense size of this museum. I decided to start with the most popular of the three because it wasn't crowded. This wing of the Louvre holds the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo, the Louvre two most famous works. However, upon mounting the stairs I was greeted by a lovely surprise. Never had I known that the Louvre houses my second favorite sculpture the Nike of Samothrace (only second to the Artemision Zeus, housed in Athens). It was a grand surprise.


I was also pleasantly surprised by the Mona Lisa. I have heard for so long that it is unexciting, even ugly in person; Small and dark. It, however, is not as small as people have made it out to be. She is quite lovely actually. If it hadn't been surrounded by a crowd, I would have lingered in front of it longer. I could have spent hours wandering around the museum, but Laurel pulled me back to reality for tea at Ladurée. I think this is something everyone should experience once in their life. Simply exquisite pastries, with actual flavor, a rare occurrence is works of art. It's sort of like disneyland for tea, but so much fun.

Notable Meals:
Friday-
Lunch: Shwarma and Falafel (we all split) at L'As du Falafel. There are no words, just the best of everything
Dinner at La Gare
-Pumpkin soup over baby greens with parmesan/prosciutto crouton. Great flavor, could have been a bit hotter
-Barbet over roasted chestnuts in a spinach puree with sauteed chanterelles. Ethereal
-Chocolate cake with banana caramel ice cream and a homemade marshmallow. Marshmallow was amazing, dessert was trumped by another dessert. Mirabelle and pear crumble.

Sunday:
Helene made chili and cornbread! And a truly delicious chili and cornbread at that. Super spicy with nice big chunks of bell pepper and kidney beans.