Monday July 12

Day 3 Lundi July 12
Because the weather forecast for the day was scattered thunderstorms we decided to spend most the day at Pompidou Center. Neither MaryAnn nor I had ever been to its collection of modern art. I’ve always been put off by the Center’s architecture which looks like some kind of horrific child’s toy. It is about 10 stories tall with the floors reached through escalators that go through clear plastic tunnels. The modern art collection is actually spectacular and traces art from post-impressionists, through cubism, to very abstract modern art. My favorites were the many Matisse, Modigliani, and Picasso’s.

There was also a very interesting special exhibit titled “Dreamland” with the theme on amusement parks starting with early World’s Fairs up through Las Vegas and Dubai. Quite interesting. One of the most eye-catching parts showed some of the showgirls of the World’s Fairs and it was quite obvious that a lot of this could actually be categorized as pornography.


In walking back to our hotel in the Marai we went through the old Jewish quarter. It is apparently much smaller than it once was but still seems vibrant. There were quite a few bookstores with books in Hebrew, Jewish delis, etc. Quite a few people walking past us wore Hasidic clothing and hair styles.

We tried to visit the Jewish Museum but got there too late in the day.

On our way back to the hotel we stopped at the same sidewalk café for a glass of wine – this is becoming our routine! And there were the same Montreal foursome that we’d met the day before. We joined them and had a fun time sharing our adventures from the day. Of the four, one speaks very good English. A second one thinks he doesn’t speak that well in English but we think he does. The other man and woman speak very little English. Of course MaryAnn and I, despite taking Level 1 and Level 2 French at Alliance Francaise in San Francisco aren’t very good. We can count, know the days of the week, can order at a restaurant but we are truly limited if you actually want to have a conversation. Despite this, using our limited vocabularies, lots of sign language, we had really had fun. They said they were staying in Paris for their whole trip here. We then bid them farewell sure that this would be the last time we’d see them. Not so however, we saw them everyday – at the same place – the corner café at the end of the day.

For dinner we walked to Place du Voges where we had seen a number of interesting looking restaurants. The setting is really beautiful – my picture won’t do it justice. There is a beautiful park in the middle surrounded with identical buildings that are unique in their architecture.

Unfortunately the restaurant we selected had, without a doubt, the worst service I’ve encountered on this trip. When our waiter came to take our order, he literally looked straight up at the ceiling when we told him what we wanted. We had to ask him for his attention numerous times. When the food came it was sort of thrown at us. Very strange. The people at the next table got up and left before their food came. The other odd thing was that the food was actually excellent. It was a very strange place.