Thursday 20 January 2011

Le Marais: Part 1

I work in the Marais. It's sad how easily you can get accustomed to the most interesting circumstances, and often when I'm trudging up the Rue de Poitou at 7.55am in the darkness I don't exactly appreciate how incredibly lucky I am to work in this particular area of Paris. So yesterday after work I wandered around the area taking photos like the perpetual tourist I am. It was sunny and I wandered around listening to Carla Bruni (I cannot believe this woman is married to the President)... I love living here.

The Marais is narrow, winding streets and buildings of honey-coloured stone. It has lots of hotels particuliers, which were built as homes for aristocrats in the 16th and 17th centuries. They are typically like small mansions with large interior courtyards, which now house museum or art collections. The Marais also has a large Jewish community centred on the Rue de Rosiers, and it's also the gay quarter of Paris. The Marais is full of gay bars, falafel vendors, boutique clothing stores, tiny workshops and small warehouses, pretty cafés, synagogues, wrought-iron balconies, winding streets and hidden squares. 

A selection of photos; mostly pretty buildings and other accidental glimpses of street life. 


                             
                                      Un beau chat dans un jardin.


"Little pleasures" (or to be more precises, "happinesses").


Close up of the previous photo; this statue is surrounded by rose bushes and should look
beautiful come summer.


Woman in café

This weekend I'm going to my first social occasion without any other anglophones. My French friend Estelle is having a little dinner party chez elle, and has invited some others over partly, I think, because I kept saying how much I wanted to meet some actual Parisians seeing as I live in Paris (as opposed to the Brits and Americans I socialise with otherwise). It's pretty terrible that it's taken me four months to get here, but I'm looking forward to it. This doesn't feel like a year out from my life. Sometimes I feel like returning to Warwick will be the 8 month sabbatical from where I really should be, which is here, in this magnificent city.

Bisous!

3 comments:

  1. What lovely photos, thank you for sharing them! They remind me, heartbreakingly, of Vienna, where I lived for 20 years.

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  2. Thanks for your comment, Katherine. May I ask where you found my blog?

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  3. After living in THE most beautiful city in this world, do you think you could ever see yourself living there in the future?

    Or is this just a journey of your life and only a 'year abroad as part of your degree'?

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