F Train to Paris

In which a Jewish family from Brooklyn moves to Paris, France for two years of work, school, and adventures.

 

Tonight represents a parental milestone: my oldest son’s first rock concert. He and a group of friends went to see Green Day at Le Zenith, a theater way on the other side of Paris. And I just want to say that I was the cool Mom who not only agreed to let him go but fronted the money for all the tickets.

 
My first rock concert was The Beach Boys at Madison Square Garden, in 1975 (I think). My friends and I had partial view seats, behind the huge sailboat set that dominated the stage. It never occurred to me to wonder what my parents thought about it, but they certainly stayed up waiting for me, as I am waiting for J., who is on his way home as I write this.

This week represents a couple of other firsts: On Sunday I made my first batch of chocolate ganache (a thick icing made simply by boiling cream, pouring it over pieces of bittersweet chocolate, stirring, then chilling the mixture), which I used to ice a batch of cupcakes. I then served them to French friends who came over for tea. They had never had cupcakes before, and delicately ate them with a fork. I baked a dozen cupcakes, and our three French guests, among them, ate one and a half.  My family ate the rest.

And later the same day, I had my first encounter with a Paris pickpocket. We (all five of us) were on the metro at around 7pm, coming home from a benefit concert of Mozart’s Requiem at the American Cathedral, for tsunami relief. The train was packed, and the trip seemed to take forever, although we only traveled four stops.

When we got off the train, there was a sudden burst of frantic activity. Two young men pushed me and another passenger toward the wall. They turned out to be cops, and they eventually explained that the other guy had opened my backpack, put his hand in, and had even had his hand in my coat pockets. I had been totally unaware. I checked my bag and found my wallet, my cell phone—everything was there. The pickpocket had been completely unremarkable: a short man in a leather jacket, with gray hair but a young face. I had noticed him, but in fact it had been the undercover cops, in their hoodie sweatshirts, who had made me nervous.  

Even though the pickpocket hadn’t stolen anything, I had to wait for the cops’ supervisor to arrive, bringing a statement for me to sign. The kids went home, and Ralph stayed to keep me company. We chatted with one of the cops while we waited—he was impressed that we could speak French. He said that pickpockets usually target foreign tourists, who are all the more freaked out because they can’t communicate with the cops. While we stood there talking, someone jumped the turnstile right behind the policeman’s back. 

Later, the boys, especially R., said they were glad they had gone to the concert, because otherwise they would have missed all the excitement.

posted by: pariskleinmans at 22:19 | link | comments (2) |

When we lived in New York, we were members of various museums. In theory, we could have dropped in frequently for short visits, but we rarely did.

One of the first things I did when we moved back to Paris was to become a member of the Societe des Amis du Louvre. With my little membership card, I can go to the Louvre whenever I want, using a special entrance and skipping the lines and crowds. The cost is 50 euros a year for one person, 75 for two. And we get our money's worth: I have been there at least ten times in the last year and a half. At least a couple of those times, I happened to be in the neighborhood with a little time on my hands and decided to stop by. As a result, as hard as it is to really know a museum the size of the Louvre, I feel I know it better than any of the large museums in New York.

On Sunday morning, I took E. for an education evaluation--a fancy name for an IQ test--required for admission to the school he'll be going to in Brooklyn next year. I expected the process to take all day, but in fact it took only two hours, and by early afternoon we were home. Ralph suggested we go to a museum, and I said there were a couple of things I wanted to see at the Louvre. E., who was in a "Mommy" mood, asked to come along. J. and R., of course, had no intention of getting dressed, let alone leaving the house, so we left them in front of their Playstation.

We took the metro to the halfway point of the Champs Elysees, where four fountains mark the end of the commercial section. From there we walked down the tree-lined boulevard, across the Place de la Concorde, and through the Tuileries, where, since E. was with us, we had to stop at both the carousel and the playground. There's a nifty playground in the Tuileries that my kids love, with all sorts of bizarre, space-agey climbing equipment, like a huge metal dish ton an angle (like a satellite dish) that kids sit or stand on and turn.

Finally, we entered the Louvre itself, where we had an agenda: an exhibit about David’s painting Le Sacre de Napoléon, commemorating the 200^th anniversary of Napoleon’s coronation, and the newly restored Galerie Apollon. Also, at E.’s request, we planned to see a few mummies.  But first, a restorative coffee in the Café Denon, an adorable restaurant tucked into a corner of the museum, not far from the entrance to the Denon wing. And fortunately, displayed right near the café are some mummies, so we avoided a trip to the Egyptian wing.

 The Napoleon exhibit, which closes next week, is small but nicely done. Set up near the painting itself (which is always on display at the Louvre) are other paintings, drawings, and artifacts related to it, including a close-up portrait of Napoleon in full coronation regalia; and the actual crown, scepter, and sword he held. The sword, of course, was E.’s favorites.

The Galerie Apollon is amazing, literally encrusted with the work of dozens of artists, who worked on it over a period of 200 years. It also contains the crown jewels and a collection of stone vases assembled by Louis XIV himself. You could easily spend half an hour or more in that one room, though preferably not with a bored six-year-old boy. But we didn’t get to spend much time, because the gallery suddenly closed about five minutes after we got there. (E. was relieved.)  I’ll go back, but next time without him.

 
I love taking my kids to museums, but you have to choose carefully, see it through their eyes, and leave early. Sometimes, I just like to go by myself and see it my way.

 

 

 

 

 

posted by: pariskleinmans at 12:14 | link | comments (3) |

Click here to see a photo of E.'s sixth birthday cake.  (I tried to include the photo, but I haven't quite mastered that skill yet.)

It was made by Tracy Treville. Finding American-style birthday cakes in Paris is tricky. A few moms have created small businesses around filling this need in the expat community, and we were lucky enough to find Tracy. What she created was beyond my wildest imagination--when she said the cake would be 3D, this is not exactly what I envisioned. But it impressed the hell out of everyone, even the 5-year-old guests. However, they didn't really eat much of it. They never do. After the party, we cut the remaining 9/10ths of the cake into two big chunks and put them in the freezer.

E.'s party (did you guess that the theme was pirates?) took place at the end of November. Why do I mention it now? Because I just had a piece of this delicious cake as a snack. Not quite the last piece, but almost.

 

posted by: pariskleinmans at 21:14 | link | comments (4) |

Happy new year to all. As our thoughts right now are dominated by the tsunami and its aftermath, here’s a link for those who are looking for a Jewish response to this disaster. The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), which does wonderful work mainly in Jewish communities around the world but gets involved in non-sectarian causes as well, is accepting donations by check or via its website.

On Sunday, the day of the disaster, we were en route to London via the EuroStar train for a few days of vacation. We did the usual fun touristy things—afternoon tea at a hotel, Indian food, museums, the theater (The Producers, minus Nathan Lane but still great)—but our trip was punctuated by news about the tsunami, on TV and on newsstands.

We got home on Wednesday night, and I spent Thursday and Friday shopping, cooking, and straightening up in preparation for a small New Year’s Eve gathering.

Tomorrow the kids go back to school, after what felt (to me, though I’m sure not to them) like a really long vacation.

So now that I’ve caught you up on recent events in our lives and in the world, here’s the entry I’ve been meaning to write for the past two weeks—a visit to the Hammam in Paris’s Grand Mosque.

My book club planned a field trip to the hammam, or Turkish bath, as an antidote to the cold, gray weather and the usual pre-holiday stress that gives all of us back- and neck aches. Eight women met at 11am on a Thursday at the hammam entrance. Having done extensive Internet research, we were armed with bathing suits, pareos, flip flops, towels, and toiletries. At the reception, we signed up for the "formule," which includes, for 58 euros, use of the hammam, a paper cup of “black soap,” a gommage treatment (more on that later), a 10-minute massage, a mint tea, and lunch in the mosque's restaurant. Most of us upgraded to a 20- or 30-minute massage. The receptionist doled out various tickets to be redeemed for the services we purchased. I couldn't imagine how we would manage to hold onto these little slips of paper in the humid hammam. (Next time, I’m bringing a small, waterproof makeup bag.)

In the locker room, we stripped off our street clothes and tried to figure out what to do. Bathing suit? Just the bottoms? No one seemed comfortable strutting around totally nude. One woman brought her entire collection of pareos, and doled them out to those who don't own one. We found our way through the huge, ornate, seraglio-like massage room, where women were spread out on four massage tables and dozens of others sprawled on banquettes around the edges of the space. We passed through a door, and we were in a different climate.

Soon we were ensconced in an alcove in the main steam room, relaxing on the tiles. Everything was pristinely clean. The heat was intense but bearable, and we all quickly got used to it. Our alcove had its own cold water faucet, and a couple of buckets that we filled and then used to cool ourselves and each other. I have absolutely no memory of what we talked about, but my body remembers how it felt—the warmth, the humidity, and the sense of complete comfort and relaxation. (Since then, on cold days, I have been able to warm up by imagining myself back in the hammam.) We formed a circle and rubbed each others back, using the black soap, which is actually brown and smells like olive oil.

Eventually, one or two at a time, we drifted off, either to try out the hottest of the steam rooms or to line up for a gommage. Imagine lying down on a table and having your body scrubbed with Brillo pad—afterward, you’re glad you did it, but the experience itself is a bit disconcerting. Two women were performing the gommage, and one (not mine) was apparently a bit more gentle than the other. In the shower right afterward, I rinsed off layers of dead skin.

The next stop was back to the room where we’d first entered, to await our massages. The first of our group to finish her gommage had signed all of us up, and we each had a number. As our numbers were called, we gratefully headed for the massage tables, to have our bodies gently but firmly kneaded and stroked. One by one, as we finished, we headed for the showers and the locker room.

Then, reluctantly beginning the transition back to the real world, we gathered in the restaurant for a late lunch. The waiter dubbed us “Les Gazelles”—we don’t know why, but we decided to view it as a compliment—and he patiently shepherded us through the menu of tagine and couscous choices, brought us a heaping platter of pastries afterward, and bid us farewell as we left the mosque and went to pick up our children at school.

The weather, which had been so cold all week and even that morning, had warmed up considerably during the hours we had been in the steam. Or so it seemed to us.

posted by: pariskleinmans at 14:40 | link | comments (3) |