I first went to Paris in 1988 to visit some friends from grad school. I had the month of January off from my teaching job at Cornell, and I spent three weeks of it in Paris.
One of those friends was spending the year in Paris the year I turned 45 (1996), so I went back in the spring for 10 days. (I did the entire trip, including airfare and hotel, for $800.) I went partly to visit my friend, and partly to revisit the architecture. The courtyards, the tall doors with elaborate ironwork hinges and knobs. I just spent a lot of time walking around looking at buildings.
I'm obviously dying with impatience for going to Rome for the first time ever in a few weeks, but I'm equally impatient to go to Paris with Denis in August. I've only been there once (in 2001) since I lived there back in 1997-1998, and there really are times when I miss it still.
Paris just "works" for me; perhaps because it was the first place I lived after moving out from my parents with a single ticket, a suitcase and a grand fortune of 300 pounds. It was my first experience with living in a big city - as well as living on my own with no parental control whatsoever - and Paris was very good to me. I had my local food market, my Louvre season-ticket, my favourite walks... I want to see all that again, and also of course I want to show all of this to Denis who has been to Paris several times but never with somebody who has lived there.
My parents took me to Paris in my early teens- as a reward for passing my "O" levels. I went all round the Louvre and sauntered in the Tuileries and bought nudie magazines from a riverside bouquiniste and that was about it until now.
I thought to myself on seeing the first top/one here, wow -- that's great, my favorite so far. Then I read what you wrote at the bottom.
I also like the first Monet house picture -- the blue-green shutters alomts making half the picture one color.
Thank you so much for sharing these impressions with us! I haven't been to Paris yet, but the next time I go to Europe, that's where I'm going. I need to see where Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre and Anais Nin and Hemingway and Joyce traipsed about.
(P.S. A while back in your journal, I thought the black sports-shirt looked really good on you, too -- it's a keeper!) :>
I took a number of shots, varying the angle and the placing of the figure (I think the woman sussed me out- leastways there's one with her looking directly at the camera) and this, I reckon, is the best.
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One of those friends was spending the year in Paris the year I turned 45 (1996), so I went back in the spring for 10 days. (I did the entire trip, including airfare and hotel, for $800.) I went partly to visit my friend, and partly to revisit the architecture. The courtyards, the tall doors with elaborate ironwork hinges and knobs. I just spent a lot of time walking around looking at buildings.
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I love Paris in the spring time...
Paris just "works" for me; perhaps because it was the first place I lived after moving out from my parents with a single ticket, a suitcase and a grand fortune of 300 pounds. It was my first experience with living in a big city - as well as living on my own with no parental control whatsoever - and Paris was very good to me. I had my local food market, my Louvre season-ticket, my favourite walks... I want to see all that again, and also of course I want to show all of this to Denis who has been to Paris several times but never with somebody who has lived there.
Ville de Lumière, here I come!
Re: I love Paris in the spring time...
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I also like the first Monet house picture -- the blue-green shutters alomts making half the picture one color.
Thank you so much for sharing these impressions with us! I haven't been to Paris yet, but the next time I go to Europe, that's where I'm going. I need to see where Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre and Anais Nin and Hemingway and Joyce traipsed about.
(P.S. A while back in your journal, I thought the black sports-shirt looked really good on you, too -- it's a keeper!) :>
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The first- the restaurant shot- struck me as being a bit like a cubist collage. Whereas the one of Monet's garden is definitely fauve.
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I took a number of shots, varying the angle and the placing of the figure (I think the woman sussed me out- leastways there's one with her looking directly at the camera) and this, I reckon, is the best.