French Architecture Lesson #1

Beautifully tiled roofs like these are characteristic of Burgundy (these pictures were taken in Beaune and Dijon). You never see them in Paris:





And now you know.

Le Poisson Cru

There are an insane number of sushi restaurants in Paris these days:


I've tried it once. I like the stuff you get in New York better.

It's Christmas Time in the Ville

Just as in New York, they are selling Christmas trees on the street in my neighborhood:


But unlike New York, these trees come with stands, of a sort:


I guess they don't water their trees here.

Public displays of Christmas decorations are all over the place as well:




As I've noted before, however, it is basically trees, stars, snowflakes and other innocuous symbols. No Santa Clauses, which isn't a surprise, and no Nativity scenes or mangers, which is. Although it may be that the latter are banned under France's separation-of-church-and-state law, which is far stronger than the United States'.

Dogs, and their Traces

One of the things I remember most vividly from previous trips to Paris was the "merdemobile." It was a street cleaning truck with a huge hose coming out of the top. From his seat in the truck in the street, the driver could manipulate the hose to vacuum dog merde off the sidewalk.

Since the French are all about letting the government take care of them, it was perfect.

I haven't seen any merdemobiles since I got here, though. Presumably they're no longer used. Instead, there has been a campaign to get the French to clean up their own messes. These signs, which read "I love my neighborhood/I pick up," can be found all over Paris:


And in the provinces, they've taken it a step further; the city of Dijon provides bags for people to use in cleaning up:


What effect this all has had, it's hard to say. Certainly there is still dog merde to be found on the sidewalks, but my impression is that the problem isn't much worse here than in New York. Whether it's as bad as it was 20 years ago, I don't remember. Perhaps I don't want to.

The Winter Darkness Arrives

We're heading into the shortest days of the year and it's becoming very, very obvious how short they are.

While sunset these days is not that different from New York, you really see it in the morning. Here is my neighborhood at 8 a.m. today:


And the same block, at about 8:45 (15 minutes after sunrise):


As you can see, the omnipresent winter clouds don't help.

It's noticeably better than in London, which is at about the same longitude as Paris but keeps its clocks an hour earlier. When I was there a couple of weeks ago, not only did it get dark by 4 p.m. but the sun was at such a low angle in the sky it felt like late afternoon the whole day.

Paris is farther north than Montreal, and almost as far north as Vancouver, but it is a couple hundred miles south of London, enough that the sun (when it is out) doesn't feel like a refugee from another world here.

Still, every visitor I've had thus far has remarked on how late-rising the Parisians are; at this time of year, they have a pretty good excuse for it.

The Mysteries of Burgundy

Every decent French restaurant has at least six to eight red wines by the glass, most of which cost between 4 and 5 euros ($5 to $6, cheaper than in New York). There will always be a Bordeaux or two, a high-end Beaujolais, one or two Loire wines and a few from the Rhone or elsewhere in the south.

I have never seen a red Burgundy for sale by the glass. And the only white Burgundies have been the cheap kinds from the Maconnais. (Better wines, both red and white, are usually available by the bottle.)

I asked a Frenchman about this; he said the French consider Burgundy to be overpriced.

I've personally always considered it frustrating -- seven of every 10 Burgundies I've tried in the United States have been thin, light and unsatisfying. But the other three have been stunning, with haunting, sublime aromas of flowers, mushrooms, and autumn leaves. The problem is that even at $50 a bottle or so, you really don't know what you're going to get.

Joey and I set off for Burgundy this past weekend to try to solve the mystery.

We saw plenty of typical wine-country scenes like this:


And this:


But one thing was unexpected:


This shows a "grand cru" vineyard in the Corton-Charlemagne area, one of the best in Burgundy (alas, on a foggy morning). Anywhere else in the world, a vineyard like this would be owned by a single winery, which would bottle and sell the wines, and you'd be able to know exactly what you were getting.

Here, because the vineyards are so old and because French inheritance laws require estates to be divided equally among all the heirs, the vineyards have been drastically subdivided over the years. That strip in the center that looks more brown than the green strips to either side? Each strip is owned by a different person, and each owner has different ideas about when to plow, when to prune, when to fertilize. So the wine from each strip can be completely different.

How do you know which are the good ones? It's the same as anywhere else: you have to drink them to find out. How can you do this affordably? Go to Burgundy -- the wines can be had there for about half the price in the United States.

And drink up -- sante!

World AIDS Day, a la francaise

It's World AIDS Day today, and in France they actually notice: one of the local newspapers had it as the lead story (it helps that today is Monday and there isn't a lot of local news to compete with it). Most U.S. newspapers, by contrast, don't even consider it news.

On the French equivalent of MTV there was a public service announcement -- at 8 in the morning, no less -- that went as follows: A straight couple tumbles amorously into bed. A condom wrapper is discarded on the floor, and shown in closeup. You don't get to see the condom itself or the exact place where it is positioned (ahem), but it is clear how they are using it.

Then, the couple goes for an HIV test, which comes back negative, and leaves the doctor's office with the apparent intention of heading right back to bed. At the end, this tagline is shown: "Before stopping the condoms, have an AIDS test."

Couples who haven't been tested yet certainly have no excuse for not using condoms: they are sold in vending machines like this in public places (Metro stops, etc.) throughout the city:


They aren't given away free in gay bars here (that I've noticed, at least) but then that practice has largely ceased in America as well. I did pick up some free ones in both London and Hong Kong, however. Why there and not here? I have no idea.