For the Birds- Marché aux Oiseaux

My favorite time to be wandering the streets in Paris are sunny Sunday mornings. The world is hungover and signs of last night's excess are littered on the sidewalks. It's almost required of you to whisper and tiptoe around the city, lest you wake the head-ached masses. If I'm motivated to get up early, the city is quiet and I can get to the market at Bastille without being crushed in the crowd, and then enjoy some wine and oysters on the sidewalk in front of Le Baron Rouge before strolling back to the maison to make a dinner with the market spoils.

So I definitely have my routine, but occasionally, I'll mix it up. One recent Sunday, we headed to île de la Cité to check out le Marché aux Oiseaux- the bird market. I had heard that there was such a thing, but it never occurred to me to actually visit until a friend in town read about it in a guide book.

Just a couple blocks from Notre Dame there is a 200 year old flower market set up at place Louis-Lépine, it's old greenhouses stretching down the block positively crammed with a riot of orchids and exotic plants and really interesting garden decorations which makes me positively crave for my own twisty-path green space with secret little pockets to decorate with treasures.

On Sundays, the exotic bird sellers step in and set up shops on the sidewalk along the greenhouses. You can hear it long before you can see it- there is a lovely symphonic chorus of hundreds of birds. While photographing birds in cages is notably tricky, I couldn't help myself. There was such a riot of color as the tiny bundle of feathers bounce from their perches.

Animals in cages always seem to make me a bit sad, and birds especially. I've never been tempted to start a collection of them despite the gorgeous vintage birdcages that beg to be collected and put to use. The willingness to wake up very early every morning combined with the melancholy of keeping a creature meant to fly in jail has always dissuaded me.

They also sold rabbits, hamsters, pigeons, doves and chickens at the market.

The tiny tropical birds were just so lovely. I can totally understand the urge to keep them as pets.

Catching Up

Just when I had the seed planted in my head that my winter coat would be a year-round staple, les printemps arrived in a spectacular fashion.

It feel amazing to get a little warm sun on your face after being completely under wraps for months.

All the news in the past weeks coming from the states has been so sad and tragic and scary, and once again, I feel helpless and a little lost not being there. But hooray, gay marriage just passed in France (which totally floored me that it wasn't legal here ages ago as the French were the original mainstream accepters of gay culture) and there's all sorts of scandals and happenings here that I'm trying to get more involved with to feel more connected to this place.

I'm dealing with a few challenges right now that's making my life a little hectic. Want to hear about it? I'm pretty sure you have no choice in the matter, so read on. Aside from dealing with the really awesome bureaucracy involved with getting my residency permit renewed and trying to convince a utilities company to get a bill to me to prove I live where I do...a small drama is in the process of happening. While we were gone this past weekend and merrily eating schnitzel and spatzel, a pipe in the wall of our bathroom burst. Not only did it flood the apartment below us, it also badly damaged the apartment below that as well. When the neighbors went to turn our water off, the pressure in the pipe in the hallway built up, and that burst as well.

Magically, in France, if this happens to be your rental flat, you are 100% liable. This is part of the reason why insurance is mandatory for renters here. There is lots of conflicting paperwork to fill out and triplicates to send to different parities involved and plenty of headaches ahead as we prepare for some experience in the land of insurance inspectors and plumbers and contractors, and the bathroom in our flat is a bit torn up and will remain so for months to let things dry out. At least it wasn't in the kitchen, as then that would be torn up and unusable for pretty much forever. But alas, our neighbors with the water damage have been nothing but kind to us, and fairly nonchalant about the whole issue. It's an old building with very old plumbing and this thing seems to happen all the time here. I have seen the glorious way in which a person or the Parisian persuasion has the ability to have a dramatic tantrum over pretty much nothing, and I was totally relieved at how cool they have all been. They shrug and give a half-smile and accept my apologies gracefully and humor my french, with the occasional run to the computer to help me translate a perplexing phrase or words that I don't understand. I will be making batches of cookies for them soon.

But I am here, I am well, and I have tons of pictures and lovely knitwear and stories to tell, and I'm currently watching honeybees swarm the beautiful pink blossoms of the cherry tree from my window while debating just what variety of cheese should I have for lunch today. Strawberries are in season here (and delicious) and I found some rhubarb at the market this morning to make this lovely gooey bit of springtime cheer, the weather has been relatively dry and warm, I These problems are small, but time consuming, and we all have to deal with them at one time or another.

Life is good.

Paris Marathon

A bright, chilly Sunday morning....

Most of Paris seemed to be sleeping off their collective hangovers.

Not these guys.

While the crowds weren't nearly as enthusiastic and amazing as those in New York or Boston (the only other marathons I've attended)...

It's always amazing and inspiring to watch.

Paris probably rivals New York as far as elevation gain and loss, but the Paris race takes the runners past a lot of monuments and things to see.

I was hoping that the race sponsors would be giving out macaroons and baguettes to fuel the runners on. No such luck. Oranges and bananas, just like everywhere else.

Don't you feel lazy now? After all, you can't spell "brunch" without r-u-n.

Arles

Wandering around Arles after the excitement of the Course Camarguaise was a nice way to settle the nerves. A nice pot of Rosé went to work effectively as well.

There were lots of festivities going along with the bullfights, and the central square was packed.

The cafe which Van Gogh painted so famously. It's been painted bright yellow so it looks more like the glow of lamplight at night depicted in the painting.

I've been on such a Van Gogh kick lately! I was trying to finagle a stop in nearby St Remy where he lived as well, but no such luck this trip.

The weather was beautiful and people were out partying pretty hard, with several bars on the square absolutely blasting music, and several live bands playing on the street. Not exactly relaxing as we pushed our way through the square, but it was a good fun crowd to mingle with. I'm not sure where the cutoff line geographically is, but in the south they greet each other with three cheek bises, just like they do in Switzerland. It makes it awkward when you aren't expecting that third peck.

It's a charming little town, with roman ruins integrated into the slightly more modern city. We were here a couple years ago and it was kind of a treat to be back. I'm not normally a repeat destination seeker, preferring to try and see as much as possible.

A walk along the Rhone proved a bit quieter than the area around the arena. It's a nice and windy walk, with views of the city and bits of the 2000 year old ramparts still holding things together.

The ruins of the Roman baths:

Back to Paris now, where the sunny springtime weather hasn't quite caught up and I've been begging off mediocre strawberries and asparagus at the markets. According to one farmer, his crop is a full six weeks behind where it should be, so I have to somberly eat my cabbage soup and wait a bit more before the greens come in.

The Warm and Fuzzy Course Camarguaise

So, let's talk for a second about Bullfights.

I can not excuse anyone for enjoying them for a second. They are terribly cruel and bloody, and if it was up to me, I would say poo-poo to your cultural history. The fight is rigged and the bull never wins. Torturing and brutally killing an animal for the sake of entertainment is probably the most barbaric form of expression Western society has decided to keep on with.

They still have these terrible events in Spain, Mexico, Portugal and yes, in France. In Spain, there is even a special kind of surgeon trained to deal with wounds that result in goring. Seriously.

But, saying that...in France, they have a from of non-lethal bullfighting called Course Camarguaise. At the end of the day, the bulls get to go home and go back to running free around the marshes of the Camargue. Remember, I was there a couple years ago? It's the marshy area around where the Rhone river empties out into the Mediterranean. Beautiful white horses, cowboy culture, pink flamingos, wild boars, vicious daytime mosquitoes, isolated beaches. It's an amazing place, and it might be one of my favorite memories of France, along with all the peaches, nectarines, cherries, and melons I couldn't stop eating that week.

The Camargue is also home to the big, beautiful black AOC Camargue Bulls.

This was about as close as I got to one.

It was terrifying.

They spend their lives running free on the marshland. Not a bad life. Most of them are eventually eaten, but the ones of a certain temperament get sent to the bullring.

Anyway. I wouldn't even think about supporting an honest-to-goodness bullfight. However, we headed to Arles to see a Course Camarguaise- the French "bloodless bullfight". Or, bloodless for the bull anyway. The day we saw it, there was no injuries (except pride perhaps).

Basically, you have a group of young, lithe handsome men wearing tight white clothes. One man will try to distract the bull by waving and shouting, while another guy will run up to the bull and try to grab a small ribbon tied around his horn, and then dash out of the arena, doing a flying leap to safety. If he gets a ribbon, he scores a point. There are 6 rounds in a game, with a brand new fresh bull introduced every 15 minutes. When the music played to signify the end of the round, the bull would head right back to the chute where he came from. Totally not the first rodeo they have been in.

It was tense, and quite a bit of fun to watch. While the bull seemed a little perplexed at times, it didn't seem particularly tormented. If the bull got up too much speed, everyone would leap out to safety. If they got him on the short side of the area, the game would begin. If the crowd thought the men were being too slow to approach or a little to quick to jump out or the arena, the crowd was sure to put them in their place. Plus, being in Arles, the game was held in a 2000 year old amphitheater, built by the Romans. People probably cheered on the throwing of the Christians to the Lions at some point in this same spot.

Let the pictures begin:

Oh, incidentally, the blood spots you see on the arena floor...they were from the "real" bullfight from the night before. Sigh.

This was perhaps the one event I've been to where I didn't have the urge to be any closer.

Not only would the bull paw the earth, kicking up clouds of dirt mixing with his urine, those horns were easily able to cross the barricade.

This one bull in particular was more than happy to try to launch himself over.

While the big bulls were terrifying, the small ones were agile and even intense.

Oh, and yes, there is a school for this. And yes, women can enroll.

Sorry about SO MANY PICTURES. I honestly just couldn't help myself. This was so much fun to shoot.