Les Deux Magots St Germain des Prés (6th and 7th Arrondissement) is often cited as many Parisians and tourists’ favorite district in Paris, mainly because of its nestling of friendly cafés, boutiques, and old-fashioned streets. You’ll also find many antique galleries, bookshops, art stores, and a few posh venues. Notably, it has long served as […]
The first time I saw Paris, many years ago, my friends and I headed for Montmartre. We’d seen the movies and heard the stories, and we weren’t about to miss this famous neighborhood. It seemed a bit tawdry, but we didn’t care. We went straight to the Moulin Rouge where we watched women in skimpy outfits dance […]
Why I love the street musicians in Europe: January, 1999: I’m 19 years old and in Paris for the first time. As I scuttle down into the Metro to escape the winter wind, I hear the strains of an accordionist playing Edith Piaf’s “La Vie en Rose.” I am transfixed and my love affair with […]
There really is a lake beneath the old opera house in Paris, just as The Phantom of the Opera says. No phantoms are boating on it, however, as far as anyone knows. The “lake,” which is more like a water-filled hole, has a more mundane purpose; it’s a reservoir used by the city’s pompiers-sapeurs (firefighters).
Josephine Baker was a legend in her own time. While she was an accomplished vaudeville dancer and singer, film star, civil rights activist, and spy, she relished her most important role as mother of 12 adopted children from around the world. Their home was Chateau des Milandes, in the Dordogne area of France.
The Avenue Champs Élysées is a prestigious and broad avenue in Paris, considered to be the most beautiful in the world. This 1.25 mile stretch is the second most expensive real estate in the world after New York’s Fifth Avenue and is lined with luxury boutiques, specialty shops, cinemas, cafés, and high-end restaurants. Chain stores, […]
Melophore The Louvre (1st Arrondissement) is the largest and most visited of the museums in the world;[1] more than eight million people come to see this museum’s glorified treasures each year.[2] Located in the 1st Arrondissement of Paris, the Louvre originally began as a 13th century fortress, home to kings and emperors who soon enough […]
In the summer of 2006, I found myself staying at the Citadines in Paris’ Place d’Italie, teaching a month-long summer language and culture course for UCLA undergraduates. I immediately fell in love with the energy of Place d’Italie, with its tall Haussmann style buildings, delicious corner bakeries, and hoards of teens and twenty-somethings sitting on the […]
On our first trip to Paris, we climbed the steps to the landmark Sacre Coeur Basilica. And finally, I saw what I had only seen in my French class textbooks–that pure white dome, the clusters of cool, chilled out students sprawled up and down the steps, laughing and chatting animatedly while rolling cigarettes with one hand. They were undisturbed […]
Rue des barres Marais (3rd, 4th, and 12th Arrondissement) is one of the city’s most historic and wealthy residential districts. The architecture in Marais is primarily 17th and 18th century and you’ll find many aristocratic mansions and trendy boutiques, shops, and cafés, especially in the Bastille Area.[1] Marais became an address synonymous with the upper […]