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Published: July 10th 2012
Ry and Will were wiped out from their all night music extravaganza and spent a vast part of the day sleeping. We packed the yellow cart and went off to the flea market Marche de Puces des Vanves..which means flea market in Vanves. It's not the BIG market, but it was still pretty large and full of wonderful old things. Of note were the buttons, glassware, real silver, and cards. It was a little rainy, but most of the market is well covered. Lee returned to join the other guys napping in the apt, but I opted to keep going. The men are sucked dry of energy, but I find myself to be completely energized by this city!
I took the metro to Galleries Lafayette and the hordes of people shopping the soldes or sales. It's my new favorite french word! Galleries Lafayette is actually 3 different buildings. The first is about a block large and is 7 floors...immense and nothing but women's items. The home store is separate, as is the men's and both are 4 floors. On the first floor of men's is the food shop - every kind of prepared food from everywhere in the world, pastries,
chocolates, a full grocery store, etc. elegant and overwhelming. On the ground floor of the men's store, I found an entire half a floor devoted to man bags, scarves, ties and hats - no wonder every French man dresses so very well. Although there are sales, everything is very expensive and so no deals to be found...except my new handbag. In the shoe dept at the heavily guarded Chanel boutique, I saw 3 beautiful Saudi women trying on half the store. I saw them leave, with their token man ( uncle, father, brother...they can't go out alone) AND 3 Pilipino maids carting at least 15 bags. Oh my. No wonder I can't afford. To console myself, I went off in search of the Veuve Clicquot champagne bar that I remembered somewhere in that shoe department and was tragically informed that it was no more. And that was my first world problem for the day- we've been trying to remind ourselves that we are very lucky people and our problems are quite minor compared to most of the world. I couldn't sip champagne while shopping for shoes...boo hoo.
The nest day, all of us braved to metro to the peripherie
to the Marche Saint Ouen ...the "big" flea market. We'd been here before and hoped it would be as much fun as last time. First stop was the street side crepe man for some quick energy. We entered what we termed "Gangsta Land" and for good reason...nothing but knock off shoes, jeans, fake gold jewelry and lots of camoflauge. Lots of girls in tight jeans and too much makeup. The boys went off in search of vinyl and CD's and we branched out to Rue deRosiers antique markets. All covered, clean and fabulous. After we left the covered market, we entered junk world. Piles and piles of stuff layed out like the biggest garage sale youve ever seen. I mean JUNK! Mounds of things like doll heads and old tv remotes, an eight track tape player with 8 track tape, old dishes, new dishes, toy dinosaurs, metal army men...the list goes on. You'd think we'd be able to find a cool lock, but no. We wandered for quite awhile before we stumbled into the a cool, but creepy sort of museum like store with no name. While I can do it no justice with any sort of description, I tell
Baskets of babies
It struck me as funnysay that it was so perfectly perfect in every way... From the stack of straight jackets on a shelf, Barbie dolls in neatly arranged glass beakers, porcelain hands jutting out from the wall, antler chandeliers, and electric chair - the entire store was done in black, white and beige and was presicely arranged according to the owner's whim. I've truly never been in a shop quite like it and I still quite in awe. When we met up with Will and Ry, we dragged them back for a second go round and they were equally speechless and in awe, too.
After all that awe, it seemed time to go home and take a nap. My estrogen power kept me going and I went alone to the Marais - one of the few neighborhoods open on a Sunday. I was called home after about an hour because the boys needed to eat and we wanted one last good meal with them before they leave for Spain on Monday morning. After a major drama with trying to print boarding passes (Ryan Air wanted 60€ to print...that's nearly $100!) we found an open cyber cafe (more drama) and paid $1 to print.
And booking a cab in Paris for 5 am is not as easy as it sounds, either. We needed dinner and we needed it bad! A delicious Italian meal cured us of our woes and now the boys are packed and ready for the next part of their big adventure.
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Jo
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OUI. TRES MAGNIFIQUE!
Kelli & Lee: I could smell the escargot avec garlique... in your inimitable blog. Loved it.. and thank you so much for sending it. The mentalpictures you painted took me away... Allons enfants de la patrie... Barcelona and Will & Ry go very well together; superb. Enjoy, and great that Will was able to meet up with Kathy, Neil and family. Con todo carino Jo