Day 45 -- Paris

Saturday, 21 October 2023

It's another day of walking around Saint Ouen in the rain. It started out with a short walk to The Art for pizza. On the way I saw a young kid -- probably about ten years old -- running through the rain with a couple of baguettes. He looked so happy. It felt like a scene from a foreign film. I got some Red Balloon vibes. 

The best picture I could get of the baguette kid

There was a park on the way. I was able to work out two of the three signs. "No bikes except for kids under ten" and "No dogs". The best I could figure out for the middle one is "It is forbidden to have fun with your balls".

Things you can't do in Square Marmottan park

I was the only one at the pizza place, and the clerk was quite friendly. He had a music video channel on the TV in the dining area so I got to watch some French music videos while I ate. Pop music isn't much different in French than it is in English. 😊

The Picador pizza at The Art

After pizza I headed southeast to work on that part of town. I took a turn into a little warren of alleys that had some sort of antique market. Row after row of nooks with art and antique dealers. 

Just one of many rows of the Paul Bert antique market

Lots of neat stuff. Nothing that I wanted to buy, but even if there was, most of it was a lot larger than would fit in my backpack, so how would I get it home on the plane? As I was thinking about this, I turned a corner and found Hedley's, a shipping company specializing in art and antiques. They set up shop right on the edge of the market. A perfect location. There still wasn't anything that I wanted to buy, but at least I knew I had transportation options if I did find something.

Hedley's global transportation services

Leaving that market, I found that there was another one across the street -- The Marché Biron. Again, much more in the vein of antiques and art than typical flea market stuff. 

One row of the Marché Biron

And another one just down the street. The Marché Dauphine, a multi-level flea market under a glass roof. It has an exhibit of a house of the future. An entire quadrant of the upper level was record stores. I couldn't resist looking through the record stores. I mean, if I found anything, I could just take it down the street and have Hedley's ship it back to Omaha for me. 😄 Only one thing spoke to me, and it was a CD, so I could fit it in my backpack. Rugby's Greatest Hits. Twelve tracks of songs you are likely to hear at rugby matches. Some are national anthems, some are songs that supporters of certain teams traditionally sing. It seemed like the right alignment of the universe to find a rugby CD while walking around a suburb of Paris during the Rugby World Cup, so I bought it. 

The Futuro House in the Marché Dauphine

The record store level -- ten or twelve record stores all in one place

Rugby's Greatest Hits

The next few blocks were more of a traditional flea market. Used stuff and stuff that "fell off a truck". Lots of clothing that may or may not have been authorized.

I found out later that the combination of markets is considered to be the largest flea market in the world. 2500 stores spread across 15 markets. They even offer private tours.

Leaving the markets, I headed to the Saint Ouen cemetery. The old section was closed, but the new section was open. I figured I'd walk the streets in the new section and then figure out if the old section is closed temporarily or permanently. While I was looking at the "You are Here" map to get my bearings and figure out if the old section was accessible from some other entrance, a guy stepped out from the attendant's booth and asked me what I was up to. "Just walking around" I said, hoping he spoke English -- or that my miming would get the point across. He nodded; and added "But no running." I agreed to that stipulation. 

I walked all the streets in that section of the cemetery and looked at a bunch of really cool monuments and stones and mausoleums. A lot of them are for entire families and are engraved as such. Family Bachelet, Family Flament, Family Trottier, and so on. There was even one labelled "Family Guy". I wondered if it was the inspiration for the animated TV show. 😉 I couldn't get a photo because the floral arrangements blocked enough of the engraving that the entire thing couldn't be seen from a single angle.

After the cemetery I made my way back to the hotel. And then to the England v. South Africa semifinal match.

I completed 55 streets today, 45 of them in Saint Ouen. Still on track to complete the whole city by the time I leave.

...doug