The Third Phase: TALE OF TWO CITIES

"It was the best of times..."

Multicultural cities with equitable representation in media and politics.

"It was the worst of times..."

Dilution of historic culture, loss of context, changing character.

"It was the age of wisdom..."

Black Lives Matter, reform policing, sensitivity to diverse perspectives.

"It was the age of foolishness..."

Xenophobia, division, defund police, cancel culture.

In 2015, at the beginning of the European immigration crises, Robin and I lived in NYC, that most multicultural American city, and I wrote in my blog:

"American culture is not based on 500+ years of traditional dress, rituals, music, or aristocracy. We are an ever-changing demographic mix rejecting, incorporating, and blending these other cultures into our own "creole". Our culture is a culture of change... However, I can't help but reflect on our culture of immigration and change relative to the current mass migration to Europe from war and economic ravaged countries. European countries (as most of the world) have long cultural traditions and cultural identities. They are not a product of constant change and immigration like America. They are a distillation, not an amalgamation. How does a culture and self-identity survive when overwhelmed by another without time to absorb?... These are historic times. There are no easy answers."

PARIS

After Cornwall we spent a few nights with Teigan enjoying her new apartment and neighborhood. We then got another round of Covid tests and filled out the PLF to enter France. We boarded the EuroStar train at London St Pancras bound for Paris. What a change from my first visit forty-two years ago. I also took a train from London to the continent. It also crossed the English Channel at Dover, but back and forth decoupled onto a ferry, crossed, then back and forth recoupled in Calais. This time we traveled at up to 190 mph in the channel tunnel (Chunnel). It was an overnight trip then. We arrived in 2.5 hours.

We've each have been to Paris multiple times since then, however the last was in 2015. We arrived at Gard du Nord at dusk, and walked the 40 minutes dragging our roller boards to our hotel located near Pompidou Center. We hardly saw any ethnic French, the streets were littered, and there were people sleeping in doorways, Metro stations, and street tents; and instead of bistros were ubiquitous Indian, kebab and Chinese restaurants.

Metro station in Paris

Tents on streets of Paris

Multi-modal transportation has been embraced by the people and the city: cars, busses, bikes, electric bikes, motorcycles, scooters, electric scooters, skate boards, roller skates, one-wheels, Segways, mom's with prams, and pedestrians looking at their iPhone, not where they are going. There are curb separated lanes, traffic islands, painted paving, and multiple colored lights for different vehicles pointing in different directions in different places. As a pedestrian we felt in constant peril; not sure by which type or from which direction you're going to get hit - but sure we were.

Bikes, Cars, Signs in all different directions

Moms, Prams, dual bike lane, rental bikes

After checking in, our hotel room looked at a blank wall in a light well, could barely fit a double bed, and there were other people's personal effects lying around. (We typically do not travel five star, to say the least, but this was too low budget). It was late, we were bummed. Before we could complain the host came up and said he gave us the wrong key. We switched to a vacant room, but he requested we leave our key with him when out for the day. Our arrival experience was not a confidence builder to leave access to our room. That night we booked another hotel in St Germaine.

Having seen most of Paris' sites multiple times, we chose to spend each day walking a different arrondissement, and take a couple of excursions out of the city. Our first was to Chartres Cathedral about an hour away. I've always admired Chartres from my studies. One reason previously mentioned, it elegantly embraced the beginning and end of the gothic style in its steeples, three hundred years apart.

Chartres Village, with Cathedral on hill in mist.

However, seeing its interiors and architecture up-close it is even more impressive. The origins of Chartres are lost in the mists of time. There are first century Roman ruins buried under the plaza in front of the Cathedral and the existing crypt goes back to the fifth century. There were several Romanesque churches built on the site following many fires.

Chartres Cathedral, under plaza are Roman ruins.
Below rose window in center and left is the remaining Romanesque facade.

After a fire in the ninth century an appeal went to all the kings of Europe for funds to build a new Cathedral. Charles the Bald, king of Norway and Denmark, donated Sancta Camisa (Holy Tunic) to help raise funds. This religious relic from Palestine via Constantinople was claimed to be the tunic Virgin Mary wore at the birth of Jesus and touched by him (baby spit-up is more likely). Sancta Camisa gained additional influence raising money after a fire in the twelfth century destroyed most of the ninth century Cathedral, but found the relic only lightly singed. You can still see it today. Religious relics were a powerful fund raisers in the middle ages as people would come from far and wide for their miracle properties. Robin and I have seen saint's finger bones, a whole forearm, pieces of the cross, even the iron spear tip that pierced Jesus' side while on the cross. Miraculously, these were found, and provenance confirmed, centuries after the death of a minor Jewish cult figure. Most are beautifully enclosed in jeweled silver or gold reliquary. It is said that there are so many fragments of wood from Jesus' "Vera Cruz" in churches throughout Christendom you could build Noah's arc.

Reliquary for Sancta Camisa

After the fire in the twelfth century the current cathedral was built in only thirty years. There are still remnants of the earlier Romanesque front facade from before that fire, but the nave, side aisles, transept, apse, and roof are early Gothic. It remains largely intact since. The new design incorporated many early gothic features found in subsequent Cathedrals: rectangular quadripartite vaults, flying buttresses to open up the walls, tall lancet windows to let in light as never before, and stained glass windows. Chartres has the most complete extant medieval stained glass windows, over 80% original, telling religious parables, narratives, and moral lessons to the illiterate population in comic-book fashion. Over 800 years later they have not faded, and bathe the interior with suffused light and color. The north spire rebuilt in the sixteenth century was in the later flamboyant gothic style.

Quadripartite vaulting to transfer roof load to exterior buttresses.
(Notre Dame in Paris uses square vaults, and here they are rectangular)

Stained glass of the "Blue Mary" surrounded by cartoon panels,
read from bottom left to top of her earthly to heavenly life story.

Our second excursion was Fontainebleau. Like Cathedrals, most palaces, eg. Versailles, the Louvre and Fontainebleau, were remodeled and added onto over the centuries by different monarchs. Fontainebleau was the favorite of Napoleon and he chose it as his seat of government, crowning as emperor, and abdication only fourteen years later in 1815. It has vast landscaped gardens and natural forests which, being winter, we did not explore. We took an audio tour of the apartments. They almost rival Versailles.

Map of Fountainebleu and gardens

One wing of palace. Main horseshoe grand stair is out of frame
to right under cover for reconstruction.

Napoleon's throne

The Great Library

Napoleon as self-styled Caesar to rule the world

Walking the arrondissements, over six miles a day, we fell in love with the city again. Changed - yes; different populations - yes; other cultures - yes, but it's not all as our first night. We still believe it is the most beautiful city on earth. Most of the city's architecture are background buildings, consistent eight stories in white or buff stone or plaster, with mansard roofs. These are laid out on a coherent urban plan designed by Haussmann in the mid-nineteenth century with wonderful diagonal boulevards intersecting at nodes occupied by notable landmarks.

Haussmann's Paris Plan.
Boulevards radiating out from Arch de Triumph

These background buildings provides a canvas for their monuments: Louvre, Tour Eiffel, Hotel de Invalides, Place de la Concord, Bastille, Sacre Coeur, and so many more. There are also contemporary buildings by architects who tried too hard to be an "artiste". At Paris' heart is Notre Dame on Isle Cite, the Seine river, and the left bank. (Previous blog discussed its fire and restoration).

Cartoon's depicting Notre Dame's reconstruction

Sacre Coure in Montmartre

Pont Alexander III and Hotel Invalides

The Good. I.M.Pei's Louvre pyramid covered entry

The Bad. Pompidou Museum.
(Actually I like it as an inside out object, just not in the historic center

The Ugly. Les Halles Canopy over shopping center and Metro Station
(A good feature is they suppressed the shopping center below grade to reduce its height)

The Sublime Tour Eiffel. On our glorious spring-like last day.

With a week immersed in its neighborhoods we rediscovered many Parisian boulangeris, cafes, and bistros which we delightfully frequented for petit dejeuner, lunch, and dinner.

Cafe culture

Mars de la Fountaine. Our favorite bistro in 7th arrondissement.
We discovered it in 2015 when our Airbnb was above it.
Turns out Barack and Michele dined here. Close to Tour Eiffel

The wines and food available at regular stores, at reasonable prices, is truly astounding. In Seattle you need to go to specialty stores to find a meager selection and then pay two to three times the cost.