Au revoir Paris, not adieu.

Well, I am just about to leave on the overnight train for Berlin... my last day in Paris was ironically the first sunny day I have seen here.... Oh well. I had a perfectly lovely day, which I will go on to explain, but let's start with last night. I decided to check out the gay scene, so I went to what is called 'un thé dansant' in Montparnasse. It was like any other night at the club, but they really did serve tea, and cheese, and brownies. Nothing sustains a weary disco dancer like individually wrapped snack packs of emmenthal, or so the thinking goes. How bizarre. But, this was not like any other club. There was an amazing dj... and lights, and confetti, and go go dancers wearing plastic yellow berets and not much else. Picture one part the scenes at Babylon in Queer as Folk, one part Bastille day, and one part Cage aux Folles, and you've got it. Incedentally, I thought that it was the time to buy my first (and last) pack of smokes. While it was fun to stand there and smoke and flirt and what not, I have come to the conclusion that smoking is a disgusting habit, and it makes everything taste like shit. I had about half a pack left, and I thought, how do people really smoke 3 packs a day? I threw out the cigarettes, and I will probably never smoke again, but let me tell you, one must smoke in Paris at least once. Well, twice. Once while sitting at a café, and once while at a nightclub, and once while walking down the champs elysees. It is magnifique, and I am glad I did it. If nothing else, I have an appreciation of the frustration that smokers now feel about not being able to smoke and drink coffee in public.

I started off the day at a store that sells 18th century lithographs.. my favourite kind of art. I bought a few, as my souvenir of Paris, and promptly left them at the ticket counter at the Gare d'Est... this probably had something to do with the fact that I accidentally ordered a half litre of wine at lunch, when I meant to order a glass... (a delicious repast at a place appropriately named 'le depart'... good, honest simple French food: warm goat cheese on toast with a salad, beef braised with carrots, and tarte tatin... hot caramelized apple pie. The place was reccommended to me by the owner of the art store, who doesn't have a cell phone, and thought it was a good thing I didn't either). Fortunately, someone had turned them in and I was able to reclaim my precious cargo. But I was soused..Well, waste not, want not is what I say.

Then, I walked around in the sun, and thought that a good way to say goodbye to Paris was to buy perfume. Incedentally, there is this huge chain of perfume stores called Maisonnaud, and they pop up every block or so, even in the really sketchy parts of town. French people take perfume seriously, and you can smell only the faintest hint, un soupcon, un suggestion, as people walk by clutching their scarves. Very nice. I bought 'Envy' by Gucci... I think it is rather appropriate! I promise to be tasteful, and to tell people that I learned how to wear perfume tastefully while in Paris. As I was leaving, the woman asked how I was liking my time in France, and I said of course I was, and she said,
'but of course! What is not to like in France?' When one is half drunk and buying perfume on impulse, on a sunny afternoon in Paris, there really is no answer to this question.