Today, I was more like a tour guide for Dr. Ibrahim Atallah. Let’s see Paris. Well, it should start with Notre Dame du Paris. Just reopened after year of restoration after the fire, the line went fast, but the amount of people was still very large. Although no phones allowed, it was impossible to enforce that with hundreds of tourists taking pictures and videos. We actually walked in while there was some sort of a service or prayer being recited. The priest kept hushing the tourists to no avail. Tourism took over the Church. People visiting the house of God overwhelmed those who are praying to him.
The priest was white bold with a white golden-ornamented robe. He had a large belly that pulled the robe from the front upwards. He stood infront of the sculpture of Marry and prayed in french repeating the same prayer over and over. Maybe they were hailmeries. I don’t know.
Tourists still crowd the place with their phones and plastic sneakers. At Shakespeare and Company, there was a line to get into the book store. As for the cafe, they have a rope that closes the door now, and they have to let you in. The place is so small, and i can imagine the employees being overwhelmed with waiting tourists. I doubt that most tourists know the value of this place. We ordered a flatwhite and a lemonade, and it rained. We stood under a canopy drinking them, then walked to the park across and sat. We noticed a mostly green colorful parot on the tree. Tourists were stopping to take a photo of it. I wonder if it is a run away parot. It won’t survive much once the craws get to it. The pigeons had a common left foot injury for some reason. Abe kept trying to feed the pigeons from his hands. It wasn’t difficult to condition them to do so. They exceeded his expectations…. his American expectations at least.
When we returned our cups to the cafe, the book store had no line, so we walked in. I ended up buying “Flirting with French” by William Alexander. I can not resist my affinity to books. I have to feed my urges every once a while with purchasing one.
I am writing this few days after, and my memories now are starting to mush together. We walked to to the Jewish Quarter where we ate a falafel. Abe spoke to them in Hebrew, which he spoke better than them. We sat in a cafe afterwards that had few drunkards playing music, and drinking something from large plastic water bottles that was dark… probably homemade wine.
We walked to the historical movie theater, Le St Andre Des Arts, across of Chez Lebanese in Saint Michele and watched a movie titled Bring Them Down with Christopher Andrews. It was a powerful thriller about confused masculinity, trauma, vengeance, and a bunch of ugly themes. I didn’t like it, although it is very well done.
The night ended with a saj sandwich of Jibny for 6.8 euros.
Wissam Charafeddine 