67 posts tagged “paris”
I finally saw Julie & Julia, the film made from the book by Julie Powell, which was in turn based on/drawn from her blog about Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child.
I loved it. Thoroughly entertaining, thoroughly delightful, very well done.
I know there has been a certain amount of backlash towards Powell, then and now, about her blog and the film. I have to ask, Why? I do not get it. If anything, I would think Powell would complain about the movie because the writer, Nora Ephron, did not make the Powell half nearly as delightful as the Child half... and then you've got Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci as the Childs, so right there... how can anyone compete?
I am actually very fond of Julie & Julia, the book and the entire story by Powell because it was inspirational to me about blogging, about writing, about finding a project that can, for a little while at least, define one and give a direction to one's life. I have been where Powell was: in a dead-end, depressing, limited job while everyone around you is streaking forward. I have re-made my life by finding a shorrt-term (or long-term) project that gives one purpose and focus, and in the end somehow changes... everything.
It was the book that made me want to start a blog, which I had never thought to do. Blog? Me? Why? I keep and have kept journals, but writing a blog which is like a public journal... not so sure.
Going to Paris on sabbatical gave me a focus for the blog. Not being there has left a space that isn't exactly full yet.
Besides, the reality of Meryl Streep playing Julia Child and Stanley Tucci as her husband, a thoroughly non-traditional couple delighting in their relationship, learning Paris, leaving Paris, their love of food and entertaining and life was glorious. Beautifully done. I am pleased too that Streep and Amy Adams have developed a kind of screen relationship, perhaps a mentoring one. It was the center of Doubt and made it powerful. Although Adams and Streep didn't share screen time (like Julia and Julia not sharing space, either), their individual performances obviously impacted on one another's.
What a great experience! Who wouldn't want to act with Streep and learn from acting with, watching, studying her work? Damn. That would be like winning the Oscar, the Tony, and the Nobel Prize in one.
And of course, watching Streep and Tucci act off each other is a dream, too. So good, so smooth: two master actors who know their craft and their talent, working actors who are both incredibly smart, too... bloody fantastic.
So while I am disappointed that Powell's half got less colorful master treatment from Ephron, overall the movie was fine. And I continue to admire Powell's original journal, and her continuing blog, and her moxie for finding something to change her life.
Pearl
One year ago, I was writing about this medieval structure in Paris.
Living in DFW and thinking about this building in Paris--a couple of centuries older than America--reminds me again how new everything is in this country. Not for Native Americans, of course, or the perhaps the Vikings, but for those early English, French, Dutch, or Spanish of the 16th or 17th century, or the later immigrants from any country who chose (or not) to come to this country.
DFW is so proud of its new constructions--like most of America. We do preserve old buildings for museum or academic purposes, but we don't live in them, shop in them, work in them. In part, because buildings almost as old as this exist only among the original Spanish missions in the Southwest, some Dutch and English settlements in the Northeast and mid-South... and that's it.
The town where I grew up has some original Dutch stone houses (the Dutch settled NY State before the English); the oldest of the houses date from the 1680s--which is still a century after the houses above. Most preserved buildings are younger, dating from 1700 or so. Colonial Williamsburg focuses on 18th-century life, based around an Anglo-centric colony. The Spanish missions of California date from mid-18th century, as well, based around Spanish/Catholic culture. Both fought Native Americans and incorporated a slave economy.
Here in the center of the country, very little is "old" in any sense. Sometimes it seems that anything dated before 1940 is considered "medieval" by our standards, and maybe that is a good thing to remember. This is a city that is all about "change," and "new," and doesn't revolve around a culture or ideas that could be called "traditional." Things change fast here--witness our northern and eastern sprawl!
Although I grew up on the East Coast, and know that those of us who did spend most of our lives on a coast (East or West) think we're cultural leaders, we're all about breaking borders and rules and that our looking outward, East or West, away from America, gives us currency, I have come to realize that perhaps--just perhaps--it is the middle of the country (let's say Colorado to Ohio, North Dakota to Texas) that is least bound by history or tradition or global culture. Without even the anchor of the 18th century, there may be a complete notion of "the new" that no one from a coast can entertain.
And how different is it to come from the middle of this country than from the edge? I don't know--I'm an Edge Person, even after 8 years in Midwestern grad schools and and a decade-plus in Texas.
And people do leave the middle for those faraway global sites like Paris--witness Ernest Hemingway, Louise Brooks, and William Burroughs--but I bet, like Edge People, they always take The Middle with them
Pearl
I missed it! Monday was the one-year anniversary of starting my blog. I was in Paris, focused on that city and my research projects and my writing.
My first entries were about my time in Oxford, my trips to Tolbiac, two delightful museum exhibits I saw that featured red as a power color, my trip to Scotland, and Paris's bird market.
Since then, it has been great fun to write about that grand adventure. Thanks to all my readers for your comments and support. We'll see what the next year brings.
After one year (and a couple of days!), Happy Anniversary to me and my blog and my readers!
Pearl
Recent blogposts on my "Other" blog:
Changes If you haven't noticed, I've changed the title of da blog. Since I won't be in Paris this fall, but at My U in DFW (not bitter, not bitter, not bitter), I thought that it would be appropriate... I'll keep the same name of the Vox blog--the original one--and work around the idea of "Paris" while not being there. (8.19.09)
Skirting the Bike First, I love the skort. It's shorts, it's a skirt... it's a skort. (8.18.09)
Favorite Things: Family Style This album by Jimmie and Stevie Ray Vaughan is one of my favorite's of the SRV canon. I fell in love with his music just before he died, when I was in grad school (for the last time), but didn't come across this album until much later, when I was gathering up all the studio and live work I could. (8.14.09)
David Byrne on biking If biking wasn't cool enough (environment, freedom, wind in your face, etc.) David Byrne has published The Bicycle Diaries, his personal observations on biking. (8.13.09)
Review: Split Pea Soup Cafe Tuesday night I ate at this new branch of an El Paso-based chain. I had read about it in Daily Candy Dallas, where I get a number of good tips about new places to eat. (8.13.09)
Dreams One good result of this summer is that I am dreaming again. (8.11.09)
Pearl
This is a delightful statue of the poet and fable writer Jean de La Fontaine, to be found in the 16th arrondissement, near the Musee Monet-Marmottan. La Fontaine lived and wrote in the 17th century, but his work is still popular. Like Moliere his family expectations pointed him toward law, but he chose another path, that of the arts.
At La Fontaine's feet is the crow and on the steps the fox, of his fable "The Crow and the Fox," wherein the fox sweet-talks the crow out of the piece of cheese held in her bill. Wily Fox. Vain Crow.
It is a charming statue found in the delightful park found between the Metro stop La Muette and the museum. Notice the stone bench running behind the statue, where you could sit and read, or enjoy a conversation. Very Parisian.
Pearl
This is the figure of Harmony above the Palais Garnier. As you can see, on a sunny day the statue gleams very, very brightly.
Pearl
I took this picture of the moon hanging over the southeastern corner of the Louvre early on a morning in October, which I wrote about here and here. It was a gorgeous, chilly autumn morning and, as you can see, Paris was quiet. Still waking up. As I rode into town on the metro, there were only people who needed to be at work early and me.
This was right across the street from the Louvre, where I took the above picture.
An eerie metal sculpture. Very striking and beautiful in the cold light of pre-dawn, but also sharp-edged and toothy.
And peeping over the rooftops, dawn itself, still shy and slowly, slowly, slowly moving over the city...
Pearl
This is another photo from Paris. Specifically, from a street in Montmartre that I took on the day I walked up behind the Sacre Coeur.
I love the color, and the way the branch hangs over the door and window.
An enchanted door, that opens into some magical place.
Maybe just home.
Pearl
Having been back in America for a while I am still getting used to different (familiar) ways of doing things that now look unfamilair because I lived in Paris for four months. Like tipping.
Suggesting that one tip based on the original full-price of an item or service rather than the discounted price one pays... is like saying that one should pay the sales tax on the original price rather than the discounted price.
An interesting notion.
And one that certainly supports the service economy America is growing.
First, in America tipping is not required or obligatory. It is a "thank you" the servee chooses to give the server.
Second, tipping is not about a server providing the elements of the service that are expected. Taking my order, bringing water, bringing my food, clearing away used plates, offering suggestions on specials or wine: those are basic elements of a good waiter's job. I am not tipping because you got the average requirements right. Am I?
Third, the amount is between the server and the servee--no one else--and is based on the servee's relative happiness with the quality of the service and his/her worldview of the value of that "thank you." Face it: anything extra the server receives is extra--like free sprinkles on an ice cream cone--and an opportunity for gratitude.
Except that, fourth, too many servers' wages are "made up" by tips, rather than salary. And this is especially true in the service industry, where the larger percentage of servers are women... Women are generally paid less but make up the larger numbers of wait staffs, hotel and business cleaning staffs, grocery and store personnel, etc.--all below management--and are actually paid less than men in most cases, or earn fewer benefits or smaller benefit packages.
So that in the service industry America is growing, more women are employed in lower-wage and benefit jobs (which is good in the current economy where women are often retaining the lower-end jobs they hold while men are losing jobs through layoffs and downsizing). If their "wages" are based on the fact they they will earn tips and thus "make up" the missing percentage, then tips are necessary for the servers, and employers have every reason to encourage servees to tip well.
But--and this is the twist--this is because when one eats in an American restaurant, for example, one pays for the food. Period. Now sure the cost of the service and ambiance and glassware, etc., is built in, but essentially one pays only for the food. And drink. Or, at least in this country, this is what we think. A restaurant bill pays for the ambiance and food served... the tip pays for the service, or at least the level of service, one gets. Or, really, just the service: if it is bad or average, the server gets 15%. If it is exceptional, the server gets 20% or more.
What is exceptional service? In specific detail.
This is why in France the tip is built in. It is not falsely presented as if it is a choice computed and assigned by the servee: you must pay for the service you get, apart from the salad and two glasses of wine you consumed. It is a separate line item in your bill. On top of that, you can leave a euro or so to sweeten the thank you... or not.
But management makes it part of their responsibility to collect the tips, not putting the burden on their employees. This annoys American visitors, who are conditioned to think of a tip as conditional and a sign of their affluence or generosity. "Required" tipping? Un-American. Exactly.
But this is also why being a waiter or waitress in Paris is a career, not a part-time, low-wage job only to be done until one graduates from college, or goes back to school, or something else better (higher paying and more respectable)comes along. It is a skill or employs learned skills--like most of these other server jobs.
Dealing with tipping in a foreign country taught me to value how and when I leave a tip. It is not automatic, and I choose the amount and recipient. But I really hate being pressured into tipping: an "obligatory" gift of 15-20%. I do tend to be generous, but I equally leave nothing. I do not feel that just because someone brought my plate to my table, wow, they earned an extra 15% on top of my bill: that's a required part of the job. Isn't it?
Pearl
Remember my unfortunate birthday visit to the spa?
Well, I went back for my second membership visit and it was much, much better. First, I got the massage I asked for (#1 improvement) and masseuse was fantastic (#2 improvement). A very, very good, relaxing massage with exactly enough pressure, head to toe.
So kudos to Hiatus Spa and Retreat.
I was also contacted by an assistant manager about the situation (thanks to my blog) who was very apologetic and generous about the situation. That first time was, obviously, a simple mistake, compounded by the counterperson's vocal tip suggestion.
They have now clarified the tipping issue by adding a note on their site about suggested amounts, so no more loud discussion in the store. Thank you!
Pearl
