A wild ride through the streets of Paris
When Marilyn and I arrived in Paris two weeks before our 25th wedding anniversary in July 1997, we took a wild taxi ride from the Gare du Nord to the Left Bank and checked in to the Comfort Inn. (It was part of an American chain, so that Marilyn had been able to make our reservations online.) She had chosen it because it was one of the hotels on the Left Bank within walking distance to the River Seine and the Sorbonne. Marilyn was excited to be back in Paris, a city that she had visited years ago and had always wanted to visit with me. She had spent years studying the French language, customs and people. Her father had numerous relatives in France, and Marilyn had received numerous letters and gifts from her father’s “Tante Lisette,” a.k.a. Elisabeth Fonte Margutti, her grandfather’s sister. Marilyn’s great-grandmother, born Laure Chartrey de Ménétreux, was the daughter of Denis Victor Amedée Chartrey de Ménétreux, who was the manager of the Suez Canal project in the 19th century.
Marilyn easily got us out of the train station, and after some wandering around we found a taxi rank. As we rode through the narrow streets, I was amazed at how assertively the taxi driver drove the little blue car. After he had loaded us and our suitcases into the car, and Marilyn had told him where we were going, we learnt that he was from somewhere in the Middle East. He and Marilyn had a little trouble communicating, but Marilyn was prepared and gave him a piece of paper with the hotel address. And we were off! We headed down a small street as if it had 5 lanes of traffic, although there were no lanes painted on the road. The taxi driver yelled and gestured at the surrounding drivers, and somehow we all merged into two lanes, heading down narrow medieval streets that had been built for people and horses centuries ago. We crossed the river and went down more little streets. We passed the Sorbonne, then we went by a little park with cute little shops surrounding it, and whizzed past a couple of bars, a small grocery store, and some other small stores.
Our hotel on the West Bank
Finally we arrived at our hotel. The Comfort Inn was was a small five story building that blended in well with the surrounding buildings, although it looked modern. The driver parked in the middle of the street and rapidly got our luggage out. Marilyn paid him, and he was off like a streak. We walked down to the hotel entrance, which was just at the end of the block, with a narrow alley beside it.
We went into the small lobby, where Marilyn checked in. We got keys to our room and took the small elevator to the third floor. Our bedroom had just enough space to lay out our suitcases and walk around the bed. At the end of the bed was an armoire to hang our clothes in, and the door to a small loo (restroom). We unpacked and lay down to rest after our long trip from London.
We take an romantic walk in Paris
Finally, just before sunset, we went out for a quick walk. We explored the neighborhood a little and then returned to our hotel. It had miraculously changed to a restaurant! Tables and chairs had been pulled out of the room facing the small alleyway, white linen cloths had been laid on the tables, and people were eating supper. The plain little space had been transformed. All along the alleyway, similar little restaurants had been opened. Each one had a small chalkboard with a menu written on it. We walked along the alley and Marilyn explained each restaurant’s food.
We begin our first meal in Paris
We finally decided that eating at our hotel would be best, because we had not yet changed much money, and we could add the meal to our hotel bill. So we sat down for our first dinner in Paris. We ordered a small bottle of wine, then our first course arrived. I don’t remember much of the meal, but I do remember that one of the early items set before me was a plate adorned with exactly two stalks of asparagus and some house-made hollandaise sauce. We ate our food slowly. We had to, because the courses arrived slowly. Marilyn patiently explained to me that we were supposed to be having an interesting conversation, not just stuffing in the food as fast as possible.
We were at the middle of a long table that could hold perhaps a dozen people. There was not a lot of room between the tables in the alleyway, so I thought it would be hard for people to get behind us if we sat near the wall. And I also thought the waiters would have trouble delivering our food, and I was hungry! A small group of smartly dressed business men came and sat down at one end of our table, on the side away from the wall, and they all seemed quite busy talking business. (I am guessing about this, as I could not understand a word they said.) Then along came a nicely dressed older lady. She sat down between me and the businessmen, and she tried to talk to the businessmen, but they only spoke to her very briefly and returned to their own conversation.
About this time a group of musicians came by and wanted to play music for us. Neither I nor Marilyn were interested (we had no French money for the tip they would expect) but they were persistent. Finally, the manager came by and and told them to leave. He walked them out to the street just beyond the alley while he was arguing loudly with them, and they were gesticulating at him.
I wanted a quick dinner, but that was not to be… I was hungry and tired, and I was wanting a plate of some real food, not just a few leaves of lettuce and two asparagus stalks!
We meet la Dame du Brésil
While I was worrying about starving to death, Marilyn and the older lady had started talking. Marilyn translated for me. First the lady introduced herself, and explained that she had been a young girl in Paris during World War II. After the war she had married one of the former soldiers, and she had moved to Brazil with her new husband. They had lived on a big farm and had seven children together, and now her children had children, and she was a grandmother many times over.
She had come back to Paris for her first visit since she had left when she was nineteen years old. She explained that when her husband had died a year ago she had been devastated, and she had started to decline, both mentally and physically. Her oldest son saw this happening, and he called all of her offspring together and asked them for ideas to help her depression. Someone had suggested sending her back for a visit to her home country. They all had been told story after story about the Paris of her childhood. So the family had banded together and bought her an all-expenses-paid vacation trip to Paris. She was so happy to be back in her home city and country!
After we had talked for a while, the musicians whom the manager had run off earlier came back around to our café. The manager tried to run them off again, but the lady from Brazil jumped up and argued with him, and said that she would like to hear some music. Then she gave the musicians some money and asked them to play music from the 1930’s and 1940’s. So we were introduced to the French popular music of that era. The lady from Brazil loved it! (Marilyn recognized some of the songs of Edith Piaf, but there was much more.)
While this conversation was going on, the waiters had been coming by with more food, and I was feeling more comfortable, eating and talking with our new friend. I guess that I was adjusting to the Parisian way of doing things. Finally the restaurant was closing and everyone was leaving, so we parted ways, but not before agreeing to sit together again, if our schedules matched.
One last meal with La Dame du Brésil
We did a lot of exploring in Paris and we didn’t see La Dame du Brésil again until our final day at the hotel. We returned to the hotel early to pack and get ready for our next morning’s destination, Chartres. So we ate dinner at the hotel one last time, and we saw that one of the items on the menu was escargot and the other was duck. Marilyn had eaten escargot before, and she did not particularly like it. From her description, I decided not to order it. So we ordered the duck.
Shortly afterwards La Dame du Brésil came out and sat with us. She ordered the escargot, so we watched her eat it with a very small and very long fork. When she learned that I had never tasted this quintessential French dish, she insisted that I sample some. She herself was not an expert at eating escargot. As I said, the escargot came with a special fork, and she had some trouble getting the meat out of the shells. Perhaps she had not eaten escargot before, or maybe it’s difficult for everyone. She offered me a small bit. It reminded me of eating oysters — very chewy, with lots of garlic. She and Marilyn had a long and friendly chat that evening, telling me every so often what they were talking about. We parted from her early in the evening, because we needed to get ready for the next day and our journey to Chartres.
It was very interesting to meet this lady and I will remember it for a long time. At one point years later Marilyn and I wished we could contact her in Brazil. We searched the Internet for someone meeting her description, but we were not able to find anyone.