This afternoon, I didn’t even go out until after Marie left. When I did, I didn’t have any particular agenda, just more flaneuring. I didn’t want to go to another museum, was feeling pretty museumed out. I did want to buy a beret at one of the souvenir shops, something I’d never had the inclination to do in the past. I do like hats, would never wear a beret here, but will surely wear it at home. And then I just wandered through the Palais Royale gardens, which I don’t think I’d ever been to before. And into one of the little covered passages that are like the original shopping malls, but very beautiful. I stumbled upon Galerie Vivienne, which I had been to on a previous trip. Found a wonderful store that just sold paper flowers, beautiful ones, of all colors and sizes. The store itself was beautiful, especially from outside it, with the wonderful original mosaic floor of the Galerie. I bought a couple of small buds in purples and greens, with the intention of using them to make hatpins for my new berets! (yes, I confess I bought two, a purple one and a green.) Made in China, but I am not going for authenticity here. And I discovered a couple more beautiful little stores - a very nice toy store, and a store that made and sold exquisite and expensive miniatures of all kinds. There were many military type figures, but also cars, comic book characters, a Monet in his Giverny garden with the Japanese bridge, even a Josephine Baker in her famous banana skirt which had been discussed at The American University Josephine Baker symposium. And also some of the grotesque creatures depicted In Hieronymus Bosch’s paintings. Oh, and one of Trump holding a MAGA sign. I was good and didn’t buy any, but if they were much less than the 40 and plus euros each one cost, I probably would have. time to head home, back here to my abode for the last two weeks. I tried to eat as much food as I had left in the house, and succeeded in eating most of it – a half grapefruit, some smoked trout, some camembert, a half baguette Marie had picked up this morning, and a little of the very rich, delicious almond chocolate croissant she’d also picked up at the local bakery where I’ve been buying my baguettes and patisseries. Did I mention the raspberry eclairs I discovered this trip? With fresh raspberries of course. I sat out on the balcony eating the last of my Paris food and waiting for dark and for the illuminated Eiffel Tower. You can’t see it from the street, and I don’t think you can see it from most of the neighborhood apartments either. One would have to be on one of the higher floors, like this converted maid’s room I’m in. And you’d have to have a balcony too. I wonder if most people in the fancy abodes below know that you can see it from some of the high up lower rent district apartments like mine. I think I’ve seen my last of the Eiffel Tower alight. I am exhausted and ready to go to bed. And also have to wake up early to make sure to get to the airport on time and fly back to Barcelona. Not that I want to leave. Maybe I'll miss my flight. Last night abroad: I went back to the same hotel I’d stayed at with the mosaic group. It was a nice place with a wonderful breakfast buffet. And I was able . And I was able to leave my mosaic pieces and a few other things there while I went to Paris. It’s the Astoria Hotel, if anyone is looking for a Barcelona accommodation. It was about a fifteen minute walk from Livia’s mosaic studio, where we worked every morning, and also in walking distance of the Casas Battlo and Mila. I’d hoped to go to the Picasso Museum, but in fact was exhausted when I arrived at the hotel, even though it was still midafternoon. So I wound up sleeping the afternoon away. In the evening I went out for a walk, and then back to the same little outdoor café where I’d eaten the evening I’d originally arrived for the mosaic program. It was on the corner of the street the hotel was on, just a few doors away, and my tapas there and superb chocolate dessert (like a chocolate molten lava cake on steroids) were the perfect way to end my stay

I am sitting in my little studio which is wonderful, especially with its little balconies and view of the tower. I have tried to watch it light up every night but somehow missed the night it was lit up in blue and white in tribute to Israel having been attacked by Hamas a few days ago. The situation is still volatile, with Hamas threatening to kill Israeli hostages, of which there seem to be over 150 including children, for each attack by Israel, which has declared war on Hamas. I am actually surprised, though, by the strength in which France, the US, and other countries have come out in support of Israel, given how much criticism it has come under for its treatment of Palestinians. Yes, the violence is an atrocity, but is the Israeli government response much better? Today is my next to last day here. I have felt guilty just spending time in my little apartment, but have now convinced myself that it’s just as valid an experience hanging out here as wandering around the city. My only complaint is that it’s too hot! Really, in October. This is a very sunny apartment, and I have to keep moving around and moving tables and desk around to find a shady place. This apartment was once what they called a chambre de bonne, or maid’s room. They are small rooms that used to belong to the owners of the apartments below, with a separate back staircase leading up to them. Now they have become chic studios, or in some cases, student rooms, or so I’ve read. I once lived in one, in 1969 or 70. I remember my parents coming to visit. I’m sure they were shocked by the primitive conditions, although I don’t remember them saying so. I had only the room. The toilet was out in the hall, shared by all the rooms on the floor. I remember a family lived in two rooms next door, but don’t remember interacting with them. I don’t remember where I took showers. It must have been at school. I ate lunch at school, and probably just bread or patisseries for other meals. My friend Marie is coming in about an hour. We have been friends since college here. She was partly raised in the US, partly in Europe. She’d gone to high school at the American School in Madrid, where her father was the headmaster. Before that, he’d been headmaster at the Choate school in the US. She lives in Beaulieu, in the Loire valley, a tiny quaint town. She’d been an English teacher, is now retired. She is actually on her way to the US for a memorial service for her brother, although her other siblings still live in France. And her daughters, and grandchildren, live in England. We have managed to stay in touch all this time, although have just seen each other sporadically, mostly here in France. She did come to our wedding party in NY, though, bringing her youngest daughter, who was an infant at the time. I carried her baby into the party, wanting to shock my parents’ friends into thinking she was my baby. And I think I did, at least one or two. Really immature of me, I think now, especially since I was already 30 years old at the time. Marie will only be here around 24 hours. She has to depart about the same time tomorrow for the US. So it was really lucky that we were able to coordinate, since I am leaving just a day later. Yesterday, I went to see the badly damaged Notre Dame, being reconstructed for the last four years since the fire in 2019. They intend to have it finished next year, in time for the Olympics. I was expecting to get a small view and feel sad about the tragedy. But my reaction was different. I was overwhelmingly impressed by the scope of the project, with huge amounts of scaffolding and at least six cranes that I could see. Even though I’d seen a documentary on tv detailing the work of the restoration specialists, including finding trees to replace those burnt, and all kinds of ways they were reproducing the ancient techniques with which the cathedral was originally built in the middle ages. It just made me appreciate more all the work that was done to originally build the place, and respect all the work being done now even more. In a way, although it sounds strange, I feel like I appreciated the place even more than before it was damaged. I sat in one place for probably an hour, watching the cranes move and looking at the tiny workers high up on the scaffolding. I could have stayed even longer. I had deliberately gone to close to the place where I sat with a friend, Dieter, another student at the school, many decades ago, before dawn and similarly just stared at the cathedral. It was 1969 and I don’t remember how long we were there and what we’d done earlier that night. But I can guess we were high on hashish. The cathedral was in the process of being cleaned, a procedure that took a number of years, having become quite black over the centuries. We sat at the edge of the Seine. The side we were facing, and that I was facing yesterday, was still black, but the one around to the left had already been cleaned. At that time, I guess people had only known the cathedral as black. It must have been quite amazing to see it become white. And now most people only know it as white. Unless they are my age or older. I often think of Dieter. He became addicted to drugs, heroin I think, and as far as I can remember, joined the army because he thought he could obtain drugs more easily. I don’t know if that was true, or even if that was really the reason, or main reason, that he did enlist. I saw him once when he was on leave, and he told me about being a helicopter gunner, his job to knock off the people that tried to escape by clinging to the bottom of the helicopter as it took off. It’s now two days later, and my last night in Paris. I fly back to Barcelona tomorrow for one night, and then to Boston via London the next day. Loring has emerged from his adventures in the wilderness. I heard from him this morning. We will have lots of stories to trade when we see each other in a couple of days. Marie has come and gone. We met up yesterday afternoon at a café down the street from my apartment, right at the metro station. She had somehow gotten lost once she got to the train station in Paris and was quite late. She was pretty frustrated. I was fine. It’s hard to complain about waiting in a Paris café and watching the world go by. We went to the Pompidou yesterday after she dropped her suitcase at my place. It’s only a block from the Poissoniere metro, so very convenient, and I like the neighborhood very much. There’s a small supermarket across the street, and a bakery around the corner. The Pompidou was great. Their permanent collection is wonderful, and there was a Chagall exhibit. I hadn’t realized it, but the exhibit largely focused on his designs for the Opera Garnier ceiling, which I had just seen a few days before. There were lots of maquettes and sketches, as well as other designs for Stravinsky’s Firebird ballet. And several ceramic sculptures. I hadn’t known that he did ceramics. They had faces similar to some of his painted work. But my favorite pieces were a series of collages that combined painting and drawing with textural materials like lace.

There were some other fascinating works, including a tiny shop that had really existed, then been dismantled and reconstructed at the museum. It was very quirky and I wasn’t sure what it had actually sold. It was more of an art installation than any shop I’ve ever seen. Must have been quite something when it was out in the “real” world. Both of us were really tired but it was a while before we could pull ourselves away from the museum. By then we were hungry. There are tons of restaurants in the vicinity of the museum, but I assumed they would be tourist oriented, overpriced, and not great quality. That didn’t prove to be the case though. I had a delicious confit de canard, duck on the bone cooked in its fat, with potatoes and those wonderful thin French green beans. I really haven’t eaten at restaurants that much during my two weeks here. Not because I mind eating alone. I just seem to prefer having breakfast here, at the apartment, with some kind of snack during the day, a salad or a crepe, then something light back at home again in the evening. I think I’ve had just four real meals at restaurants over the last two weeks. A few days ago I went to try a restaurant a few blocks from here that my host, Paul, had recommended. When I got there, though, it was crowded and noisy, and even if there had been a table for me I don’t think I would have wanted to eat there. So I tried another restaurant I’d passed on the way, and had a delicious leg of lamb, with zucchini and potatoes, and a rich chocolate ganache desert. The server/owner spoke flawless English. Turns out she was originally from Connecticut but was married to a French man and has lived in Paris for many years. The name of the restaurant is Dylan.

Several days later… I am firmly ensconced in my Paris apartment, starting to settle into routines and realizing how quickly the time is going by. I may not get in as many museums as I had hoped. Have been to the Orsay, one of my and probably everyone’s favorites. And also to the Musee dArt de la Ville de Paris, where I had discovered the weird and wonderful Henry Darger on a previous trip. Maybe wonderful isn’t an accurate word, his work is pretty bizarre and dark. Look him up if you are interested in outsider art. Both his art and his life are intriguing, as I find true of many self-taught artists. It’s a great museum, with stupendous views of the Eiffel Tower and the Seine. It’s referred to as MAM, I just discovered. This time there were two special exhibits; you know, the ones where you stand in a slow-moving line for some time, then have to elbow your way up to each piece of art. Each of those had opened just a day or two before. One had long lines, the other had none, so I opted for that one. It’s an American artist, her name is Dana Schutz. Her work is shockingly stark with scenes of people consuming themselves and others, peppered with body parts and other graphic images. It’s interesting to come into a large exhibit with absolutely no expectations. The piece that appealed most to me depicted a group of men on some kind of outing, some carrying others, all in hyperreal images and colors. For some reason it reminded me of Clarence Thomas’ excursions with his super rich buddies. Just what was on my mind, I guess. I don’t think there were any severed body parts in that one! There was a short film of her being interviewed about her work, which I found intriguing. Interesting to see and hear a seemingly normal person whose art is so bizarre. Also at the museum was a room sized mural by Dufy depicting the dawning of electricity. And also several panels by Matisse of dancers. The original ones had been commissioned by Albert Barnes for his Philadelphia museum. I felt so cultivated, having seen those in Philadelphia a year or two ago. Fun fact: I just read (in Wikipedia) that Barnes’ wealth came from his development of a treatment for gonorrhea. The day before, I had gone to the Orsay, the stunning museum right on the river that was transformed some decades ago from a beautiful train station no longer in use.. A lot of the structural architecture was preserved, and there’s a short film depicting the transformation, that I hadn’t seen before. The current draw there is an exhibit of Van Gogh’s work of his frenetic last few months, while living in a village in Auvers-sur-Oise. I saw no mention in the exhibit of his specific affliction, but the described highs and lows sure sound like bipolar. I did find some research afterwards that agreed that he suffered from that disorder as well as psychoses, and possibly syphilis as well. Vincent had spent the previous year self-committed to an asylum in Provence. I had visited there a few years ago while at another mosaic workshop in Avignon. That hospital was fascinating, and if you are in Provence I highly recommend visiting there. It’s in the village of St. Remy. While there he painted many of his famous works including A Starry Night. This Paris show was one of those you indeed had to wait it line and elbow your way to see each piece. I had tried to get a ticket online, to no avail, because of a problem with an additional code for my charge card. So I went directly to the museum, had to wait in a line for folks without reservations to just get in the door, probably 45 minutes or so. Not too enjoyable but worth the wait. And it’s hard to complain about standing in the warm sun surrounded by the beautiful architecture of Paris. And eavesdropping on the conversations of my fellow waiters in line. Van Gogh was extremely prolific those last months. I think he did about 300 pieces while there. One was painted on the day he shot himself, dying three days later. The exact site of that last work, a tangle of trees, was just recently identified by an art scholar. He identified it when going through postcards during the pandemic.

I keep meaning to read the book about how his brother supported him, and how his sister-in-law was actually the one who promoted his work and was responsible for his fame, only after his death. Actually I think there’s a couple of books, one based on the numerous letters he wrote to his brother Theo, and the other I think focused on the story of his sister in law, Jo, Theo’s wife, who was responsible for bringing Van Gogh’s work to light. Just looked them up, one is Dear Theo, the other is The Secret Life of Sunflowers. If anyone has read either or both and has an opinion, let me know! One night I went to a performance at the Olympia. It is the famous concert hall where many well known musicians have performed and continue to perform. It is not the exact space, they tore it down some years ago but preserved the facade. This show sounded unusual, it was called One Night in Tunisia. It sounded like a panoply of performers with a large band. I took a chance, wanting to be in the space as much as seeing a particular performer. I had been there once before, in 1970, to see Simon and Garfunkel. I have a clear image of Art Garfunkel hitting those exquisitely high notes of Bridge over Troubled Water. And that’s about all I remember. It didn’t strike me until I was there that the title of the show “One Night in Tunisia was in English. And that was about the only English I heard during the show, it was in a combination of French and Arabic, neither of which I could understand much. There were two co mc’s, a band of about a dozen, and an audience that seemed to know most of the lyrics. I wish I could have understood what they were singing about. Many were ballads or pop type numbers. Most striking was a violinist who played and sang intensely. I was prepared to not like her based solely on her outfit that reminded me of a dance hall lady (not the reggae kind, the saloon kind) more than a concert performer. But she was a superb performer, and I forgave her décolleté outfit. I later found her name by googling Tunisian woman violinist, and there she .was, Yasmine Aziez, a British-born violinist of Tunisian descent . She currently resides in Tunisia. But she had lived in Boston and studied at the Boston Conservatory! The audience was more than enthusiastic, and very mixed by age. Many women and some men undulated their hands or arms while they listened, some while holding their phones. I was tempted to also. And there was a good deal of the vibrating vocalizing one hears in some Arabic music, from musicians and also audience, called ululation. The word in Arabic is zaghreba, or something close to that. It was all very interesting. But most intriguing to me was the Tunisian hip hop group. The rhythms were certainly recognizable as rap. But the music was quite different, more melodic and with all the instruments of the band behind them, including lots of violins.” And, a bagpipe! The bagpiper came forward and riffed with the rappers. The other performance I attended was the Paris Opera Ballet at the Palais Garnier. The Garnier is a beautiful and historic theatre, with a ceiling designed by Chagall, and is also the setting for the Phantom of the Opera. They give tours, which I have been on twice, once by myself and a second time with Loring. But I had never attended a performance. Before leaving home, I had checked their schedule, only to find out that the entire season was sold out. Nevertheless, I went to the box office to see if they had any single tickets, and they did. I wound up sitting in the second row. And with the orchestra pit between me and the stage, it was perfect. It was a performance of three half hour pieces by three different choreographers. Although it’s called the Paris Opera Ballet, this was not traditional ballet, no toe shoes or tutus, nor traditional gendered roles. The performance was terrific, more what I would call modern dance, and I felt very lucky to have obtained the ticket. The curtain calls must have gone on for at least 10 or 15 minutes, with many bravos. The only performance I can recall attending with such extensive curtain calls was when I cut school when I was about 14 or 15 and wound up getting last minute tickets to see Nureyev and Fontaine at Lincoln Center. Maybe long curtain calls are common at ballet, I don’t know. But it was exhilarating, especially from so close. Well, there were a couple of other performances. One was the chanteuse and dancer at the Josephine Baker symposium I previously mentioned. And I must mention a performance I came across briefly in the metro. I could hear the singing and music echoing from several corridors away, and then came across a group of Ukrainian men, perhaps six or eight of them, singing a powerful chorus in beautiful harmony.

Now several days later. I have been either too busy or too tired to write. I have settled into my apartment and somewhat of a routine. Read and take it easy in the am, with some breakfast at home. I bought some groceries in the market across the street my first day here. Now am well supplied with cheese, crackers, fig jam, bananas, skyr, which is like yogurt but thicker. Supposed to have less calories and more protein than Greek yogurt, but to me tastes richer and more like sour cream. Excellent with bananas. I have only eaten one meal out so far, at a café. Have been happy with my own foods and a pastry every couple of days. Plus have had snacks at a couple of events. Yesterday I went to visit my old school, the American College when I was there, now the American University and pretty much unrecognizable as the place I attended. I stumbled upon a Josephine Baker symposium and spent a couple of hours there. I plan to go back for the second session this afternoon. There was a panel with a few Baker scholars and enthusiasts, and the attendees seemed to be a mix of students and other interested folks. One of the panelists was one of Baker’s twelve adopted children. She had called them her rainbow tribe, and apparently adopted them with the intension to create a diverse and compatible family and model for living. During a break, I opened one of the books for sale, I believe written by one of the panelists. The page I randomly opened to was a photo of Baker with eight of her twelve children, and the little girl she was holding was Maryann, her daughter who was sitting next to me at the event! The highlight of the session was a music and dance performance featuring a snazzily dressed woman who’d been sitting in the audience, who sang in both French and English. Then a dancer who seemed to be channeling Baker burst into the room and danced around the audience. It was magical. There happened to be an informal alumni get together that evening. Coincidentally, there was also an alumni event in Boston yesterday as well. I have never had much contact with alumni or the school, and wouldn’t have gone to the Boston event if I’d been home. But this was interesting and fun. Good food too, and, of course, wine. And there was an activity run by one of the art teachers in the new art building. We did printing with potatoes. But the best part was the socializing. I talked to a number of recent graduates as well as some older ones. But none who dated back nearly as far as me. Or so I thought. Until someone introduced me to Rozey. She actually held the record, having predated me by a couple of years. I arrived in 1969, the year after she graduated. The school had only been in existence a few years at that point. Rozey lives in Paris, as do mostly all of the people in attendance. She was originally from Iran, had completed her studies there after ACP, and then the Iranian revolution occurred and her whole world was shattered. I'm not sure what or where the rest of her life has been, but she did mention having lived in LA at some point. We talked for a bit, and I wished I’d had the opportunity to talk to her further. (but the potato printing was about to begin! The last few days here I have been mostly a flaneur, the French term for someone who wanders thru a city without a set plan, just observing and enjoying the environment. It’s what I most like to do here. The term was originally applied just to men, but has broadened over time. I read this morning of a different form of the word, flaneuse, indicating a woman. Part of the description was that it was different than a flaneur not solely because of the word’s gender, but because a flaneuse, a woman, observed the world differently than a man. I’m not sure whether that’s supposed to be a feminist perspective, it has me a bit confused. Well, flaneur or flaneuse, I'm soon to do head out to do some flaneuring. To backtrack to Barcelona, the original motivation for this trip. I had heard about a mosaic trip there, to both learn mosaic techniques and to do some touring around the city and the area, home to Gaudi and his famous mosaic and architectural work. I’d been on the groups’s waiting list and a space opened up, and I didn’t hesitate much. And because a week in Europe seems hardly enough (although some of the group did just that) I thought might as well go to Paris, because, well, why not. So I rented a place for two weeks, and here I am. In Barcelona we spent mornings making mosaics and afternoons touring. We went to the famous Gaudi mosaiced Park Guell, Gaudi’s Casa Mila and Casa Battlo, as well as the famous and not yet finished Cathedral, la Sagrada Familia. I’d been to Guell Park and Casa Battla before, about 20 years ago, and to Sagrada Familia 15 years ago with Carolina. I have a great picture of her observing the very much under construction interior. The crossed straps on her dress echo the construction materials inside. In our current visit everyone in my group seemed very impressed with the cathedral, which is now scheduled to be finished in about a year after many decades of construction. I must admit I find it very overwhelming and unappealing, especially the exterior, which looked to me like a mishmash of styles and reminded me of the drippings of a mud castle. And once I saw the image of Jesus hanging on the cross inside, suspended from the ceiling, that looked to me like he was hang gliding, I could not get that image out of my head. Sorry if I’ve offended anyone. I had been at Casa Battlo before. My memory is that I just walked by and saw that it was open to visitors, and went in. From what I’ve heard it had just opened as a museum shortly before that.

And I remember reading that Casa Mila was an inhabited apartment building and not open to visitors. It apparently opened as a museum shortly after I was there. Casa Mila was built for a wealthy family who occupied the entire first floor. And there were four apartments above, two on each floor. Part of the deal was that descendants of the original apartment owners could still live there provided that they were continuously occupied by family. And two of the four apartments are still lived in by members of those families. The rest is a museum. Both Casa Battlo and Casa Mila were designed by Gaudi for individual families, are architectural wonders and musts to visit if you are in Barcelona, despite the crowds that now visit and the advance reservations you have to make. Perhaps the best excursion we made was a couple of hours outside Barcelona to Salvador Dali’s house. I had known nothing about it and it was absolutely fascinating. The house was constructed by connecting what had been six separate fisherman’s shacks. The place undulates from section to section and is full of quirks and oddities. Much of the story is of Dali’s wife and maybe muse, Gala, and their unconventional relationship. The furnishings are all original. The bedroom is where Gala died. We finished off that day’s excursion with a visit to an elegant restaurant and winery, where we had a beautiful lunch. There were courses of olives, tomato bread (ubiquitous here) watermelon tomato gazpacho, salad, pork with local mushrooms, and dessert, all paired with wines. It was impressive but a bit over the top for me. Our trip ended when we returned to the city. Many of us gathered in the hotel bar to say goodbye. Some were heading home, some to other parts of the continent, and a few were staying in Barcelona for a few more days. In all, our group was 22. A dozen were participants in the mosaic workshop. Another three were spouse/partners of mosaic people. There were a mother and daughter, and two eighty year old women who had been friends since high school in Yonkers, NY where my parents lived for many years, and where my sister also went to high school.) Also one woman who carried an oxygen tank the entire trip, and kept with everyone at least as well as I did. Many of the participants had either travelled with Bonnie before or participated in some of her workshops at home. I think nearly everyone beside me knew at least one other person from before the trip. Sadly, two of the participants, a couple, came down with covid after the first day, and were confined to their hotel room until the last day. Another tested positive the last day, and two more a day or two after the trip had ended. The couple who got it first had both been through some serious non covid related health issues over the past year, with one of them requiring additional surgery after their return. Perhaps because they’d already dealt with so much, they seemed to handle the covid,frustration and isolation better than one would have expected. I’ll stop here, having caught up, and go on to actually doing something out in the world today. Updates soon!

Two Special Cities

October 2023 I have come to Barcelona to join a mosaic workshop, organized by an American mosaic artist, Bonnie Fitzgerald. She has organized a number of mosaic trips before, and several of the people in this group have travelled with her previously. I like to travel with a purpose. For many years it has been through Volunteers for Peace. With them I have gone to Thailand, Peru, France, Romania, Israel, Ukraine, and more. Most but not the projects all have been related to the arts Most of them are documented further back in this blog. But more recently, I have become less inclined to participate with bare bones accommodations, like sleeping on the floor in a room with a dozen, and the like. It’s not sleeping on the floor itself that’s a problem, I’ve done that often enough camping in Maine. But having to step over many bodies, sharing one toilet and shower with a dozen, etc, that’s becoming less appealing in recent years. Although I wouldn’t rule it out for the right project. So, more recent trips have taken me mostly on art related trips, particularly to participate in mosaic learning. it was my original mosaic volunteer project in Paris, though, to create a mosaic mural to brighten a housing project in an immigrant neighborhood, that started me off in doing mosaic work in the first place. I am still very impressed and proud of the beautiful mural we created those 14 years ago. Unfortunately I have never been able to find it when visiting Paris, and was told recently that it had been put in storage. But it still exists in pictures and in my mind.

Well, that’s as far as I got in documenting my adventures while I was in Barcelona. We kept a busy schedule with mornings mosaicing and afternoons visiting various sites. I am now writing from Paris on the second stint of my adventures. So let me catch you up to date here, and then I will backtrack to Barcelona and try to recount some of our adventures there. I am now writing from my abode in Paris, in the 9th arrondissement. It’s a neighborhood I am not very familiar with, although I have spent time visiting and wandering the Garnier Opera area and the Grands Magasins (elegant old department stores in previous trips. I chose this place partly because I have become partial to apartments with views of the Eiffel Tower. (who wouldn’t be?!) So while I haven’t made it a prerequisite I have made it a priority in looking for a place to stay. I’d say the last three or four times I’ve been here I have managed to find one. I don’t think one can fully appreciate the tower without seeing it lit up at night and especially the glittering lights every hour starting at dark and continuing until midnight. And since I don’t tend to be out and about anywhere near that late this is a great way to view it. (provided I can even stay awake that late. Which I did last night, my first night here.) • I arrived yesterday afternoon from Barcelona. Was planning to take a taxi into town when the man next to me asked if I wanted to share a cab. He was British but living outside Barcelona where he and his wife both did tech work from their home in the country. He was heading to a bachelor party in Paris overnight, heading home the next day.

Last Days in Ho Chi Mihn City/Saigon

 We are on our way home in line at the Emirate Airlines counter.  Our flight is at midnight.  We'd been told to arrive at 7pm, which seemed earlier than necessary. So we got here at 8pm, and the counter doesn’t open until 8:55 pm. That’s only 10 minutes from now. 

 And at precisely 8:55 a line of uniformed ticket agents stands facing us, bow, assume their stations, and the line begins to move. Efficient and charming.  

And that illustrates how all the service personnel in hotels, restaurants and other locales along the way has been. Everyone has been polite and friendly. Sometimes it feels to the point of subservient and a little uncomfortable. I do like the slight bowing, though. 

 

We spent the last two days of our trip in Saigon. Though Ho Chi Mihn City is now its official name, and has been since the war ended in 1975, it is often still called Saigon, understandable since HCMC is a bit cumbersome to say, and also because Saigon has historically been its name. It doesn’t seem to be an issue.  

I was expecting to not be overly impressed with Saigon, having somehow had the impression that Hanoi had more character and charm. So I was pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed our stay as much as I did.  We were at the Grand Hotel, a historic place built in the 1930s, in the center of the city. It was surrounded by numerous other luxury hotels. It was probably the ritziest of the hotels we stayed at, although the Morin in Hue was pretty elegant too.   There was a courtyard with a nice pool, and our room had an impressive view of the skyline and river.  

We went to the War Remnants Museum, which is a representation of what the Vietnamese call the American War. It was one of the most moving and upsetting places I have ever been, on a par with places like Auschwitz and the September 11th Museum, and the Holocaust Museums I have been to. There were a certain number of foreign tourists, few of whom were Americans. Many of the visitors were groups of school children, largely of middle school age. One exhibit was the photography of a number of foreign journalists, a couple of whose names I remembered, all of whom had died in the war. It was chilling to read their last reports, and then that they had died the following day.  

Most upsetting was the exhibit about Agent Orange. There were graphic photos of people with horrible birth defects, both physical and mental. And US soldiers as well as Vietnamese citizens have been affected by the the chemicals, down through subsequent generations.  

Kim, our guide, had warned us when he dropped us off at the museum that we would see a different perspective on the war from what we were used to. I think he expected us to be surprised. I wasn’t at all surprised, and in general felt that the presentation was fairly even-handed. Yes, the U.S. was presented as the enemy. Well, we were, and I didn’t get the feeling of the US being an evil empire or anything like that. The message I got was more that war is evil.  

I would like to have known what the school children were told, and thought, about the war.  

I am glad that we had Kim and our driver to take us and pick us up from the places we went. We could have gone by cab, but it was so much easier to have rides arranged. The city is vast and sprawling, and I am glad we were in the area we stayed in. 

From our hotel room the day we arrived, we could hear extremely loud music, even with the windows closed. And from the lovely rooftop bar, (high on my list of hotel criteria, for the view, not the bar part) the music was equally loud and annoying.  

When we went for a walk, we discovered the source. There was a festival on the main walking mall. There was a stage, tables and chairs and rows of more chairs. And dozens of women and men in traditional costumes and a large number of additional costumes hanging and performers waiting in a backstage area. We discovered that it was the annual Ao Dai Festival, celebrating the traditional Vietnamese costume, consisting of a long silk tunic with slits up the sides, paired with silk trousers in a matching or contrasting color. They are worn by men as well as women, and there were men wearing them in the presentation as well as in the audience.  

We watched the show for a while, including numerous speeches and presentations of flowers, to Vietnamese and foreign dignitaries and celebrities. We understood none of it, of course.  The performances were mostly parades of young women and men, fashion show style. Some of the performances  included music and projections, and dancing with fans and such. One was a group of blind children singers. 

A young woman pop singer performed. Then a male singer with blond hair sang a few songs. Some of it was in English. Loring caught a few words that sounded like field, mines, and helicopter. He sang it in both Vietnamese and English. We later found out from Kim that he was American, came to Vietnam as a volunteer from Princeton in 2009, sang in karaoke bars and eventually a singing competition, then became a phenomenon. He has become a Vietnamese citizen, is married to a Vietnamese woman. We found him online and the lyrics to the song, which indeed included fields and helicopters, but what Loring heard as mine”” was actually “rice.” His name is Kyo York.  

We went to dinner, then returned to the festival which was still going strong, and we watched a little longer. It was the whole phenomenon that most interested me, rather than the performances themselves. There were the invited and/or paying guests, then all of us behind the barricades, It was almost entirely locals, many with kids, trying to see from the sidelines. 

The Art Museum doesn’t seem to be on any of the tourist itineraries, but is well worth visiting. It is three buildings and contains both Vietnamese and foreign art, from early artifacts to modern painters. Most interesting to me were some large lacquer paintings that depicted scenes during wartime. I had never seen lacquer used that way, am more familiar with it on decorated plates and boxes which are easily found in the souvenir shops here. (I resisted.) 

At the museum, we were especially entertained by the many young women posing with the art and the architecture (it’s a beautiful old building) taking large numbers of selfies and each other and the art, and sometimes by the young men they were with. They were clearly planning to post numerous pix to social media. Many were wearing the ao dai or other fancy outfits. It really was quite amusing. I wondered if this was related to the festival or if it was an ongoing pastime.  It also was similar to the scene in Hoi An, where there were numerous women wearing the outfits and posing at various places along the river. We’d been told at the time that they were foreign Asian tourists, but I am now wondering if they were mostly or all Vietnamese.  

The first place we’d seen people walking and posing in the outfits was actually in Hanoi at one of the temples. Our guide there said people rented them on the site.   

Our last day in Saigon, and in the country, until our midnight flight home, was when we went to the art museum.  Then we lounged at and in the pool and finished our stay in a wonderful way with a performance at the Saigon Opera House. I was thrilled that we were able to get tickets, because it was a company called the Bamboo Circus that we had tried to see in Hoi An, but they were not performing that night. I hadn’t thought we’d be able to see it in Saigon either, because we were leaving that night. But the show was at 6pm and our flight was at midnight, so it worked out. We got the tickets that am, and there weren’t many left. The Opera House was only a five-minute walk from our hotel. Before the show there was a 15-minute tour of the theatre. 

It was a great performance and way to end our stay. Bamboo Circus is an apt name. They perform three different shows in three cities – Hanoi, Hoi An, and Saigon. If we had been able to see one in one of the previous cities, I think I would have wanted to see a second one. It was that good. It’s about 20 gymnastic performers plus a number of musicians playing both traditional and modern instruments (ie a four- or five-piece rock band.)  They use bamboo as a symbol of the culture, but also as the means for performing a creative variety of innovative scenes, using poles, baskets, and other props.  The scenes were very creative and the performers very talented. They went from depicting workers in fields to construction workers and break dancers in the city.  

Again, I hadn’t seen mention of the show in any tourist itineraries I’d looked at although it was surely included in many group tours. Just a reminder to myself to try and do a little more homework if we do a private tour like this again, to make sure that we include the places I want to go.  

But for the most part, we were both really pleased with the way this trip worked out, and very impressed with the tour company’s arrangements for our guides and drivers, connections, and lodging. I did choose many of the hotels myself. It’s hard to know if the places they’d suggested would have been as nice, not as nice, or nicer! 

 

One place I realize I neglected to mention in Hoi An is a café/ crafts store called Reaching Out. It features crafts all by people with disabilities.  The café workers are clients as well. I watched a man precisely cutting small bamboo sticks and assembling them, without first realizing that he was making paper lanterns. I also hadn’t realized that the people all had disabilities, and that he had the use of only one hand, until another employee told me. Lanterns are a big part of Hoi An, they are everywhere.  I brought home a couple, of course.  

I’m going to end with a list of the Vietnam related books we read and a list of the places we stayed. 

  

The Quiet American           Graham Greene  

Aloha Vietnam                      Elizabeth Nguyen  

The Mountains Sing            Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai  

The Beauty of Humanity Movement: Camilla Gibb 

Mãn                                         Kim Thúy 

And I'd be remiss if I didn't mention The Things we Carried, by Tim O'Brien, although I didn't read it on this trip but many years ago. It is one of the most beautifully written and powerful books I've ever read, not only about the Vietnam War, but in general. I probably should read it again.

 

 

 

 The places we stayed: 

 

Hanoi              The Chi Hotel         

Halong Bay   The Peony Cruise    

Hue                Hotel Saigon Morin   

Hoi An            La Luna Resort  

Quy Nhon     The Avani           

Mekong       Bamboo Eco Lodge  

Saigon          The Grand Hotel     

 

Until our next adventure!