Give me a break

I'll be hanging out around here for the next month, so French posts will be on hiatus until I move to Lyon at the end of September. Till then, enjoy some Lake Tahoe pics, and if they make you feel so inclined, come visit me :)

Space and the Cultural Divide

Everything is relative. Even something which could seem as universal as the difference between the public and private spheres. There are some things that we all have been socialized to keep in the private sphere, knowing that not all things are meant to be shared in public.

This socialization however, entirely depends, like everything else, on the culture you in which are raised. Confrontation with the practices and mores of another culture can be anywhere from funny, to unsettling to shocking. France, naturally, has its own codes of conduct, and an especially strict line separating the public from the private sphere, a line that is much less permeable than in the US. As I mentioned in my entry on Rue des Rosiers, eating, for example, is absolutely considered part of the private sphere. We do not share our crumbs with our neighbors on the sidewalk. Besides that, as eating forms a very important and essential part of the French culture, it is an activity to enjoy, to spend hours over multiple courses and endless wine. Shoving a sandwich in your face as you run to catch the metro to work may be an acceptable sight in NYC, but in Paris, it elicites disapproving glances and sarcastic "bon appetits."

This line affects much more than eating habits. It is even in great part responsible for the fact that women didn't get the vote until 1944, and only recently began entering politics in large(r) numbers. Women were traditionally and strictly considered part of the private, domestic sphere, thus excluding them from politics, considered strictly part of the public sphere. The idea of women entering the sphere reserved for men--the public/political--was nothing short of revolutionary.

Their more reserved behavior--which can sometimes be mistaken for coldness--is also related to this public/private division. Just because they aren't yelling to each other across the metro car or smiling at every passerby doesn't mean that "the French" are any more unfriendly than anyone else, and I personally have had many more positive experiences with les Francais than negative. As the authors of 60 Million Frenchmen Can't Be Wrong observed: "Oddly, Anglo-Americans can see that the Japanese, Chinese, and the Indians are different, and that these fundamental differences shape the way things are done in those societies. Why can't we do this with the French?" A little cultural relativity never hurt anyone.


After being immersed in all things French for the past year and spending two months straight in this country, three days in the Netherlands presented a number of striking contrasts (besides of course the pot-filled coffee shops and scantily clad prostitutes decorating the windows of the red light district), one of which stood out, something seemingly small that in fact represents fundamental cultural differences. I began noticing the large, often un-curtained windows that make up much of the Hollandaise architecture. The fact that I could often quite easily peek into someone's private apartment started to surprise me and I realized that was because I had gotten so used to the French public-private mentality. It was when, on our way to the Anne Frank house, Ahjin and I passed by an apartment, windows wide open, into which we could have easily climbed and sat down next to the Dutch girl reading on her bed, that I really became conscious of this contrast. In doing so, I recalled a story our Colonial Algeria professor told us earlier this summer on this exact subject. She had spent some time living in Belgium, and this kind of public living--large windows allowed just as much looking in as looking out--both unsettled and shocked her French sensibilities. Coming from a society constructed around a very strict dichotemy of public-private space, she couldn't understand this Northern European mentality. As pictured above, the apartments tend to have large, shutter-less windows that seem to welcome outside world in. In France, the apartments are often higher off street level, with skinny shuttered or curtained windows. In Paris especially, they are often set back and even will have a little balcony gate in front of them. Next time you're in France, see how many windows you can see through. My guess would be not many.

To get back to those prostitutes--in the 19th century, France decided to get prostitution out of the public view by enclosing it in houses that looked bourgeois on the outside with only a little red light indicating what went on inside. One quick walk through Amsterdam's "Red Light district" will show how this culture chose a very different approach, putting prostitutes on display and giving "window shopping" a whole new meaning.

A Taste of the Orient in Paris

The #1 most-popular dish in France is not escargot, crêpes, steak tartare or duck a l'orange. No, en fait, it is the humble, and completely un-French couscous.

During the 19th and 20th centuries, part of France's colonial empire included a huge chunk of North Africa--Morocco (protecterate 1912-1956), Tunisia (occupied 1881-1956) and most importantly, Algeria (French colony and officially part of France 1830-1962). Because of this, as well as its proximity to these three nations, there is a large Maghreban presence in France. (The "Maghreb" is an Arab word meaning "west," but from their point of view, used by the Occident to designate this clump of North Africa, thus rendering it senseless, and the "maghrebans" only refer to themselves as such in an official capacity)

Part of this presence is, naturally, a large number of North African restaurants especially in Paris (and Marseille as well--the first city they reach across the Mediterranean). Over the past few weeks, I have gone to 3 different "Maghreban" restaurants, and have now had enough couscous to last me for the next few months.

The two main types of dishes you find at these restaurants are couscous of course, and tajines. The couscous is served on a communal dish, with another dish full of sauce/vegetables, and then individual plates piled with whatever meat you ordered. A tajine is a kind of stew that gets its name from the dish it is cooked in--a tajine--which keeps the food really hot and infuses it with amazing flavor. The lid is kind of like a party hat or an upside-down funnel (without the actual funnel) which they remove upon serving you, revealing a mass of steam and delicious odors--cinnamon, apples, roasted duck (in my case).

If the couscous hasn't yet fully expanded in your stomach, it's time for dessert! Besides some typical French desserts that sometimes sneak their way into the menu, oriental pastries (often filled with marzipan and flavored with orange flower), orange and cinnamon salad, fresh fruits, "crème parfumée à l'eau de rose," and of course, "thé à la menthe" (mint tea) await you.
The mint tea is a must--it is an experience in itself. They pour your tea in front of you from a silver pot way up high into skinny class cups from which you can enjoy this sweet and refreshing drink.

If you're on a budget, short on time or need a little break from France, a little trip to North Africa via one of the following restaurants (or the hundreds of other options all over the city), is the best (and tastiest) way to experience a new culture:

Chez Berbert ($$)

71 blvd du Montparnasse (15e metro: Montparnasse-Bienvenue)

(2 other locations: chezberbert.com)

Le Tajine ($) (pictured above)

10 rue Sophie Germain (14e, metro: Mouton Duvernet)

Le 404 ($$$)

69 rue des Gravilliers (3e, metro: Arts et Metiers)

Also recommended--A tour of the beautiful Grande Mosquée de Paris followed by some mint tea and a pastry or even a whole meal (still on my to-do list) at the courtyard restaurant.

A Jewish Crossroads

For my urban anthropology of Paris class, we were supposed to choose a place for an enquete de terrain, a mini investigation in which we could combine history, observation and interviews. The first place that popped into my head was Place des Vosges, my favorite lieu in Paris. However, I finally settled on a different place, not too far away--the street known as la rue des Juifs, or the street of the Jews, Rue des Rosiers.

Despite the fact that the non-formal celebration of Passover and Chanukah is about the extent of my Judaism, I have nonetheless always had soft spot for Jewish history, and my friends and family are well aware of my morbid fascination with the Holocaust. In college, my roommate Julie would get excited for me when I took a class on "my peeps" and she really enjoyed taking a surreptitious shot of me with some Orthodox Jews in the old Venetian ghetto--the first in the world--that I forced her to find with me (no easy feat in Venice). I haven't yet had an opportunity in my masters program to write a paper on Jews in France, so I figured it was now or never.

This street has been the heart of Paris' most famous Jewish quarter since the middle ages. Despite expulsions from the city, they always come back--and some accounts even attest to a continuous presence. Thus this street tells the history of Parisian Jews as one of longue duree, or "long term," which refers to the continuous presence of certain basic structures despite larger changes in history.

One aspect that becomes immediately clear, at least to a student of Paris, is that this street, and in fact much of the Marais, escaped the face-lift given to the city in the mid-19th century by Baron Haussmann under Napoleon III. He was the one who created the wide boulevards and the stereotypical grayish-white, blue-roofed buildings found throughout the city. Here, the streets are still short and narrow and a mish-mash of architectural styles.

As for the Jewish presence itself, though it is not what it once was, with many of the spaces now filled with clothing stores and boutiques, it is still the defining characteristic of this street. Any day of the week (besides Saturday), you'll see any number of yamakas making their way through the crowd, as well as a whole range of other traditional Jewish headgear and clothing, often being immortalized on some tourist's digital camera, for the slide show back home.

Every other shop is still firmly Jewish. Besides the falafel places, there are at least 5 bakery/cafes selling Central and Eastern European gastronomie--latkas, parogies, knish, strudel and more. There are bookstores, an imprimerie (paper/printing store), art galleries, jewelry stores, judaica shops--even an alterations place. On the side streets (rue des Ecouffes, rue Pavee, rue F. Duval, rue des Hospitalieres St. Gervais), the trend continues, with a number of delis, butchers and other miscellaneous shops and restaurants.

If you take a closer look, you'll notice plaques all along the street and on some of the side streets as well. Each one is in memory of Jews deported during WWII, several of them children (165 from the primary school just of Rue des Rosiers on Rue des Hospitalieres St. Gervais). The memory of the Holocaust is never very far from any Jewish community, and this is certainly no exception. Important to note on the different plaques is whether or not they admit the collaboration of the Vichy government (the official French government during Occupation). It took France decades to finally begin to accept that the majority of the French were not in fact part of the Resistance, a myth inspired by Charles De Gaulle and clung to until the overwhelming evidence proved otherwise (namely through the Robert Paxton's Vichy France). Once again, Jews came back to this quartier after the war. Millions of years of persecution has taught them great resilience and persistence.

Here's a slideshow of some pics I snapped during my enquete.
I took most of them on a Saturday (the sabbath), so it looks a little dead. Normally it is much more lively, especially on Sundays. Click on it for a better look and to read my captions!





Rue des Rosiers is the place to be on Sundays. When the rest of Paris closes its doors for a day off--according to Christian tradition--the Jewish establishments lining this street welcome you with open arms. Apparently, this is no secret, as my Sunday experience was not unlike a day at Disneyland or a New York street fair. What it certainly was not, was another dead Sunday in Paris.

The second you get to the intersection of Rue des Rosiers and Rue des Ecouffes, you are plunged into the ceaseless falafel war between the famous L'As du Falafel and its unfortunate neighbor just across the narrow street, Mi-Va-Mi. The desperate employees of the latter establishment fling a basket of their fresh falafel in your face, begging you to choose them instead this time. On either side of the street, employees reach farther out into the intersection attempting to grab customers before the other can pounce. As both offer a bottomless basket of warm samples to tempt the confused and fumbling tourist into their line, the best strategy is to take a bite before choosing sides. Everyone has their opinion. While Lenny Kravitz, any number of websites, and salivating customers in the mile-long line swear by L'As, Mi-Va-Mi has its cheerleaders as well. Personally, I found their falafel has too much cilantro for my taste. The round, older man of L'As, who has turned customer-grabbing into an art form, won my heart along with their delicious falafel. Between puffs on his cigar, he calls out to passersby, whom he assumes MUST be on their way to L'As, "Falafel? Falafel? Vous voulez du falafel? A emporter ou sur place! To take away or eat here!" Yet somehow, he still found time to smilingly bring me a chair and a fork, without me even asking.

This magical street, a street that seems to be hors de Paris (outside of Paris) is, I have decided, a sort of crossroads, where everything comes together and shakes hands before heading off in another direction. Historically, this neighborhood was often a stopping point for new Jewish immigrants, just arrived from Eastern Europe, before they became established enough to move on up (toooo the east side...oh wrong city). Today it is where history meets memory, the past meets the present, tourist meets the local, religious meets the profane, private meets public, East meets West (Europe that is), and even where meet Jews of all different backgrounds. My North African falafel sandwich and Eastern European linzer torte can attest to that.

Bastille Day

I thought you all might enjoy a little taste of Bastille Day! Here's a video of the fireworks from the roof of my friend's apartment, Eiffel Tower on the left, Hotel des Invalides on the right (where Napoleon tomb is). Oh, and don't mind our commentary...

Just as we call our Independence Day the 4th of July, Bastille Day is referred to in France as "le 14 juillet" or the 14th of July. Their version is a commemoration of the storming of the Bastille (a old prison on what used to be the outskirts of Paris) on July 14th, 1789, the event which jumpstarted the French Revolution and turned France from a monarchty into a republic (well, for the first time anyway...). A bankrupt monarchy, disgruntled bourgeoisie, increasing food prices and bread shortages, plus, let's not forgot the heat (and several other more complicated details that I'm sure I would bore you with), led a mob of Parisians to flood the streets on July 14 and storm the Bastille in search of arms and amunition, and ended up freeing the prisoners. Though there were only 7 at the time, the event's importance stemmed more from what the Bastille symbolized (the monarchy and its abuses of power) than from the "liberation" of these prisoners.

Thus began the French Revolution, which lasted for another 10 years, changing constitutions and governments like a girl changes clothes, until Napoleon came to power and the day lives on in infamy, commemorated with a military parade on the Champs-Elysee and fireworks on the Champs de Mars (at the Eiffel Tower)!

At the Library

This time around, my study abroad program expects us to use French libraries for our research papers. I guess that's one of those differences between undergrad and graduate studies...

You might be thinking, oh cool, a French library, doing it like a real etudiante francaise, plus, it looks pretty nice in there (Bibliotheque Sainte Genevieve at left), with its gorgeous 19th century interior, what's so bad about that? Well I'll tell you.

First, there's no air conditioning, quelle surprise. When it's 90 degrees outside, it gets a little toasty, making it hard to concentrate--not to mention stay awake. According to my professor, an air-conditioned library is in fact "execrable."

So why don't you just take the books outside, to a nice park, to an air-conditioned Starbucks, or even your room where you can use the fan? you may ask. Ha ha. Silly Americans. That would be because you can't check books out! Many libraries here only allow on-site consultation. As far as I know, only the small municipal libraries allow you to borrow books, and the chances those will have what you need for an academic paper--especially one on women and colonialism--are pretty slim. And last but not least, limited hours and closed on Sundays. Thus, for the next few weekends, I'll be passing several hot hours in this beautiful library, nodding off in front of the laptop I have to lug halfway across town.

So if you have been wondering about something I prefer in the US, voila, there you have it. It even makes me nostalgic for YRL library at UCLA, and for my fellow Bruins out there, you know that's saying something.

The King's Playground and the Queen's Hideout

Despite the fact that I have now been to Versailles four times, this is the first time that I saw Les Grandes Eaux (the great waters, aka they turn the foutains on and play baroque music), discovered that there was way more to the gardens than I thought, and saw Marie Antoinette's hamlet.

In the 1660s, King Louis XIV, also known as the "Sun King," who represented the truest form of an absolutist monarch in European history, decided to move the French government from Paris out to Versailles, which at the time was in the middle of nowhere. His decision stemmed from a lifelong fear of Paris, and more specifically, of Parisians after a scarring childhood experience. When he was 5 his father died, leaving his mother regent until his 21st birthday. The nobles decided they didn't like this, riled up the Parisian masses, and staged a violent rebellion. By moving out to Versailles, he could concentrate his power, keep the Parisians at a safe distance, and create a whole little world wrapped around his royal finger, handing out all manner of symbolic favors--even peas!--a master of getting something for nothing. Constructing a extravagent palace and never-ending gardens were a part of his master plan, demonstrating his wealth and power, both symbolically and materially. The fountain pictured at the right is the "Apollo Fountain," which depicts the god driving his chariot towards the sky to bring up the sun. Louis decided to make the sun god, Apollo, his personal symbol, hence his nickname (the Sun King). What better symbol to represent his absolute power than the god responsible for making the very sun rise? This superfluous and extremely expensive show would have grave consequences in 1789.




Louis XIV died in 1715. As he outlived both his sons and grandons, it would be his great-grandson, Louis XV who would take his place. Upon his death in 1774, the ill-fated Louis XVI would become King of France until guillotined by the revolutionaries in 1793. He was the last king to live at Versailles. His wife of course, was the Austrian Marie-Antoinette, who suffered the same fate less than a year later. Before angry Parisians took to the streets and stormed the Bastille, Marie-Antoinette had her own little world built on the vast grounds of the Versailles gardens, known as Le Hameau, or the Hamlet. It was a place where she could take down her hair and forget the strict protocols of court life. This is the Simple Life, circa the 1780s. She had a whole farm here where she milked cows and lived like a peasant--or at least, the Queen of France version of a peasant. It is literally an entire village of buildings, complete with it's own vineyard, dairy, and, most importantly fake ruins for authenticity.

In the face of such an ostentatious show of wealth, while many French people couldn't even afford their pain quotidien (not to mention their Nutella!), it's little wonder that "Long live the king and queen" turned into "off with their heads!"