Culture Week

After living in a place for a while it tends to become as familiar as a favourite pair of jeans; there are bars and restaurants I like to go to (mainly all up the road), I have my favourite walks and the culture that I so craved after Madrid and it’s Golden Triangle of three museums fade into the background. At the beginning of this summer I couldn’t remember when I had been to museums or stuff like that. Admittedly I’ve had my head shoved so far up my laptop these last couple of years that it’s been hard to extract it, but the combination of a nice long holiday, a friend visiting and a need to fill spare hours with something other than someone else’s fiction has drawn me out (and I explored the cupboard of crap and found my teachers card which gets me in free to a number of museums.)

First stop was the Palais Garnier or Opera. The first time I saw the exterior of the building was when I was running around it trying to find the Roissy bus. It’s a fantastic place to meet with its capacious steps, but I couldn’t tell you what the inside looked like although I had probably read about it or heard or something, but yep, the auditorium ceiling is most definitely Chagall.

The rest of it is a bit difficult to describe, it’s a mixture of styles which if you ask me seem a bit ... kitsch. I loved the opera boxes though and all the different little areas on that floor where one could meet secret lovers (that’s what happened in the early 20^th century, isn’t it?) And I tried to imagine myself in some floaty ball gown in the hall of mirrors that tried to emulate Versailles.

Actually I guess what I really like about it is that for as little as 7€ I could actually go to an opera and waltz around and pretend to be some high society Paris demoiselle in those halls and corridors.

Next stop was the Lizard Lounge which is some trendy bar in the Marais that I’ve never been to. We went for a Spoken Word event. I liked the sing song at the end!

Followed by the Pompidou; I actually have always loved the Beaubourg as the locals call it. I just like that Modern Art doesn’t allow for that middle of the road reaction. What do you think of these? You see, you can’t say, ‘Mmm, it’s nice...’

But while there I realised that I had NEVER been to the Picasso Museum. Moi, who claims to worship the man, who whenever I am asked to name five geniuses starts with: Picasso, Einstein and Marquez and then because I recognise the gender stereotype spend half and hour scratching my head trying to find two women to balance it out.

Now the best thing about the Picasso Museum is that as you follow the signs there are little café’s every two steps and there is one on the corner opposite this little park that does gorgeous CAKE! Actually I wouldn’t recommend that one because it was quite expensive, but surely one of the other eleven are more reasonable. Ok that wasn’t the only best thing.

And then as Ms Maru left to go and get her bus to the airport I realised that I had forgotten the one museum I wanted to go to all summer- Quai Branly! Duh! I think it was something to do with the little bundle that has finally gone to sleep on the chair opposite after spending the morning parping like a goddun (I don't think anyone has noticed that I've slipped in another bit about the ...)