George? Is that you?
Just got back from a disappointing trip to the bibliothèque. I brought my computer with me to class this morning with the plan to go to the bibliothèque after class and set up shop. First, I get there and I see that the small room with all the desks is completely packed with students, not a single chair was left. Then, I find the books that I looked up but as it turns out they don’t really apply to my research paper. Very frustrating. The bibliothèques can be like that sometimes. They are open weird hours and none of them are open on Mondays, which is not convenient with my schedule because I don’t have class on Mondays so it would be a perfect day to work in a library. Now that is November, I have to actually start thinking about my schoolwork…..
Yesterday (Monday) I didn’t have any classes so I went to Cite de l’architecture et du patriomoine, a museum about architecture and the heritage of Paris at Palais Chaillot. I don’t know why they couldn’t just call it the architecture museum because that is what it was but I have found that the French always love an excuse to celebrate patrimoine français. The special exhibit I saw was called Le Grand Pari(s) and it was an exhibition of ten plans for revitalizing the greater Paris area, making it more accessible and more environmentally sustainable. It was a pretty cool exhibit even though all the displays were a little difficult for me to read. All the info was using fancy architect language so it was a little tough for me to read the French but I got the gist of it all. It was organized by the French government as a sort of contest, (un pari is a wager or a bet, conviently leads to a play on words with the word Paris…) but I don’t think they are actually picking a winner and implementing the plan or anything. It was really cool because I could imagine Paris changing over the course of the next fifty to one-hundred years and looking like some of the proposed designs. The most important concept in the contest was opening up Paris to the surrounding area (le grand Paris) and les banlieues (the suburbs, low income areas). This included improving roads and metro lines and in one case eliminating la périférique, the road that rings around Paris and separates the city from the outer banlieues. The only downside of the visit was an annoying, smelly security guard guy who kept hitting on me and telling me how this security job is only a temporary thing that he does three days a week and he’s looking for an architecture job….sure you are dude, sure you are……Trust me, he was not the architect type. When I was in his little section he kept moving into the next exhibit ahead of me so he could talk to me. It would have been a lot creepier if he didn’t appear to be a little on the simple side. I moved as quickly as possible through his section until I obviously reached the end and he had to retreat back to his little post.
After the musée, I took one of my usual wandering walks around the area with my little red Paris par arrondissement book and I stumbled upon Place d’Iéna and the statue of George Washington. The statue struck me as kind of odd. Anybody else get this feeling when looking at the picture? To me, the face looked very harsh and a little menacing, not the GW I am used to seeing. At home, we usually don’t see images or statues of George Washington in such a fighting pose. Of course we have images of him on horseback, leading the troops, but this statue struck me differently. I didn’t read the inscription on the base of the statue because I didn’t want to dodge traffic trying to get to the middle of the square, but I am guessing that the statue was erected more as a tribute to his victory over the British than to his leadership qualities both during and after the war. To me, it comes across as a very European interpretation of our man George. I’m not really a fan. I’m sure not everybody gets this vibe, but you will all have to tell me your opinion after your own visits to Paris :)
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