1077foh-R1-006-1A

Solo Paris Trip, November2003 / 1077foh-R1-006-1A
Nick Fohl
11/30/2003

nfohl --- sixthelement

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My third day in Paris (2'nd one where I was coherent!) This is the center of the Louvre - the pyramid is part of the refurbishment led by I.M.Pei and was constructed partly by a company that I worked at for a summer as a machinist apprentice during college (Navtec though I think they have since merged and morphed since then - Lewmar??) Behind me is the Carousel

Below is an e-mail I sent out from an Internet cafe next to my hotel - to my very short list of addresses I could remember. I need to update my online address list!

Bon Soir all!
I'm having a great time here and the weather is very nice - cool and crisp. I can tell it can get extremely hot here in the summer - all the sidewalk cafe's have little dents in the pavement out front (tar mostly) where the chairs have sunk into them in while they were melting... as the saying goes, Africa Hot - Allison and Tom should be able to relate.

I've been very busy. I hit Notre Dame, Pont Neuf and generally stumbled around incoherently on my first day. Yesterday was fun, the Orsay museum (an old Jules Verne type railroad station turned into a meseum - the upper cafe is behind this giant clock face - you can pear out through the works on the Seine (it is on the banks)) the art there is incredible. At first I was extremely disappointed while wandering the main open air gallery - sculptures - relatively un-interesting stuff. Much better stuff in the Concord Art Association or Washington DC in my opinion - though apparently historically significant to the internal politics of the Academy & Salon (also, the Plein Aire sculpture garden in front of the Louvre is much better). But in the galleries, the painting and the Art Nouveu salon's were unbelievable. really cool stuff that you never see in the US. I ended up going to St. Eustache afterward but it was closed for some serious renovation -apparently it has the largest pipe organ in the world - installed in 1980's. then wandered over to an Irish Pub nearby for some beers and conversation with the barmaid from Dublin, who seemed very happy to see someone besides her mates who spoke English. Tried to go to the modern art at the George Pomperdiue center (sp??) but it is essentially surrounded by Walmart - Icounted at least 2 macdonalds - and the crowds of locals turned me off since it was 8:00 pm

Today, was Eiffel Tower, shopping, hanging out etc... (a little landscape drawing - before I remembered that I'm no good). Allison, I looked in the window of the Des Maggots and ended up going in up the street to Cafe Des St. Denis - where I could stand at the bar with my Espresso like a blue collar parisian - the 2 maggots was too formal for me to sit by myself... maybe next time.

Louvre tomorrow - hope all is well!

Love - Nick

Please pass this along to others who might be interested - I forgot to pack all my e-mail addresses and this is coming from my meager online address book - which obviously needs updating