Gung Ho!

I saw the martial arts film The Grandmaster yesterday and the sage philosophical musings of some of the different schools of Chinese fighting led me to ponder how is it that every time the American government wants to start a war with someone, they waste no time shouting it to the winds. What about the stealth, the element of surprise, the strategy? What about knowing your enemy? (If they did, they would think twice about it).
I do tai chi, which is not, as you may think, a gentle stretch for little old Chinese ladies, but a martial art. My teacher is always saying things like, you gotta have strong legs so the first thing you do when confronted by a possible attack is, run the hell out of there. The first rule of Chinese martial arts seems to be to avoid, deflect, defuse, and discourage confrontation. If that is not possible, however, then that swift, out-of-the-blue, lethal kick will come in handy. But if you let your enemy, (and the enemy of your enemy, which in the case of Syria is also your enemy) know two weeks in advance that you intend to kick his ass, it may not work out as well.
I just came back from France, where the national pastime seems to be to sit in cafés and talk. The French are obsessed with thought and discussion, and having as much paid vacation as possible. The Magnificent Arepa had an epiphany that the reason why there are so many French philosophers is that the French like to sit at cafés, smoke, drink coffee, and think. Like Sartre and Beauvoir at Les Deux Magots.
Americans however, are obsessed with action. No sitting at cafés in the middle of the day for us. We do shit without thinking.
This is the only way I can explain the surreal moment we are having right now about going to war with Syria. First, we don't do anything when it's the time to do it, if ever; we wait until the guy has killed 100,000 people and then, when he steps over "the red line" (which, as Jon Stewart points out, is a dick measuring tape), we bluster and threaten and announce our intentions to attack. Obama whips his dick out, and not to be outdone, many of the putrid vermin that populate Congress follow suit. This is the one issue in which Republicans all of a sudden stand behind a President they have stonewalled every step of the way. They strangle health, education, immigration, economic issues, but war? BRING IT!
Has there been a thoughtful conversation, analysis or debate about this latest hankering for infernal action? Can this President, who promised to get out of Iraq and Afghanistan now say with a straight face that we are going into Syria as well?
The problem with Americans is that ours is a lethal combination of "gotta get things done, but first we need to brag about them". We neither do them when it is advisable, if ever, nor talk or think about them enough, which should be always. So by the time we take action, we do it thoughtlessly, unleashing even bigger messes, more enmity, and more chaos.
There must be an alternate way, a way of reason and brilliance. This takes true brains, and is therefore rarely used, but this constitutes the ideal scenario: people with great strategic thinking come up with smart, complex, unfolding solutions; not gung-ho, easy as a fart, morally abject posturing that is going to get us into a whole world of trouble. Again.

The Extra Step

A woman once said that the French think they are like Germans, but they are actually like Italians. Some stuff they do spectacularly well: The wine, the cheese, the bread. The trains work, the roads are pristine and clearly signalized. The bathrooms are spotless clean.
But when it comes to service or process, it's not that they are chaotic, it's that they love bureaucracy. They love steps. If you can do something in thirty steps, as opposed to one or two, pourquoi pas?
If you need a part of a stove replaced because its glass cover exploded in the kitchen (don't ask) and you call the numero de service of the appliance store, the monsieur you are speaking to, who displays an admirable balance of hostility, impatience and propriety, insists on talking of Electrolux when you clearly said Airlux. Twenty minutes later, he throws in the towel and advises you to take a picture of the serial number label to the store, so they can deal with you there. C'est tout he can do for you.
The trip to the store becomes three separate trips to three different stores, because in each one, the person in charge disavows himself from the responsibility of helping you: it's not their department, their phone doesn't work, Madame de Pompadour called in sick. But when you finally make it to the third store, the one they should have told you to go to in the first place, the lady behind the counter knows exactly what you need, and where to get it, and your suffering is over in five minutes. It is uncanny, as if she knew your sad story with the exploding cover all this time and was just patiently waiting, like Proust in search of lost time, for you to show up.

Try doing something on a French website. I tried to reserve a taxi, because I'll have you know that cabs in Paris are always mysteriously absent or have arcane, incomprehensible rules of where they pick up and where they drop off passengers. Why can't it be in the same place? Je ne sais pas. There are empty taxis parked at the TAXI sign. Some of them have drivers in them, but they cannot take you. There is even a hopeful-looking button you press that goes, like something out of Camus, unanswered.
But at home, there is an internet taxi reservation site. They even have an English version! I fill out all the info: name, time, place, and give a final, relieved click, only to run into the little extra step: they want a cellphone number to send me a code to confirm and verify that I, and not the Marquis De Sade, ordered the cab. But then the site won't accept a foreign number, so after a good 15 minutes of filling out forms and trying Kabbalistic number permutations, there is no cab to be had.
I should have called, but what if the guy sent me to the other guy, the one that works for Cardinal Richelieu? Plus, when I dial, a prerecorded female voice tells me something about the nature of the call I am attempting and she scares me off the phone.
Here in the US, you can go on a kafkaesque limbo of customer service hell, sans doute, but it usually takes one interminable step. Over there, it's a waltz. 

Bonjour Tristesse

I was recently in France, where pretty much everyday, like every French person, I put a golden, fragrant, crunchy, chewy baguette under my arm; and unlike every French person, waited to get home before tearing into it in the middle of the street.
Last Sunday, I went into a boulangerie and purchased a ficelle, which is a smaller, thinner baguette (so as not to appear like the grosse cochonne I am).
I ate this glorious thing sans anything. No butter, no jam, no jambon, no fromage. It was so spectacularly good, it did not need anything else. I ate it in the park and could have eaten five more, but I have my dignity.
New York may have pretty much everything the heart desires, but there is no good baguette to be found. Those of you who think there is, are deluding yourselves and should stop immediately.
We have found a very decent croissant and pain au chocolat, and French pastries a block away, but a simple, wholesome, perfect pleasure like a baguette, which is flour, salt, water and yeast, New York cannot muster. This makes me extremely sad.
Some say it's the water. Pourquoi?
I just feel like crying.

Now Showing At A Theater Near You

A modern adaptation of Henry James' What Maisie Knew.
A muddy Mud, with Matthew McConaughey.
François Ozon best movie, In The House.

Coming Attractions

Not showing anywhere near you yet, but you should run to see them as soon as they hit the theatres:

The Gatekeepers, or, Shin Bet leaders spill the beans. Best documentary I've seen this year.

A trifecta of extraordinary movies:
Amour, the latest masterpiece from Michael Haneke, with the immortal Jean-Louis Trintignant and Emanuelle Riva, Cristian Mungiu's masterful Beyond The Hills, and the lovely Like Someone in Love by maestro Abbas Kiarostami.

Also worth watching is the impressive debut of orthodox female film director Rama Burshtein, Fill the Void.

On the other hand, these clunkers are better left unseen.

Now Showing At A Theater Near You

The 50th edition of the New York Film Festival is in progress:

Noah Baumbach gets a muse with the delightful Frances Ha.
The Taviani Brothers collaborate with William Shakespeare in the masterful Caesar Must Die!
And the insufferable You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet by Alain Resnais.

La Chispa de la Vida

Today I did another Modernist pilgrimage of the neighborhood known as El Raval, which is still affectingly seedy in places. A spot on the walking tour is a bar called La Confitería, which used to be a pastry shop at the turn of the 20th Century and has been restored into a gorgeous bar. It's in the middle of a slightly down at the heels neighborhood and the two older gentlemen tending the empty bar were fun, crusty bohemians. Here's what transpired:

Me: A Coke please.
Bartender: Ice?
Me: Yes
Bartender: Lemon?
Me: Yes, please.
Bartender: Bubbles?
Me: That would be perfect.

Then the bartender, who I suspect was French and gay, helped himself to a piece of horrible cake, the kind they sell at supermarkets. He complained about the horror of the cake in detail until the other guy took a bottle of brandy from the display and poured a swirl of brandy on the slice. The bartender pronounced it much better.

That was fun.

La Confitería and if you look closely, the offending cake.

DSK: The Potage Thickens

Thanks to Mr. Ex-Enchilada for sharing a very interesting article in the New York Review of Books about some new discoveries in the DSK rape case in New York. The writer, Edward Jay Epstein, brings to light some interesting facts that may hint to the theory, which many in the French Left had at the time, that DSK had been framed by Sarkozy because he was surging ahead in the polls. It is fun detective reading:  DSK's Blackberry (one of many), the reason why he called the Sofitel and let them know where he was, so they would return it to him, appears to have been disabled -- not just turned off -- but its GPS capabilities disabled, at 12:51 pm, about half an hour after the alleged rape occurred. DSK was not just simply concerned about his lost phone. As head of the IMF and very important VIP person, he has lots of phones. He was greatly concerned about this one phone, which he used only for IMF business, because somebody in his staff had alerted him to the possibility that it had been hacked. Hmmm...
His accusers' inconsistencies, which are the reason the prosecution dropped the case, include her lies about having visited the adjoining room after the rape, but not before it. However, the electronic key records show that she was in that room twice but did not confess to the second time, which is why the police did not search that room and treat it as a crime scene. There's more: a room service employee was also in DSK's room at a certain point around the time of the crime but he refuses to talk to anyone. The hotel refused to tell the police who was staying in that room for privacy reasons (couldn't the police get a search warrant or something? Hmmm...). Also, a long time elapsed between Diallo's alleged rape and how long she took to disclose it, but more importantly, Sofitel management placed several suspicious phone calls and took its sweet time to finally call the police (kind of understandable, if not justifiable, since they are a French chain dealing with a very important French VIP).  Diallo was allegedly raped between 12:07 and 12:15 pm and ended up at the hospital about 4 pm. There's even more: the head of security operations for the Accor hotel chain, which owns Sofitel, "had worked closely in the police with Ange Mancini, who is now coordinator for intelligence for President Sarkozy", and that very day he happened to be sharing Sarko's box at a soccer match in France. Hmmm...
There is too, a bizarre little dance of celebration between two high ranking employees of the hotel after Diallo speaks to them, and many other loose ends that hint to a web of conspiracy. What is a little befuddling is that Epstein wrote that the dance lasted 3 minutes, when as you can see above, it lasts less than 15 seconds. In any case, the little dance is explainable in a different way from "Yay! Conspiracy successful -- mission accomplished!": if it is true that since his arrival to the hotel, DSK had been hounding every female employee that crossed his path, they may have harbored some antipathy to such a guest and were happy to see him nailed. Still, such victorious joyousness aprés a rape is a bit hard to fathom from usually stone faced security staff, nes't pas?
Harder to understand, in the light of these discoveries, however, is the fact that if indeed DSK committed a violent rape, why would he be calling the scene of his crime and letting Sofitel know exactly where he was so that they could bring him his phone? Even as coddled by power as he is, if he had committed a violent rape, he'd have thunk "screw the phone and the IMF, I'm outta here!" It turns out he was preoccupied by what turned out to be a prostitution ring scandal in which he is also involved as head of the IMF, among other things. This may explain why he was so hysterical about losing that phone. But if the phone was so important to him, how come he lost it? Hmmm....
I feel an irresistible urge to write the following sentence in the voice of Inspecteur Closeau: The pheune was never recovered. Hmmm...
If you think about it, would DSK even have had lunch with his daughter before leaving for the airport? We all knew this is what he did, and many of us still thought he was such an entitled bully, he was just brazen about it. He had acted with impunity before, why not this time? I must admit, knowing this string of strange facts makes him look like indeed he had nothing to hide. There is incontrovertible evidence that sex took place, (his semen mixed with her saliva on the carpet), but as far as he was concerned, it was kosher. We will never know if it was consensual or not. There is no point on taking sides. One thing is clear: he's still disgusting.
After reading Philip Gourevitch's profile of Sarko in the New Yorker, and given the nastiness and corruption of French politics, a conspiracy, although farfetched, bizarre and unseemly, is not inconceivable. Still, this does not disprove that DSK is a gros cochon. If indeed this was a conspiracy, it was brilliant: they used his Achilles heel, his uncontrollable sexual addiction, to nail him. They made him an offer he could not refuse, and he took the bait.

Today On I've Had It With Hollywood

A love letter to the movies, the lovely The Artist.

Dick in a Box

What is it with men in positions of power and sexual compulsion? DSK and Anthony Weiner, for instance? Is it insecurity?
I'm not comparing the two. DSK is a sexual addict and sexual harasser, an alleged rapist, an abuser of women, and Weiner is just an idiot and a blossoming cheat.
But what makes them both seem pathetic is the enormous disparity between the importance of their roles and responsibilities as public figures, and the kinds of inappropriate things they do privately. It doesn't compute. Why risk their position of power for something as pedestrian as getting a hard-on?
Regular people who cheat know the risks. They are aware of the potential destruction of their relationships and of the world of pain that cheating can cause. In the case of men with huge public responsibilities, this may also entail the destruction of their careers. Are they not aware of that? Unlike the Governator, most randy public figures cannot fall back on a Hollywood career.
I think that the disparity between their public personae and who they really believe they are is enormous, which must be the reason why they seem almost naive about the risks they take. Either they can't believe they are where they are, or they think they are untouchable and can get away with murder.
Why is it so difficult for certain men to keep it in their pants? DSK and Schwarzenegger are notorious gropers and that puts them in a category of particularly vile lowlife that is disrespectful to and contemptuous of women. This is the kind of Berlusconian machismo that claims to love women but in essence is predicated on their domination and debasement.
(By the way, click the link I provided above to Ariel Levy's The New Yorker's article about Berlusconi. Your jaw will drop. I came to the conclusion that Berlusconi could not exist in any other country but Italy. He is as much a product of that crazy tit-obsessed culture as pizza or pasta).
DSK is a case of sustained abuse of power; he harassed women in a society that allowed him to do so without consequences for years. He did it here, and he got punished (he must be glued to the TV watching the Salem Witch Trials of Weinergate and thinking if this is what happens to an amateur loser, imagine what's gonna happen to me!). He must rue the day he decided to let his dick loose in the USA, but he's so arrogant, he just pleaded not guilty. 
But what the fuck was Weiner thinking, using twitter and facebook to conduct affairs? What rock has he been living under that he doesn't know to be careful? Everybody knows how volatile these things are! You send them out and have no further control over them! Their entire nature is about spreading information. Hell-o?
Weiner seems to have been getting his kicks, like an excited schoolboy, out of nothing but virtual innuendo, and although he was incredibly stupid, it is painful to see the press conference. It's not like he lied and declared war on a foreign country. I never really followed him, so I don't have a political axe to grind here. I've always found him unlikable. Do I think he should resign? No. This is what he was doing with his private life, which is not a crime and has nothing to do with his job. It just is very pathetic and rather unsavory, sending out pictures of his boners and his pecs.
But Nancy Pelosi needs to start the witch hunt before the other party does and I bet Weiner will end up resigning. I hope he doesn't, just to tip the puritanical end of the scale a bit to the other side. We don't want to be a place like France, where abusers are coddled, but we also don't want to be a convent. Until DSK came along, I always thought that the French were far more mature than us when it came to sex and romance. How sophisticated it was that both Mme. Mitterrand and the lover were at the funeral, Pepe Le Pew, etc, etc. It has been disappointing to learn that French culture is nothing but yet another boys' club, with the acquiescence of les femmes, as always. But here, the sexual hysteria is even more disturbing.
Americans are a bunch of horny puritans and this is rather confusing, not to say very hard to pull off, so to speak.

Department of Culinary Suspicion

The New York Times reports there is an authentic taquería in Paris. The only one. It's called Candelaria and serves spicy tacos, whether the French like it hot or not. However, the lines at the door are of many Americans who miss their tacos. This makes me highly suspicious, because most Americans have a distorted idea of tacos.
A woman quoted in the article says that Candelaria's tacos are not as good as Mission (San Francisco's) tacos. And I say that Mission tacos are not as good as real Mexican tacos. I know all of you Californians (and some Texans) want to challenge me to a duel right now. What can I say? Bring it.
Your tacos may be very tasty but I always find something off with them. Too big and fat, not the right tortilla, bad accoutrements (cabbage, too much lettuce, sour cream, radishes), etc.
To their credit, at Candelaria they make the tortillas in-house. The reporter says that they were too spicy, which is also a no-no. The optional salsas can be as spicy as hell, (although they should not all set your tongue on fire) but the taco fillings shouldn't be.
I once ate at a Mexican restaurant in Paris that was owned by a guy from Oaxaca. In order to get the French to come in, he had to take any evidence of spice out of the food. The food was like a consumptive cousin of the real thing. It reminded me of Proust, swaddled in bed, afraid to go outside and breathe. It wasn't bad but it wasn't good. It was bland and it tasted off-Mexican. It was a bit sad.
In countries where corn is not a staple, it's hard to make Mexican food work. The tortilla is key, and outside of Mexico tortillas usually suck. Then there are the misreadings: too much spice or not enough and lack of balance and subtlety.  In New York, things have improved greatly since the arrival of many Mexican workers to the city's restaurant kitchens.  Now taquerías are ubiquitous. Frankly, I am afraid to try them, as I find that restaurant owners still don't quite understand the taco concept.
A short taco primer: everything needs to be served hot temperature-wise. The tortilla and the filling need to be hot. Not the filling hot and the tortilla frigid, like in Chipotle, or viceversa. In Mexico, most taco fillings are cooked fresh on the spot. So if you get a taco de bistec, or any other taco a la parrilla, the meat hasn't been sitting in a container since the morning. It gets put on the grill and cooked right then and there. If they are tacos de guisado, the stews are made beforehand but somehow they do not taste like they have been congealing there all day. Most taquerías served grilled meats and pastor (pork on a spit), but here the fillings tend to be stews, even when it's meat. It's always disappointing. So concentrate on the contents and stop the obsession with the shit that goes on top, which in Mexico is chopped onions and cilantro. Provide some juicy limes instead. Also, be generous! Don't make me look for the optional sauces with a microscope. Don't give me a tiny plastic thimble of sauce and an eighth of a dessicated lime. This is where you really don't get it.
I always get asked where do I go for Mexican food in NY. My answer is usually "to Mexico City". But there are a couple of places that I like. Hecho en Dumbo, in the Bowery is top of my list. Great appetizers, very good carnitas, quite authentic. And they make an addictive tamarind margarita. The tacos de cochinita and the sopa de tortilla at La Esquina are also good. La Superior in Williamsburg is fine. In the case of taquerías, I resent to have to pay so much. The prices of tacos have not translated very well to the NY economy, I'm afraid. I have not tried some newer places, for fear of bitter disappointment. But I might.
Which brings me to tell you, however, that I found the best enchiladas verdes I've eaten outside of Mexico right in my neighborhood. They are so good that if I ate them in Mexico, I'd be very impressed. The green tomatillo sauce is fresh and perfectly balanced with a spicy kick, and the chicken is not dried out left overs but is stewed as they do in Mexico, so there is a delicious reddish ooze coming out of the green. As the tortillas are smothered in the excellent sauce, they don't call too much attention to themselves and they taste fine. And although the cabbage garnish is not quite right, the dish is absolutely delicious. According to a waitress, the cooks made the enchiladas for themselves and the chef wisely decided to put them on the menu. Now I can't live without them. They are served at Burger and Barrel in West Houston St.

Le Perp Walk

How about the reaction of the French media to the arrest of IMF president and former French presidential hopeful Dominique Strauss-Kahn! They are appalled, they are horrified... at how harshly the NYPD treated him, fishing him out of first class on a departing plane and oo la la, the violence and the humiliation of le perp walk.
Quel horreur!
They have not shown that much sympathy for the chambermaid who accused him or the many women he has apparently groped and humiliated throughout the years. He comes with a reputation for randiness. Mesdames et monsieurs, if the guy is innocent, he will be exonerated. If he isn't, he deserves to be behind bars. Knowing the French, they may even vote for him in solidarity with his irrepressible joie de vivre. Stephen Clarke, the guy who wrote the very funny A Year in the Merde, explains how French society really works. Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite, mon cul.
What the French don't understand is that we are a country of puritans and the perp walk is our morality play. We collapse as a nation if someone shows an accidental nipple in the Superbowl, so actual sex scandals really do scandalize us. In contrast to the laissez faire attitude of Pepe le Pew, we don't believe that you should be the leader of a country, a party, a state, or a world bank if you can't keep your dick safely inside your pants. And usually we're talking mostly pecadilloes, like cheating on your spouse, having secret children out of wedlock and getting bjs under the table, not rape.
The French also don't understand that in this country the wealthy can try to get acquittal with the help of very good, expensive lawyers. But if you are arrested, and particularly if you are notorious, you'll get the perp walk (remember Bernie Madoff, O.J Simpson, etc). The perp walk is unfair and perhaps it should be abolished, but it's not a guilty sentence either. Some people are championing the perp walk as an equalizer, although I suspect that the perp walks of the rich and famous get much more attention than those of anonymous criminals. Supposedly, in America everybody gets treated equally (thanks to some ideas we actually borrowed from the French). However, this sentence made my eyebrows rise to the ceiling:

Mr. Strauss-Kahn was being held in protective custody in the West Facility at Rikers because there was room there to give him a wing to himself, an official said.

Do all presumed rapists get a wing to themselves in Rikers? Je ne croi pas.
In this world there is no such thing as 100% equal justice and there will never be. It's simply not in human nature.

Quote of the Week

As quoted in the movie Of Gods and Men:

"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it for religious conviction".
Blaise Pascal.

Amen, brother!

The Spark of Antisemitism

Apparently, it takes three drunk French people at a bar to get it started.
Fourth Musketeer wannabe John Galliano got suspended from Dior for allegedly hurling racial insults at a Jewish woman and an Asian man. It's all very confusing.
It turns out that the woman isn't even Jewish and furthermore, she works at the Institut du Monde Arabe. She filed the claim against Galliano because "she feels solidarity with Jews and Arabs".
To which I have to say: Gee thanks, pal. As usual, too much politically correct fervor paves the road to hell. Thanks to you, Yahoo News is now chock full of the vilest hate speech against Jews since the middle ages. Just scroll down to the comments section of the Galliano news story and let your stomach start churning. Anonymity allows pathetic losers to spew evil and inflammatory stuff in the internet.   Blood libels, conspiracy theories, anti-Zionist rants, "Hitler was right", "Henry Ford was right", poor, stupid "Helen Thomas was right" (she is now quite unfortunately in the company of the other two bozos), you name it. It's as if you put the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, Mein Kampf, The International Jew, the anti-Israel hate brigade and the blood libels of yore in a shaker and stir.
Galliano is countersuing the attacked couple for defamation. And he should, if indeed they made the accusations up. This is as inexcusable as racially insulting people, maybe even worse. It is what in Jewish tradition is known as lashon hara, an evil tongue, a terrible sin which is not to be exercised by anybody.
The way the Galliano incident was reported in the media makes it seem that the hoopla is more about the antisemitism than about the other racial insults. I find this unfortunate, since both are equally racist and this gives the anti-Semites an opportunity to complain that the Jews are always kvetching about antisemitism. However, the fact that this happened in the Marais, a Jewish neighborhood, in a city that is still reckoning its collaboration with the Nazis, may have to do with the extra sensitivity. You can't walk two blocks in the Marais without running into a plaque commemorating the hundreds of Jewish people or schoolchildren who were deported to their deaths from those very homes. People in the USA have never seen their neighbors forcibly taken from their homes or attacked for ethnic reasons (except for Blacks in the South or if you were Japanese in the 1940s), so they think it's all an exaggeration.
So the new trope is that Jews are oversensitive, and that we overreact. I think it is true in some cases. But who is to decide what is an overreaction?  Because we have so much to complain about, we should not complain at all? Blacks have the same problem. Some people think they overreact. Who is to judge? How can anybody who doesn't share a history of persecution and humiliation, deem it an overreaction?
It's a delicate subject. Are we paranoid and oversensitive, or are we finely attuned to prejudice and hatefulness (not that we are not capable of it ourselves)?
I can tell you this: I know it when I see it. I feel it in my bones. And I can read between the lines. Sometimes it is carefully euphemistic and baroquely disguised (like Charlie Sheen's violent hatred of "Chaim Levine") and sometimes is outright nuts and transparent (see Yahoo comments). Many times it is an overly feverish disgust with Israel, as if Israel was the only country with behavioral issues in the world, but most of the time it's the banal, ignorant, prejudiced remarks about noses and greed and world domination.
I'm fucking tired of all of it, whatever its latest guise.

NEWS UPDATE: Here is evidence that Galliano did say horrible things. His defamation suit is bullshit. 

Esto es Vida!

I don't know what it is about the Cote D' Azur that it is so delightful, even as it is chock full of  men wearing ugly square-pointy shoes and pastel colored pants. There is something about this outrageously expensive town (one beer and one glass of rose at the Hotel Majestic: 23 Euros), that is extremely soothing to the eye and the soul. The sun shines, the sky and the sea are super blue, and the seafood is amazing. This is, after all, Provence.
I have been coming to the advertising festival for 3 years now and was finally able to get a table at perpetually mobbed Coquillerie Brun, est. 1958, late last night. It did not disappoint. A non pretentious seafood place with amazing shellfish platters (freshest oysters ever), an unbelievable fish soup and a tarte tatin with caramel and fleur de sel ice cream that made us vow to eat there everyday, if we only could. The euro is a little bit cheaper than last year, totally engorging our sense of largesse. 
So you will forgive me if all I can talk about is food right now. That and the thing that never ceases to amaze me, which is that the French in this part of France are so much nicer (for the most part) than the ones in Paris.
I have to find out at what time is the Mexico game. I also didn't see mes amies the Leopard Ladies last night, so there are 2 mysteries to be solved.
See you later (I wanted to say A tout al'heures, but I don't know how to spell it)

La Fete de la Musique

Here's a country that still has a certain sense of community, after all. La Fete de la Musique is a day when all of France devotes itself to making music, listening, learning, dancing. All events are FREE. Money has nothing to do with it. Every neighborhood has different bands performing almost every style of music imaginable (with an unfortunate penchant for hard core electronica or truly awful dance music). Most bands are conformed of amateurs, and most suck. But the enthusiasm is undeniable, both of audience and performers. France is a country of great aficionados. Most of them may be constitutionally incapable of moving to the rhythm, but this does not intimidate them in the least. They are willing to learn and they have no sense of ridicule.
What moved me, for I was deeply moved, is that everybody gets together to make it happen and to enjoy it. For one day, you share something special with your neighbors, it's that simple. Very, very cool.
I was thinking, imagine if we did this in NY, or the whole of the US. One single, solitary day when it's not about money, but about connecting. Imagine all those talented people who would come out and play on the streets, and all those neighbors that would enjoy it.
I don't understand how a country like this is less constrained by money than we are. They do public projects for the benefit of the citizens and they do not begrudge them every cent they cost. The fabulous mayor of Paris has instituted the amazing bike rental program, still going on, the Paris Plages festival with beaches on the Seine every July. They open and pay for art centers in struggling neighborhoods. They give back.
We, who are supposed to have everything, are miserly. Even free events like Summerstage or Celebreate Brooklyn are always about asking for contributions, donations, sponsors.
So I suggest to Mayor Bloomberg, who is so keen on winning again, to check out what they do over here.

Finally: One very good meal.

Thanks to Analia and Nicolas for recommending La Cave Gourmande, 1o Rue du General Brunet, 19eme (Metro Botzaris).

This is what we ate. It was all superb:

• Vichyssoise in a glass. It tasted of smoked bacon, of potato, of leeks, of cucumber. It had little croutons and also thin strips of fried leeks and potatoes. Amazing.

• White asparagus in a parmesan croute, with some sort of gentle sweet sorbet and a touch of balsamic. Excellent.

• "Toblerone" of lamb with BBQ sauce. The tenderest, tastiest lamb I've ever had shaped into little mounds like a Toblerone bar, sitting on a light puff pastry base with an amazing ratatouille on the side.

• Perfectly cooked Filet of Turbotin (fish) with a super subtle, elegant, light garlic cream sauce, smoked potato puree (genius) and the best fried parsley ever.

• Chocolate fondue with fruits. Simple, but the chocolate, out of this world.
• Almond torte with apples and saffron icecream. The cake was nice but a bit heavy, but the saffron icecream -- fantastic.

• One glass of excellent white wine from the house and one glass of rouge Vin de Pays D'Oc.

There is still good food in Paris at about 50 euros a pop.

Not that I am complaining or anything, BUT:

It's time to kvetch about France, Paris and the French. No visit here would be complete without a certain degree of exasperation, nes't pas?
Par example: There is always an extra bureaucratic step to everything. Free events are free, which is a wonderful thing. BUT. You still need to get a ticket for the free event. You still need to do the bureaucratic dance. Ces't comme ça.
More annoying: There is a mystery as to what metro ticket vending machines accept working credit cards. Some do, some don't and it's all very mystifying. Some machines only want cards with chips, others are more ecumenical. Seems that the more touristy the area, the more benevolent the machines.
BUT. Would it kill the Metro to have a machine that accepts bills, not only coins, and cards with and without chips? Would it kill the Metro to issue easy, convenient things like NY's Metrocards instead of annoying carnets of 10 loose tickets or a Navigo pass that requires your picture and the signature of Cardinal Richelieu?
It is the height of convenience to buy your train tickets online and just print them out in a machine at the station. In the very possible case that the machine does not accept your card, happily, you can also type in your confirmation number, BUT after you do so, it still asks you FOR THE FREAKING CARD IT WON'T ACCEPT.
So in the end you have to do everything analog anyway, like in the Ancien Regime.

Le Grand Paris

I spent several hours today at the exhibition about the architectural contest for Sarkozy's self-aggrandizing project (every French leader since Napoleon has to have one) of the Parisian metropolis of the future (thanks Mimosa!).
9 or 10 (I lost count after a while) architectural firms presented projects, among them Richard Rogers, Jean Nouvel and Christian de Portzamparc. It was extraordinarily interesting to see how each team conceptualized and solved the problem. It was also inspiring to see how big you can dream to try to make life better for the citizens of a metropolis. Some projects seem undoable, or too vague, others, like Jean Nouvel's, spectacular, and cunningly likeable, but it was all heady food for thought.
For a more journalistic but shamefully incomplete article you can turn to the NY Times. Here you will read about my own Napoleonic suggestions:

1. Destroy the offensive Tour Montparnasse and rebuild something gorgeous in its stead. Jean Nouvel imagines a spectacular golden structure on the top, but I say it's throwing good money after bad. Dynamite the eyesore and do something fabulous, as befits the area and the city.

2. One of the studios proposes a redecoration and renovation of the Place des Fetes, a few blocks away from here and a perfect example of condescending, ugly public housing for the immigrant poor. I second that emotion. Raze this horror to the ground and build a livable, beautiful, community space.

3. Destroy the Les Halles shopping mall and put a new central market there again. As one walks in the heart of Paris, thinking that this seventies monstrosity used to be the amazing central market of this town, one feels like sending whoever is responsible for this mall to the guillotine. I imagine Les Halles became untenable, but what they did is unforgiveable. I am no fan of the Pompidour either, but I'm letting it live for the time being.

4. As in New York, je vous propose to curb, limit and discourage the use of private motor vehicles as much as possible. Cities with great densities and mostly flat terrain (particularly cities with many narrow streets) have no business allowing cars anymore. More bikes, better subway cars, electric buses, minitaxis and trams, and voilá.

As for the outskirts, most of the teams concurred that they are dangerously cut off from city life. Paris is surrounded by an ugly freeway that functions like a moat, a demarcation line. Even with trains going to the banlieue, the poorest suburbs are ugly and neglected (and bad enough to spark riots, remember?). Many of the architects reimagine the balance of power between the center of the city and the outskirts, Richard Rogers in particular. They propose to end the isolation of the suburbs and make them into part of the city. I am all for the abolition of suburbs everywhere and the creation of cities of different sizes, where, as one of the architects noted, life does not have to depend on the automobile.

There was a wonderful quote in one of the projects. I paraphrase:
A city is not about a place in space, it's about drama in time.
Exactly.
In all, the contest is a fascinating opportunity to dream, and an example of the kind of projects the government should support. Many major cities should think in terms of this kind of long term planning (Are you listening, Mexico City? New York?).

Paris Pictures