Saturday, October 01, 2005

Look--it's a Barbie Barista sized car! These tiny Smart Cars are all over Paris. You can park them anywhere and they use about a teacup of gas a week. We didn't see many nice new cars. Most of the cars are dented and dinged and have crumpled spots on them. Gee, wonder why? No big SUVs or vans either. With gas at $5.65 a gallon the smaller the better. Motorscooters, mopeds and motorcycles everywhere. This is the interior of the Gare du Lyon which is a marvel of art nouveau decor rolled into a busy train station with 21st transportation.
Outside the station you will see about a zillion motorbikes parked as their owners commute to jobs outside the city. They were packed in so close we couldn't figure out how they got them all untangled.
One of the most fabulous dining experiences ever was at the famous restaurant upstairs at one end of the station. Le Train Bleue (The blue train). The interioir is a marvel of opulent frescos and paintings, gilded carvings of voluptuous mermaids, cherubs and other assorted femmes (women). It celebrates everywhere the blue train went back in the day it hauled rich people to vacation with gorgeous vignettes of le bonne vie, the good life of the age. The food was sumptuous too. And the wait staff were old school, one person carried a silver crumb tray and a crumb brush and tidied the table after rolls were torn up and made a little mess. The service was almost military, stand up straight, one hand behind the back, etc. But gracious--Americans could take a lesson or two on supreme service from this wait staff. Of course, being the barista that I am, I am already their equal in service with a smile.

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