Paris part 2

Today, we picked up where we left off – the 7th arrondissement.  We started off with a morning trip to the Rue Cler market, then took our goodies home and headed back out for the Arc de Triomphe and the Champs Elysees.  This led us to meander all around the north (west, sorry) end of Paris for the day.

There are some mundane, “family life” details that I have left out of these posts.  (I know that from the length of them, it’s hard to believe I have left out any details, right?)  One of which is the times when we parents try to let the children decide where to eat.  This is pretty much a bad idea.  It never seems to end well.  Usually this is because the kids are desperately homesick for some kind of American food.  For Aidan – bagels, pizza, hot dogs or mac-n-cheese.  For Riley, well, I’m not sure what she’s missing, besides root beer, but she has some mood issues when it comes to her blood sugar.  Sometimes, she claims she’s not hungry, and doesn’t eat, and then the mood goes straight down hill.  We can try to offer her things but to no avail.  Then we hit crisis mode and practically have to force something down her throat, (I know, foie gros reference again, sorry) just to make sure we remain a family of four.  Today was one of those days.  Both kids were on attack.

A sure sign of zombies

Perhaps – and I’m just taking a stab in the dark – but perhaps it had something to do with the fact that we decided to take the Paris Sewer tour.  Um, I don’t really recommend it, though it is interesting, and then at the end you do get a chance to purchase toy and stuffed sewer rats.  And - the smell lingers in your olfactory organ, and you don’t quickly forget what you experienced down there.  But the owner of Ken’s company thought it was a hoot, and you know, it was worth a try.  Just maybe don’t do it during the heat of summer.

Rumored to be the best tasting chocolate in the world

So, at the close of a very long second day of loving this city, we ended up at the Rue Cler again for dinner in one of those afore mentioned attempts to placate the kids.  This meant that we were not actually dining on delicious French food, but were sitting at the sidewalk tables of an establishment of a young Chinese man who assured us he had food the kids would like.  It was ok, but too greasy for my liking.  However the dinner show couldn’t be beat.

Everything in here is hand sculpted out of chocolate, simply because.

As we were finishing our meal, I looked up and saw a young French guy come loping toward us.  As he got closer, he picked up speed.  Then behind him came shouts – and it was pretty easy to interpret because he began to sprint. Then we heard the hurried steps of two women who were running barefoot as fast as they could (fashionable shoes are not conducive to running on cobbled streets.)  The first lady started yelling, "Arret! Mon porte-monnaie! Mon sac-a-main!"  

Every person in the street was now paying attention.  The thief had grabbed her purse, which was inside of a paper-handled shopping bag.  Soldes, you understand. 

Typical Parisian guy with good hair

He kept running; she kept running.  Now shouts were relayed up the block.  I think that French men take a very dim view of a lady being so dishonored, and the thief was about to have a rough ending to his day.  Sure enough, as we impatiently paid our tab (so we could watch the drama), the thief was none-too-gently taken down by chivalrous well-dressed men with beautiful hair.  

They held him and within minutes an unmarked police car with plain-clothes officers arrived to cuff him and also none-too-gently help him into the back seat of the car. 

I like to think Leon represents French plain-clothes cops

We walked from one corner to the other at the intersection so we could watch from all the angles and I had the idea to photograph it, but I was afraid that if the police saw me, they might be interested in my camera or something.  Then as the door shut we, and all the bystanders, broke into spontaneous applause and whoops of congratulations to everyone involved.  It was pretty neat.