Au Marché, Au Marché

October 17

In California it’s a prison, but in this part of Paris, St. Quentin is a market. We had passed it during the cab ride from Gare de Lyon to the hotel. So we decided to walk there.

It’s on the Boulevard de Magenta, which seems to be the discount alternative to the Champs Elysées. I could buy a black suit with gold pinstripes for about $150 American. A pair of pointy shoes was going for 25 euro, or less than $35.

But unfortunately, my luggage is pretty tight for space now. Maybe next time, I won’t pack anything. I’ll bring an empty suitcase and buy my clothes on the Boulevard de Magenta.

We stopped at a wine shop and bought another of those extremely low-priced bottles of estate wine, 5 euro 90 for Chateau Pier Rousselle ’09, a Bordeaux that won a silver medal at the Concours Général Agricole in Paris in 2010.

The Marché Saint Quentin was already closing for the day when we got there a little after one. Most of the stands were shuttered, a few more were in the process of bringing the shutters down. A butcher, maybe a baker, and a few fruit shops were open. I’m guessing the building is late 19th or early 20th century—beautiful ironwork, like an old train station, and the base of the wall is stone surmounted by a wall of decorative brickwork.

The photo of the day is “Joanna Goes to St. Quentin.”

Not much to do there, so we moved on. We passed a side street that looked pretty dense, and decided to go there. It was Rue Faubourg-St. Denis. I think I’ve heard of this place before. When, where, why, I don’t know. Maybe it’s disreputable for some reason.

It was on the way there that we passed the organ grinder.

At the end of the street is an arch with the dedication “Ludovico Magno,”  to Louis the Great. In 16 and something he did something. We had come to the Boulevard Bonne-Nouvelle and followed it for a couple of blocks, when lo, there’s a second monumental arch dedicated to Louis the Great. This had words more including the words “Germanorum” “exercitibus” “superavit,” and “sub-something-or-other.”

My take is that Louis XIII fought and defeated a German army, and as a result took over some provinces. They could have been fighting over Alsace and Lorraine back then. I don’t know. Shakespeare didn’t write about these guys, so to me, they’re just kings.

If Louis XIII is the right Louis, then his mother is Maria de Medici, who commissioned the Tuileries. If it is some other Louis, then forget it.  Royal families are inbred, so they have a hard time even naming the heir apparent. Most French kings are named Henri or Louis. I was watching Jeopardy one night and the answer was “the last king of England who wasn’t named George, William, or Edward.”

The question (this is how contestants play Jeopardy) is “Who was James?” that’s James II in 1688. In 325 years, the royal Brits couldn’t come up with anything but three names for their kings. Genes will out.

We sat over a glass of wine at a cafe and realized we were headed in the wrong direction. Wrong in the sense that it was leading us away from Galeries Lafayette. We were trying to bear in that direction because it would keep us within reasonable walking distance of our hotel, and also of the Red Light district, if we needed to go there.

We stopped on the way for lunch. We were still headed in the same direction, but the name of the street had changed to Boulevard de Montmartre. The Cafe le Zephyr is next to Musée Guerin. I mention this because the musée is marked on our maps, in case I want to go back there again.

Joanna had crepes with banana, and I had saucisson frais and potatoes with cheese.

The Galeries Lafayette on the Rue de Lafayette are several department stores, a home store, a men’s store, a ladies’ store, maybe more. Very colorful. Went into the home store and saw stuff. Not my kind of thing. I’m trying to get rid of stuff at home.

We wandered some streets up the hill toward the hotel. We stopped in a park where there were stuffed animals hanging in the trees.

A man came up to sell me flowers. Non.

This pissed him off and he shoved the flowers in front of me and started to yell.

A salesman doesn’t make me say no twice. That pisses me off. So we had a mild confrontation while I told him, “Deux fois, non.” About that time I was already calculating, in case things got rougher, where I would step to kick him in the knee and get the most damage done.

He went off saying something about “merd.”

A man on the bench pointed his thumb toward his mouth: drunk.

Damn. I almost rolled a drunk. I felt mildly ashamed.

We got back to the hotel, took a rest and I opened the Pier Rousselle, another surprisingly good wine that was a lot of fun. As Bordeaux go, this wasn’t as smoky, but it had the taste of good fruit and an alcohol bite.

After all the walking we had done, dinner was going to be near home base. We went to the L’Anvers de Decor, where we had gone a few days earlier for a snack.  We had a whole grilled sea bass for one course and lamb shank cooked with rosemary for the second.

We had glasses of Bordeaux and Côtes du Rhone with that.

Perfect end to another perfect day.

Love to all.

                       Great wine at Le Consulat, Montmartre