European Honeymoon 1999 - Paris/Versailles
next pageOK, so one of the things I REALLY wanted to do while we were in Paris was to visit the Père Lachaise cemetary (more info here). Oscar Wilde is burried there, as is Jim Morrison, Frederick Chopin, Marcel Proust, Sarah Bernhardt, Gertrude Stein, Edith Piaf, Isadora Duncan, Maria Callas, Colette and so many more. The cemetery, which covers 44 hectares, contains 100,000 burial places and since opening has had over one million burials!!!
I don't know who this was for, but I loved the woman grieving over the man (you can't see him) with the paint brushes to the right.
Don't know who this is, either, but I got a kick out of the fact that the only places without the patina of age were his lips, his hand, his shoes and his crotch where people had touched him!!
This is Oscar Wilde's tomb. I loved it. You can't imagine the magesty of this Egyptian-like winged woman over him. There were hundreds of lip prints where people had kissed his monument. Of course, I put on fresh lipstick and kissed it too!!
This cat came up to us around Oscar Wilde's tomb. He was so friendly!
I really, really enjoyed all the sculpture on the tombstones. This one was so interesting, the way it had weathered. Its aging totally enhanced the carving. Can you see that it say "Immortalitie" at the top?
Just a pretty angel. We put the flower in her hands.
Tomb of Georges Rodenbach a 19th-century poet represented as rising out of his tomb a rose in his hand. I thought this was so neat!
Me, being dramatic, beside the statue of a weeping woman.
Another piece of stonework we loved.
And now, we proceed to Amsterdam!
General observations about France/Paris:
- AMAZINGLY good drivers, best I've ever seen
- All the motorcyclists there are CRAZY
- Crazy folks on the Metro, just screaming and talking to themselves
- Metro, while useful, is FILTHY, and you are covered with grit and dirt each time one pulls up
- The lanes in the road have no demarkation (no lines in the road). Manu said, and I quote, "Why do you need them? You know where you want to go and you go there!" Driving in Paris was like driving in a war zone. I loved it!
- Very little English spoken on the television or the radio
- AMAZINGLY gorgeous black girls in Paris. Just stunning.
- The food! The food! (marvelous Creme Brulee)
- You do a LOT of walking (this was pretty much true everywhere we went in Europe. No wonder we're all fat in North America. :/
- The cars are VERY TINY, all of them. When you park (parallel), you leave your brake off so that when other folks pull in and out, they can lightly tap your car to move it. If you leave the brake on, you're likely to damage your car and theirs!
- Help Me Keep My Site Afloat!