Chapter 5

Those Lovable French

Paris, France

September 1

After eleven days in Costa Rica, we boarded a plane and flew to Washington, D.C. We had to travel to Washington in order to catch our flight to Paris, and as long as we were on the East Coast, we spent a few weeks visiting friends and relatives and showing our kids the star-spangled sights in Boston and Washington. Then we crossed the pond.

As you might imagine, Devi and I were not looking forward to a seven-hour transatlantic flight with three small children. But to tell you the truth, it wasn’t that bad. We got lucky and flew to Paris in a brand new 777. We were in coach, of course. But the plane had plenty of legroom, comfortable seats, kids’ meals and little television screens in the back of every seat. Those mini-TVs were a godsend. As soon as we took off, all three children slipped slack-jawed and drooling into video-induced comas. At home, we usually get out the crash cart and revive them after a few hours—but not on our flight to France. This was the first flight since we left home where our children weren’t fighting, kicking the seats, crawling down the aisles, dumping their drinks, or trying to stand on the folding tray tables.

When we landed at Charles de Gaulle Airport, we collected our luggage and went outside to organize a ride into town. There were six of us, plus a dozen bags, and we had no idea how to get where we were going by bus. So we either had to take a limo or two cabs. I spotted a limo first. The driver had a neatly trimmed moustache and wore a smart grey suit. When I approached him, he regarded my jeans and running shoes with high Gallic disdain. I asked him what it would cost to transport the six of us to Trocadéro. He said 550 francs—the equivalent of about $110, plus tip.

Since I’d only been in Paris for ten minutes, I still thought that was a lot of money. I sucked in some air French style and said in my best high-school français, “C’est trés cher, monsieur.”⁸

I thought maybe he’d lower the price a bit, but he just stuck out his lip and shrugged his shoulders expressively. I asked him to wait a second and ran the length of the sidewalk to find out how much two cabs would cost. Uh-oh. It was $120—plus two tips. The limo was actually cheaper. I high-tailed it back to the limo, but by that time the driver had consummated a deal with two slick Euro-tycoons who probably never even inquired about the fare. The driver saw me coming, raised his chin and said, in the most haughty possible way, “You had your shawnce.”

I just had to laugh, because it was so gorgeously French. I replied in my high-school patois, “Monsieur, there is always another chance.” As if he cared. He sped off with the two chic executives, and we stuffed ourselves into a $120 taxi convoy.

Forty minutes later we were at the Citadines Aparthotel—one of Devi’s great guidebook finds. There, for half the price of a typical Paris hotel room, we got two bedrooms, a small living room with a foldout couch, and a kitchenette. Our little apartment was clean, pleasant, and brilliantly situated in the heart of the stylish 16th arrondissement. We dumped the bags, showered, and took a three-hour nap. When we woke up groggily in the early afternoon, we set out to stroll the tree-lined boulevards of Paris.

In my experience, only three cities in the world—New York, Paris, and Hong Kong—give you such a buzz just walking down the street. They’re completely different, of course. In New York and Hong Kong, you are mesmerized by the kaleidoscope of humanity. In Paris, you’re seduced by what D. H. Lawrence called the “man-made nobility” of the place. But in all three cities, you can wander the streets for hours on end buoyed by the ever-changing spectacles.

We left our hotel and walked north to Avenue Foch, a broad, tree-lined boulevard girded by luxurious apartment buildings. We strolled several blocks to the Arc de Triomphe, and turned right into the very elegant Avenue Victor Hugo. Along the avenue, there were perfect little shops—some famous, some not—but all with gorgeous window displays that were works of art in their own right. One little store sold nothing but doorknobs and drawer pulls. I know that doesn’t sound too scintillating, but this hardware was so exquisitely displayed that it looked like the crown jewels of England. (Probably cost the same, too.)

We stepped into a very fancy chocolate shop. It must have been the most beautiful chocolate shop in the world. It had cases full of exquisite truffles and floor-to-ceiling mahogany shelves that held artful papier-mâché candy boxes in soft shades of rose and turquoise. The entire place was suffused with the aroma of cocoa. The kids were transfixed. We allowed each child to pick out a single truffle—about a twenty-minute procedure—then, an elegantly dressed shop lady carefully wrapped each piece to go. The price was absurdly high, but in this case, worth it.

Speaking of prices, Devi and I were soon confronted with an incontrovertible fact. Our food budget for Paris was hopelessly insufficient. Back home, in a flash of naïveté, we allocated sixty dollars a day for food in most places, and one hundred dollars a day in expensive cities like Rome and Paris. That seemed like a lot of money at the time, but we realized that between the six of us, that only came to sixteen dollars per person per day. To put that in perspective, one family lunch at La Tour d’Argent would have wiped out our whole four-day Paris food budget and then some. Of course, we weren’t eating lunch at La Tour d’Argent. They probably wouldn’t even let us in. But even the corner bistro exceeded our modest means.

What’s more, we got the distinct impression that Paris restaurants don’t welcome small children with open arms—especially at suppertime. And who can blame them? They’ve got this very elegant thing going with starched white tablecloths, dessert carts, and waiters in black jackets. Then along come the Cohen kids, screaming at 120 decibels and sticking breadsticks in their ears. Our children aren’t demure by American standards, but in a Paris restaurant, they were more like rampaging Visigoths. Devi and I spent most of our first dinner in Paris shushing the kids and saying “pardonez-nous, Madame, pardonez-nous Monsieur” to all the people around us. Everyone was fairly understanding, but at the end of the meal, we felt obliged to tip heavily.

We obviously needed a new plan. Our little apartment had a kitchenette, so we went on a grocery shopping expedition. It was a very pleasant adventure. The neighborhood shops were small and highly specialized. They had the best of everything, lovingly displayed, and the proprietors spoke absolutely no English. Devi speaks four languages fluently⁹, but French isn’t one of them. My French is rudimentary, but aside from making a few perplexing requests, like asking a butcher for a slice of jambe (leg), instead of jambon (ham), things went reasonably well.

Subsequently, we ate about half our meals in the room, and Devi and I even slipped out for a few suppers sans enfants. This way, we found a bit of Paris romance, avoided a great deal of Gallic opprobrium, and only exceeded our food budget by 50 percent. Good thing, too, because with fabulously overpriced Venice and Zurich ahead of us, we’ll probably be scrounging for berries and witchetty grubs by the time we get to Australia.

On our second morning in Paris, we took another superb walk. This time, we strolled down to the Seine River along the Right Bank to the Tuileries Gardens and the Louvre. Initially, the kids were skeptical about the itinerary. When I told them where we were going, Willie asked suspiciously, “What’s the Loove?”

I was sort of hoping that the kids wouldn’t inquire too closely, but now there was no way around it. “Well,” I said, ’fessing up, “The Louvre is a gigantic art museum.”

“What?!”

“An art museum. You know, paintings, sculptures, drawings, that sort of thing.”

“No, Daddy,” Willie groaned. “Please don’t take us to an art museum. Anything but that! I mean it. I’ll even go to a church.” His anguish was truly poignant.

“Look,” I said, “This isn’t your normal, run-of-the-mill art museum.

It’s the greatest art museum in the world. They have the Mona Lisa there, the Venus de Milo, the Nike of Samothrace.”

Willie perked up slightly at the mention of Nike, but both he and Kara were clearly poised to sulk.

Fortunately, Devi had anticipated this reaction. She told Kara and Willie that they could each pick out five postcards at the Louvre gift shop. Then we’d have a competition, and whoever found the most pieces of art depicted on their postcards would win a treat. Having a winner and a prize made all the difference. Kara and Willie could now engage in their favorite hobby: sibling rivalry. They also figured any place with a gift shop couldn’t be all that bad.

Now everyone was anxious to get to the Louvre, but to get there, we had to walk through the Jardin des Tuileries. This urban oasis of formal flowerbeds, ancient trees, and cement ponds was a perfect place for kids to cut loose. Kara and Willie raced up and down the crushed granite paths, watched elaborate model sailboats tacking across the ponds, and even found a big Henry Moore sculpture suitable for climbing.

Lucas scampered around the Tuileries as well, but he was held in check by the baby harness that Devi bought back in San Francisco. I’m sure you’ve seen this contraption. It’s sort of like a dog leash for kids, and it was actually quite serviceable for keeping Lucas out of Paris traffic. But the reaction of the French citizenry in the Tuileries suggested this device is not in wide use here. As we strolled down the broad central path with Lucas straining at his leash, everyone started pointing and laughing at us.

It took us a few minutes to figure out why, and by that time, even Lucas was becoming self-conscious. We figured we’d better restore his dignity, so we unclipped the leash, and let him scamper off with Kara and Willie. Still, I’m sure that several dozen Parisians went home that night and regaled their families with stories of the wacky Americans who walk their children like dogs. (“Oui, c’est vrai!”)

And speaking of dogs, what’s the story with dog poop in this town? Paris is one of the most immaculately groomed cities in the world. Every hedge is trimmed and every facade, scrubbed. But the entire town is blanketed with dog feces, and no one expects the dog owners to scoop it up. Dogs also ride in taxis, sit in restaurants, and are generally treated with more kindness and affection than people. In my next life, if I happen to slip down the karmic ladder a few rungs, I hope to return to earth as a Parisian dog, nibbling gourmet table scraps and gaily crapping my way down the Champs Elysees.

In the face of all this canine excrement, the kids developed a new sport. Each time they spotted dog droppings, they pointed and yelled, “Pooh-pooh, pooh-pooh,” like a cuckoo clock to warn the other members of our party. But even with this early-warning system in place, it was nearly impossible to navigate three small children through the fecal minefields without a few minor mishaps. So after we traversed the Tuileries, we had to clean up the kids’ shoes before ushering them into the Palais Louvre. Fortunately, there was a drinking fountain nearby, so we did a pretty good job of it.

When we finally got inside, we ate lunch, made a bathroom stop, and thoroughly inspected every square centimeter of every gift shop under the I. M. Pei pyramid. By the time the kids picked out their postcards for Devi’s “Find the Masterpiece” game, we barely had time to skim the Louvre’s gargantuan collection. Still, we were able to find most of the showstoppers, and we even managed to elbow our way through the coterie of Japanese tourists gathered reverently around the Mona Lisa.

The competition was a great success. As we wandered the wide marble hallways of the Louvre, dwarfed by heroic Delacroixes and lush Fragonards, the game compelled the children to cast at least a perfunctory glance at every work of art we passed. They even discovered a few pieces that captured their imaginations. And whenever they found a painting or sculpture that matched one of their postcards, they were in seventh heaven. Miraculously, the kids didn’t want to leave—even when a guard tapped us on the shoulder and told us it was closing time. Kara had the bad luck to choose three postcards from a touring exhibit that had recently departed for another venue. So, much to her chagrin, Willie won the competition. Cheated by fate, Kara desperately wanted to return the next day for a rematch.

On the way back to the hotel, we learned another fact of Parisian life: Unless you enjoy sitting gridlocked in a crooked medieval street helplessly watching your net worth diminish on a taxi meter, don’t take a cab at rush hour. Luckily, our driver knew a whole slew of tunnels, shortcuts, and back alleys. But when we finally got to the hotel and shelled out a few zillion francs for the fare, we resolved from that point forward, we’d either walk or take the Metro like everyone else.

Back in the room, I spoke to an old friend who runs Paris’s renowned Magnum photo agency. He invited us to his apartment for dinner on Sunday and suggested a few places we might dine in the meantime. One that sounded particularly intriguing was called the Brasserie Balzar. It was located on the rive gauche near the Sorbonne. Devi and I decided to give it a try.

The Brasserie Balzar had a celebrated past. It was a hive of anti-government activity during the 1968 student uprising, and had a rich literary and philosophical tradition as well. William Shirer, who wrote The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, ate there regularly, and Jean-Paul Sartre used to drop in to argue passionately—and apparently quite loudly—with Albert Camus about Existentialism, Marxism, and the Absurd.

When we entered Brasserie Balzar, the maître d’hôtel immediately recognized us for what we were and escorted us to an obscure corner of the restaurant reserved for uninteresting people. There, we sat next to two fiftyish schoolteachers from Minnesota who were in Paris on a two-week holiday. These ladies undoubtedly wanted to dine next to a couple of Sorbonne classics professors, or at the very least, some rive gauche roués. So when Devi and I arrived, their faces fell, and they weren’t particularly interested in speaking to us. What’s more, the food was heavy and old-fashioned, and the service was perfunctory, at best.

Anywhere else in the world, this would have added up to a disagreeable dining experience. But Devi and I discovered that when you’re sipping a smooth red wine in the Quartier Latin on a cool autumn evening, none of these things matter. The lights in the fin de siécle restaurant glowed soft and yellow, burnishing the brass rails and dark oak. The silken patter of French conversation swirled and eddied around us, and waiters in crisp black and white darted to and fro importantly among their favored clients. Devi and I relished this sumptuous scene for hours and left with a warm sense of contentment. Afterward, we bought a baguette and strolled together, hand in hand, down cobblestone streets in the City of Light.

⁸ “It’s quite expensive, sir.”

⁹ English, Japanese, Spanish, and Italian