This is our first entry. Now that it’s come to it I feel a little daunted, so I’d better plunge right in. I (Helen) have seen a lot of the world and I have never missed my home and wanted to turn back. I have, however, missed my dog (Raja). The solution is to take Raja. One needs an affable and portable dog. The Shih Tzu is perfect for travel. Genetically the Shih Tzu has all the qualifications: historic nomadism, patience, companionability, disinterest in chasing birds, and surprising ruggedness and stamina. And the Shih Tzu is small… small enough to ride in cabin on planes, small enough to slip undetected into a duffle bag, small enough to ride on a camel over the saddle front without making you feel you’ve captured a goat, small enough to share your dinner and sit on the banquette in the Café Trocadéro.
Which is right were I wish we were right now. The French love love love dogs, but not so much Americans. Although that is changing (the American part), of course, since Pres. Sarcozy seems to have a crush on us and his wife really loves us ever since we made Senator Obama the President-elect. So things could be looking up. The French consider us fat, loud and renegade. But it’s only because we beat them to the punch in the area of global bullying. And we did it in a sloppy way. Double ouch! Personally I forgive the French and I will eat their fries and drink their wine as long as they let my dog sit at table in the “Café Troc”… which is in a primo spot right opposite the Musée de l'Hommeon a bluff in Paris where you can stand waist high to the Eiffel Tower (its waist not yours) and where the waiter asks “bien cuit pour le petit?” meaning, “I guess Mr.Puppy wants his meat well cooked.”
If you want to see other sights, stroll into the Musée de l'Homme and look at all the shiny PC displays about anthropology, ethnology and colonialism and its discontents. The museum used to be much more fun years ago when it was the hideously politically incorrect Musée d'Ethnographie du Trocadéro, which collected its first acquisitions from the cabinets of curiosities of European nobles. These fertility figures and shrunken heads and wampum belts were accompanied by huge, “modern” diaoramas of enormous-breasted women from the Maldives and Samoa and Africans with pierced faces, all made from crumbling plaster. It was just ghastly once, but so much fun.
You also might want to see the gem that is theMusée Guimet, the Paris collection of Asian art, right down the street from the Troc at 6 Place ded'Léna. Just come out and make a left. There are great views down into Paris along the way. The Guimet has also been renovated. Perhaps it needed it. Now there is a lunch room. But nevermind, you ate in the Troc. Do not miss the Tibetan collection. It’s just too good.
Stroll your doggy down the Place d'Léna and descend the steps toward the cultural district when you feel like it. Everybody will admire your dog, nobody will expect you (moi!?) to clean up after your pet. They have a whole brigade to do that in Paris and if you bag it up people will think you have a peculiar fetish. Wouldn’t want that, would we Mr. Puppy?
RSS Feed
