A week end in Paris

This past weekend was my birthday weekend, or rather, my birthday was on Saturday, and my husband gave me a gift of a trip to Paris.

Paris is my city – I lived there for almost two years. The confession about the destination of the trip came on Friday night. Saturday morning we flew from London to Paris (a 40-minute flight where you barely have time to use the bathroom).

At the airport, I took a picture of the departure screen and posted it on both my blog and personal Instagram accounts, making a kind of “coming out” announcement. I confessed to everyone about my illness, my deafness, and what had happened to me in recent years.

I hadn’t been to Paris since 2018. We had gone there for our first wedding anniversary, but then in 2019, I got sick. I missed out on birthdays (which I spent sick or in the hospital) and travel (the only trips I took were from London to Florence).

Anyway, on Saturday, we arrived mid-morning and went for a walk around Le Marais (Place des Vosges) and had lunch at Les Loir dans la Theiere (actually, it’s the dormouse in the teapot), where I always used to go for brunch with my friends and spend Sunday afternoons with their lemon meringue cake (which, of course, I had again). For dinner, we went to Sacre Fleur, where I adore their duck.

Sunday was dedicated to my birthday gift – another one – which was EuroDisney (thanks to my disability and deafness, I had a handicap card that made it easier for me to access the rides). We were exhausted when we returned, but we went to dinner at Chez Janou, my favorite bistro. I used to go there for dinner with my friends, but it’s become a special place with my husband as well.

We then rushed to see the illuminated Eiffel Tower, but of course, for the past six months, it’s been turned off at 11:45 pm (which I obviously forgot).

On Monday, our last day, we took a stroll through the center of Paris. An obligatory stop was at La Samaritaine, the new department store in Paris. My favorite is still Bon Marché, but this one is also quite good. We took a walk along the Seine, but the fog was so thick that we couldn’t see the tower (it felt like an unfriendly place). We went to Île de la Cité and then Saint Germain, my favorite neighborhood. I had lunch with a dear friend and then, before we knew it, we were back at the airport.

This is my first article in a small series about Paris – for now, I’ve given an overview and focused on food. I’ll write another article that is more specific to disability.