French customs

Battling with French Administration

4 Comments

I just hot-footed it over to the tax office to file a new declaration because my accounting software made a mistake with my depreciation expenses (well, I might have had something to do with it). The tax office closes at 4 of course. I arrived with 3 minutes to spare only to discover it’s moved. Now why haven’t I been told about this? I file VAT (GST) every month, over the internet admittedly, but I reckon I should have been told anyway. 

French administration is very annoying and complicated. They also write letters and instructions in incomprehensible French. None of this plain language for them. I couldn’t believe it when I filled in my last Australian passport form. It’s obviously written for dummies. I approve of that. At least you know what to do. A few years ago, when my office was in Nogent sur Marne, I had an Algerian neighbour. I was always helping her to fill in forms and write letters. She spread the word and I was soon helping another Algerian and a family from Mali.

After participating in a lobby to have the Australian constitution changed so that Australians living oversees could have dual citizenship, I applied for French nationality a few years ago. I went along to the Court to get all the forms and sent in my application. One of the things you always need in France is a birth certificate (well, an extract) less than 3 months old. This is because your life history is written on your birth certificate here  – naturalisation, change of name, marriage, divorce, legal decisions relating to legal incompetence and death. So I explained in my covering letter that Australian birth certificates don’t give that sort of information (I didn’t want to have to get another certificate plus have it translated officially at great expense).  Relationnel was convinced that they’d ask for more papers (they always do).

However, all went well and after a few months, I was contacted by a police officer who came to visit me at my office to make sure that I was really living in the country and spoke French. Another few months went by and I had to go to the local police station with my diplomas. The man who interviewed me had no idea what he was doing. He admitted he’d never done it before! I also had to prove I was well integrated into the community. Then exactly one year from the date of application, on 2nd December 2002, I was declared to have French nationality. On 29th March 2004, I received a FRENCH BIRTH CERTIFICATE . Isn’t that too much ?

Now I have two passports – French and Australian!

Lifestyle

Outdoor swimming at 4°C in Normandy

2 Comments

‘Twas the day before Christmas and the ground in Normandy was covered in snow. So we decided to try the outdoor pool in Rouen. We had a lot of trouble finding it, despite the Tom-Tom because it was in the middle of an enormous housing estate. We picked our way carefully along the path from the car, making sure we didn’t break our legs on the ice and slush before we got to the pool.

Inside, there was a 25-metre pool and a smaller children’s pool. The 50-metre was outside. You got to it by going down into a pool on one side then swimming through one of those plastic strip curtains out to the other side where you could see the steam rising off the water. Relationnel, who’s happier walking up mountains than swimming, remained inside to “warm up”. When the cold air struck my head despite my swimming cap, I started swimming energetically. After about 300 metres, I decided to go indoors. Every time I took my head or a limb out of the water, I was cold despite the fact that the water was 28°. And the snow-laden fir trees I’d somehow imagined as a backdrop were missing. Just urban suburban.

I met Relationnel on my way back through the strip curtains but he only did about a half a lap before scuttling back inside. I was much happier doing my laps out of the cold I can tell you.

Suzanne Berlioux Pool

I usually swim in the Suzanne Berlioux pool in Les Halles in the middle of Paris. I discovered recently when taking some Aussie friends for a walk in the area that you can actually look down on the swimmers from above. It was a bit eerie. When you’re swimming, you can’t imagine it. In any case, you’re so busy making sure that you don’t get drowned by people (mainly men – why aren’t they swimming in the fast lane?) pounding their way past you that you don’t have time to notice your surroundings. I’ve finally discovered a time when it’s reasonably safe – Tuesday afternoons. I once suggested to one of the monitors that they should have a special lane for brutes. She replied that they would need too many!

I find it difficult to imagine how you can be breastroking away and someone actually backstrokes into you. And how they can bang into you when you’re backstroking and they’re breaststroking is even more incomprehensible. I was swimming away the other day perfectly happily on the right side of the lane (as I should have been) when I saw someone coming towards me at a fast crawl (ha! ha!) in MY LANE for no apparent reason. It was difficult to know where to go but they swerved back at the last moment thank god.

The people I dislike the most are the ones that swing up and down like monkeys from the ring at the end of the pool. It’s OK it you’re doing breaststroke or freestyle but if you’re doing backstroke you can be walloped in the head by their rear end as they swing back.

What I’d really like is to have the pool to myself.

Paris

Miss Bibi and the Palais Royal in Paris

10 Comments

cannon in Palais RoyalOw! that was loud! I always forget. At 12 noon every Wednesday, the time cannon in the Palais Royal gardens goes off. Initially installed in 1786 on the Paris meridian by a clockmaker called Rousseau who had a shop on one side of the gardens, it would go off at exactly midday on sunny days. The simple mechanism was ingenious. A fuse under a  small magnifying glass was sparked by the sun’s rays. At the time, it was used to adjust all the clocks in Paris. It was stolen in 1998 but was eventually replaced and has been working again since the beginning of the year. Sadly, it doesn’t have the magnifying glass system anymore and doesn’t depend on the weather.

There are lots of other surprising things in the Palais Royal galeries. All sorts of interesting boutiques. One day I even saw a fur coat made of teddy bears! Today, the shops are very chic, with Stella McCartney and La Petite Robe Noire (but where would I wear a little black dress ?), Delage and Corto Moltedo, all way over my price range of course.

In the galerie Beaujolais, there’s a shop that sells ribbons for medals. You know, decorative medals like the legion of honour. It’s next to another speciality shop called Le Magasin à l’Oriental, opened in 1818, a real Ali Baba’s cave that sells pipes and other things of that ilk. In the Galerie Montpensier on the other side, there’s a beautiful toy shop with the most wonderful collection of dolls and wooden toys. And just opposite, a shop called Anna Joliet that sells hand-painted music boxes. You can pick your box and pick your music. Mine plays the theme from Doctor Zhivago. L’Escalier d’Argent, run by madame Danou Jacquard, possesses a unique collection of over a hundred men’s vests made out of 18th century-inspired fabric and tailored according to the period of Louis XVI. It also sells silver jewellery.

Anna Joliet music boxesBut my favourite is Miss Bibi. L’Escalier d’Argent used to have a tiny showroom in the Galerie Valois with a dusty collection of bow ties. One day, we saw they had taken everything out and were redoing it. The sign came down and after a while we saw them putting in a sort of shadow box. It was hard to imagine what sort of shop it could be, it’s literally about two metres square. But it’s turned into an increasingly popular jewellery store called Miss Bibi. “Bibi” is short for “bibelot” or knick-knack. But it’s the clever window dressing that attracts the customers.  The shadow box with its tiny shelves fills up almost the entire window and the jewellery, “inspired by the world of childhood and nostalgia”, is displayed on miniature items of furniture and little houses and other original items. I didn’t believe for one minute it could work but it’s always full.  At 50 to 200 euros apiece, maybe it’s the only shop in the Palais Royal that’s affordable for most people.

miss bibi's shop in the Palais Royal

 Don’t forgot to sign up and receive the latest posts in your mail box or on your smart phone!
French customs

Summer Time and French Time

5 Comments
Sunset over the Volga

I really love the long summer days in Europe when it doesn’t get dark until 11 pm. Of course the midnight sun is even better. We went to Saint Petersburg a few years ago in July and it was quite magic to actually watch the sun set at midnight. The problem is that on the last Saturday of October, we have to put our clocks back again and it’s so hard to have night suddenly fall at 6 pm even if it’s lighter in the morning. It completely upsets my biological clock and I’m tired for days on end.

Talking about time, that reminds me of another difference between France and Australia. When I was first invited to dinner here, I used to turn up on the dot in good Australian style. However, I soon realised that no one ever seemed ready when I arrived – they even seemed quite surprised to see me – and they certainly didn’t ever turn up on time when I invited them.  It has now been explained to me that if you’re invited at 8, you must get there at 8.20 at the earliest and 8.40 at the latest!

Imprecise versus precise

My own relationship to time is somewhat rigid I must confess. I was brought up by a father who was always on time and a mother who was chronically late – she would have done very well in France.  Relationnel is exactly the same. He doesn’t even wear a watch on weekends. I know why people are late of course. I’ve had time to study it over the years. They always think they can do one more thing before they go, such as shine their shoes or send an email (typing with just two fingers of course), take the rubbish out (not that I really mind, that is one job I am allergic to), while people who are on time know they can’t. It used to exasperate me terribly with Relationnel because there are some things where you need to be on time such as movies and planes.  One day he told me “Je ne suis pas à une heure près” which roughly translates as “give or take an hour”. Five minutes, OK, even ten minutes, but an HOUR? After that I realised that I would have to change my way of thinking altogether.

Among English speakers, we always check when giving a time, “Do you mean French time or English time ?” It’s safer !

Food, French customs

Halloween and Pumpkins in France

8 Comments

I can remember being in Troyes one year at Halloween and was surprised to find a restaurant decked out in black and orange because although Leonardo was born on 31st October, I had never seen any sign of Halloween in France. Then I heard the explanation on France Info. I love that radio because it keeps repeating the same news all day. If you get distracted by something else (and I always do), you know you’ll hear it again a little while later. It has lots of lifestyle and other interesting tidbits as well. I get a lot of my scattered knowledge from there. Far better than watching the 8 o’clock news with one of those annoying news readers who wear tons of make-up and carry on like film stars. Also, you don’t get the horrific pictures that you do on TV. I have still not seen any videos of 7/11. I’d be having nightmares if I did.

So, back to Halloween. In 1992, a costume company called Cézar bought out an American firm and found itself with a huge number of Halloween costumes. It opened a mask museum in Saint-Hilaire-Saint-Florent near Saumur in the Loire and did an amazing publicity campaign and that was the beginning of Halloween in France. It boomed in the late nineties before gradually fizzing out, probably because it lacks tradition here.

On Sunday, I heard an English woman at the market asking if there were any appropriately sized pumpkins but no one seemed to know what she was talking about. Speaking of pumpkins, they are excessively disappointing in this country. Usually big and tasteless. I bought a butternut in Romorantin last week – didn’t think you could go wrong with a butternut – but it was just like a bland squash. They only make soup with pumpkins here, but I’m not into soup. Some places have started selling what they call “potimarron”. I looked it up in the dictionary and it says « red hubbard squash, red kuri squash », not that I’ve ever heard of it. It’s not bad, but nothing like the Queensland blue. I still have a scar on one of my fingers from cutting up a pumpkin.

They do sell these neat little inedible squashes though. I found some in the Loire at 0.30 euros a piece. A real bargain. They’ll probably last a couple of months and are great decoration next to my forest floor with its autumn leaves, holly, pine cones and acorns. I even brought some moss home.

One of the first things I’m going to do in my new vegetable garden is plant some Australian pumpkins. That and raspberries.

Lifestyle

iPhone Thieves in Paris

6 Comments

Of course, the problem about iPhones is that other people want them too.

When I had lunch at Vilalys in the Palais Royal gardens with my German friend Chris just after I got my iPhone, I naturally had to demonstrate all its wonderful features, particularly since the last time I saw her, I only had my Palm Pilot, cool I must admit but nothing like an iPhone. After lunch, Relationnel and I left for a long weekend and it was not until we were a couple of hours out of Paris that I realised I no longer had my iPhone.  A weekend of anguish. The first thing I did when I got back was to go and see them and, wow, was I lucky! The waitress found it on the table when I left and gave it to the manager. I was so grateful that I bought them all Lotto (lottery) tickets in true Australian style. They were most surprised as it’s an unheard of “thank you” in France.

Recently however, Black Cat phoned me when she got to work, most upset. She had been listening to music on her iPhone in a crowded metro when the music cut out. Her iPhone had disappeared at the same time of course … The only good thing was that she was able to buy an iPhone 4. Now she has less recognisable black earbuds instead of the characteristic white ones and never gets her iPhone out in the metro.

I was careful about mine for a while but I gradually got blasé again and the next time I saw Chris, we had lunch on the terrace of the Autobus Impérial, which, by the way, I can highly recommend, unlike Vilalys which, despite the honesty of its staff, has become a victim of its success. It used to be very good, but last time I went, the salmon was overcooked and the other things on the Vilalys Platter were not up to scratch.

Anyway, I had put my iPhone on the table next to me to show Chris some photos when an unkempt-looking Spaniard came up and threw a sheet of paper on the table, begging. I waved him away and so did the waiter. He picked up the paper and left. It was only then that I realised he had taken my beloved iPhone with him! Chris was most upset, convinced it was her fault. I assured her however it was entirely due to my own carelessness. I used her mobile to phone Orange to cancel the account, which took quite some time as they asked for my “confidential code” which the recorded message said was on my phone bill. Not exactly something you carry around, is it? Fortunately Relationnel was home for lunch and was able to give it to me. It turned out to be my pin code. Why didn’t they just say so for god’s sake?

After an excellent lunch which included the best entrecôte I’ve eaten in a long time, Chris and I went to the Orange boutique nearby. We were looked after by a very nice girl (surprising for Orange) who organised a new iPhone but in the meantime, the old one had been cancelled which meant I had to go to another boutique at Madeleine. To cut a long story short, despite the price of the iPhone, the damage wasn’t too disastrous. I was able to reduce my call plan and get unlimited SMS, a most definite advantage as I was constantly going above my 30 per month limit. A couple of weeks later, I spent an annoying two hours at the local police station making a declaration so that the phone itself could be disabled (see link below). Good thing I had my iPhone with me!

Apparently, the paper trick is well-known. Our real estate agent in Blois said that she’d only had her iPhone one day when a customer came in, sat down and asked about a place to rent. He, too, put a piece of paper on the table and when he left, there was no more iPhone!

This ever happened to you ?

L’Autobus Impérial: in a small street in the Châtelet Les Halles area,  midday menu at 13.50 euros for main course + café gourmand or 15.50 euros including an entrée + main course or main course + dessert + wine + coffee.

How to disable your iPhone and why: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=426564

 

 

Loire Valley

Blèsoise – a demonym

5 Comments

I think the only thing I don’t like about having bought a 16th century house in Blois is that I’m going to be Blèsoise. I’m a bit put off by all those slippery s-pronounced-z-sounds. When you come from Townsville, the most you can be is a Townsvillean or a Townsvillite. We have Sydneyites and Sydneysiders, Melbournites and Brisbanites. Dare I suggest Darwinians? Surely not! And I wouldn’t know what to call people from Perth (they live on the wrong side of the country anyway) or Adelaide (which isn’t much better).

Château de Blois

But in France, every town has its own adjective, called a gentilé (demonym or gentilic in English (bet you didn’t know that one) to describe its inhabitants and there are some real beauties. If you live in Saint Etienne you’re a Stéphanois, for example. It’s all a question of etymology and word origins of course. Somewhere along the way, the “ph” in the middle of Stephanos, the original Greek name, got slurred out and turned into a diphthong to give Estienne (after the “os” disappeared and an extra “e” was added at the beginning as well). The “s” was eventually lost altogether. I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed, but the circumflex in French – that little “hat” ^ – often corresponds to an “s” that disappeared, e.g. château = castle, mât = mast, bête = beast, fête = beast, gîte = guest, hôte = host, moût = must, etc.

The people in Angoulême are called Angoumoisins – see that ê indicating a lost “s” again. If you come from Auberive-en-Royans, you’re an Albaripains.  The inhabitants of Béziers are Biterrois, Réginaburgiens live in Bourg-la-Reine, while Cadurciens come from Cahors. If you hail from Carquegou, you’re a Carquefolien.  Now I don’t know why Jarlandins come from Châteaux-Arnoux but there is surely a reason and I wouldn’t mind being a Bellifontaine (beautiful fountain) from Fontainebleau.

Maison de la Magie

I love the fact that the inhabitants of L’Isle Saint Jourdain are called Lillots and that Radounauds come from Oradour-sur-Glane.  Paimblotins live in Paimboeuf while Pont-à-Mousson has lots of Mussipontains, Pont-Saint-Esprit has Spiripontains and Pont-Sainte-Maxence has Maxipontains!  But it’s the Saints that take the cake each time: Saint-André-Les-Vergers = Dryats, Saint-Brieuc = Briochins (like baby brioches), Saint-Jean-de-la-Ruelle = Stéoruellan and  La Tour-du-Pin = Turripinois. And how about this one? If you come from Villefranche-sur-Saöne, then you are Caladois. I’m not going to pretend I understand that one.

However, the real surprise is Saint-Adresee on the coast of Normandy, whose inhabitants are called Dionysiens, just like 19 other towns in France, but all the others are variants of Saint-Denis, directly derived from Dionysus, the Greek god of the grape harvest, very appropriate for a saint. It turns out that the town was originally called Saint-Denis-Chef-de-Caux. One day, a ship was caught in a fierce storm of the coast; the sailors all but abandoned ship to pray to Saint Denis, and the ship started to drift dangerously into shallow waters. The captain was furious and berated the crew, taking over the helm himself, and saying that only the only thing that could save them was their own astuteness. It woke them from their torpeur and they managed to steer the ship to safety.  So why Sainte-Adresse? Because “adresse” in French means cleverness or astuteness so the “astuteness” of the captain having proved to be more effective than Saint-Denis, the town was renamed Saint-Adresse.

So Blésoise it will be. For the moment, of course, I’m just a plain old Parisienne!

For more French demonyms, go to: http://www.lexilogos.com/noms_habitants_villes.htm

Lifestyle

iPhone Crazy

19 Comments

I love my iPhone. Sounds like some corny commercial doesn’t it? But I really do. I used to have an uncool Sony mobile with bluetooth and a cool Palm Pilot. That was before Black Cat dropped her phone in the Seine on the first day of her first real job when she went out onto the gang plank to make a private call. She could see the phone lying on the bottom of the river sinking further into the mud each day until it finally disappeared. But it was a good excuse to get an iPhone.

When she showed me what it could do, I couldn’t wait to have one of my own, particularly as my Palm was no longer performing very well. There was the added bonus that she would be able to explain it all to me. I reckon I’m pretty gadget-literate for my generation but the thought of learning how to work yet another one was a little overwhelming.

Relationnel has a Blackberry which I personally find totally useless. He came home from work one day with this little black thing and told me the others called it a “baignoire”. Why on earth would anyone call a phone a “bathtub”? He thought it might be the shape. Then it suddenly dawned on me. What they were really saying was “baie noire”, the literal translation of Blackberry, which is actually “mûre”. It’s become a standard joke in our house!

But back to the iPhone. I went to the bookshop and bought myself “iPhone pour LES NULS” because it never hurts to be a dummy even though Leonardo scoffed at me. That way I didn’t have to rely on Black Cat totally, particularly as I only see her once or twice a week which is not very often when you get a new gadget. Once I got the hang of the Apps, there was no holding me back. Now I can look up the dictionary or check out something on google whenever I want. I can find out what the weather will be like next day or next week. I can do my banking and take the bus instead of the metro (like a real Parisian) because I don’t have to try and decipher that awful bus map.

I can play WordWarp in the metro or standing in a queue. I can look up the yellow pages and give people directions in the street (instead of sending them in the wrong direction the way I did one night when a lady was looking for the theatre – never ask a foreigner for directions!). I can look up words in foreign languages. I can find out where the traffic jams are and save someone’s life with my Red Cross App (haven’t tried this out for real yet). I can listen to meditation exercises when I can’t go to sleep. I can measure the length of a room (how come I didn’t think of that the other day when we were visiting our new house ?).

I can jot down ideas for my blog and identify unknown mushrooms in the forest (and not be poisoned). I can talk to Leonardo on skype. I can consult my Paris tourist guide or the TV programme (not that there’s ever anything on) and best of all, I can take photos ALL THE TIME. Then post them on Facebook!

You may have noticed that I haven’t mentioned actually talking to people on the phone. It does happen, occasionally, and that’s where having earphones is wonderful. I can talk to Black Cat while I’m making dinner or hanging out the washing or doing some other boring thing. I can consult my emails whenever and wherever I like. And I can flick the screen and make it all big enough to see. And do you know something really strange – it took me two years to realise than when I swap languages from French to English, the keyboard switches from azerty to qwerty!!!

So, tell me, why do you love your iPhone?

Family

Black Cat

13 Comments

“Black cat entre home. Y’a pas happy moi. Moi pleure. Black cat parti. Moi happy.”  A direct quote from Black Cat at the age of 2 ½ when a stray cat came into the house and upset her. And that is typical of the way she used to talk. Growing up in a family where Mum spoke English to her and her brother and to the occasional English-speaking friend but French to her father, she assumed everyone spoke both languages. So I guess she just took the first word that came into her mind or the easiest to pronounce.

I did wonder whether she would ever manage to speak normally. A few months later, when she started maternelle (the French state-run pre-school that begins at about the age of 3), the teachers had me a bit worried. “She’s obviously very clever and knows how to do a lot of things. It’s a pity we can’t understand what she’s saying though”, they told me. As well as mixing up the two languages, she had a few pronunciation problems such as “fwing” for “swing” and “wabbit” for “rabbit”. I had no trouble understanding her of course, but that’s often the case, isn’t it, even if there’s only one language involved.

By the time she was six, she had become much more comprehensible but had practically stopped speaking English even though she could understand everything I said. We went to Brittany on holidays and met an English family with a little girl the same age. They got on marvellously and her English seemed to reappear out of nowhere. When we left, however, I explained to her that if she continued to talk to me in French, she would forget how to speak in English and wouldn’t be able to talk to her little friend the next year. We struck a bargain. Whenever she spoke to me in French, I would pretend I didn’t understand; she would know that I really did understand, but she would then say it in English. It took about three months. Ever since, she has always spoken to me in English.

When she was born, I asked Leonardo, who was three, to speak to her in English, which he did until one day, about three years later, when we were staying in a camping ground. They were playing with some other children and he was obviously embarrassed about being different. He looked her straight in the eye and said, in French, “From now on, we’re always going to speak to each other in French”, and Leonardo being Leonardo, that was the end of that.

They both went to French schools so didn’t learn English officially until they went to high school at the age of 11. Their English was always way ahead of the others but it didn’t necessarily get them good marks.  Both did German as their second foreign language, but it wasn’t their strongest subject either. I think they imagined that languages just came automatically and you didn’t have to actually learn them the way you did with maths and science.

It was not until Black Cat went to Australia on an exchange in her fourth year of uni that she started to sound a bit Australian. We like to call her accent “mid-ocean”.

Paris

Padlocks on the Pont des Arts in Paris

9 Comments

The view from the Pont des Arts footbridge is one of best in Paris, according to Relationnel. Difficult to beat, I must admit. If you stand in the middle and look towards the Left Bank, you have the Institut de France containing the Académie Française with its famous dome in front of you. Behind you, on the Right Bank, is the Louvre. On your left, looking downstream, Ile de la Cité with Notre Dame and  Sainte Chapelle. On your right, the Eiffel Tower which shimmers and shines for 10 minutes every hour, at its best at midnight on 31st December where we join with what seems like half of Paris, champagne bottle and glasses in hand, to welcome in the New Year.

But what I like best are the cadenas. The railings on either side of the bridge are being gradually covered with padlocks of every shape and size. Although the collection was started a few years ago, most are recent. At the beginning of May last year, there were about 1,600, but only about forty of the most resistant were left on 16th May. No one knows who took them off. Neither the town hall nor the police knows anything about it. I didn’t count them but both sides of each railing are now covered in new padlocks!

There are big ones and little ones, old ones and new, square locks and round ones, key locks, combination locks and even bike locks. On some, the inscriptions are written with felt pens, others are beautifully engraved. The names come from everywhere – Ana  y Pablo , Lus & Carlos, Monset & Leila, Sacha et Serge, Ruth and Michael, Pedro & McJosé, Fio & Angel, Eliot and Madeleine, Princess Titti & Magic Benoo, Christ &  Natasha, poopy pants & becky,  J. Vilorio & L. Villaverde, the list goes on.  Some of the messages are mundane – a heart or “loves” between the names, “1 an de bonheur” (a year of happiness), “forever” or “Thirty years of wedded bliss”; some are inventive : “Mikaël & Vanessa : une évidence” (perfectly obvious); while others are hopeful of things to come: “Christina Joe Maybe One day cos”.

The  enormous “50 mm sécurité” and “Triangle 75 mm” padlocks left me somewhat bemused.  They hardly seem appropriate for a long-term relationship. There’s a little yellow star (on a bridge in Paris?), a bottle opener with “I love Paris”, lots of big red hearts and some smaller ones, a lovely embossed padlock that looks as though it came off a trunk, and one with 3 little coloured hearts glued on. Some are handpainted miniatures and I love the one with the two flags, one red and yellow and the other blue and white with a star on one side, even though I can’t identify the countries. There’s even a plaque with Mona Lisa on it. The most elaborate has three little buttons sewn on. Sometimes, there are two padlocks together, with a name on each. Very economical. Nothing like allowing for a change of partner!  

So where do they all come from? Some are obviously prepared in advance while others are more spontaneous. I noticed that some of the nearby bouquinistes are selling the plainer variety. The basement of the BHV department store on the corner of Place de l’Hôtel de Ville further along the right bank no doubt has quite a selection, but I don’t know where you get those heart-shaped ones. They seem made for meaure! Likes like a thriving business in any case.

Has anyone seen padlocks in other places on their travels?

For more information on the subject in French: http://tempsreel.nouvelobs.com/societe/20100512.OBS3875/qui-a-fracture-les-cadenas-d-amour-du-pont-des-arts.html

from the Tropics to the City of Light