In the past, I have celebrated Bastille Day in a variety of ways. It happened to be my college boyfriend’s birthday, so some years back it involved candles and cards and cake. Then there were the years of dancing with the firemen. Many of the Parisian fire stations hold Firemen’s Balls on the 13th and 14th of July, with DJs or live music and food and drink for sale and good fun to be had. One memorable summer, one of my pals made it a priority to kiss a fireman and we all made sure she got her wish! Also years of the fireworks on the Champs de Mars, dazzling eruptions of color around the Eiffel Tower – excellent wow factor there.
These activities were, for me, pre-kiddos in Paris. Les bals du pompier are clearly not for the under-18 set, and my last experience of the feux d’artifice involved some young boys hurling fire crackers into the crowd for sport, and dealing with the awfully crowded metro home. So we were looking for something other to do. And our friends E and M suggested the morning parade on the Champs Elysées (that's French for Elysian Fields, which is where -- according to ancient Greek legend and myth -- great warriors go when they die), something I (and they, it turns out!) have never actually done. It was a date.
E and M are a delightful, young Franco-American couple, married now for a couple of years. Both attorneys, they used to live in OKC, but they moved to Paris about 18 months ago hoping that E would have an easier time finding work (she’s the French one). And she has (M landed a job at an international law firm before they departed). I really like both of them and am a bit sad that they left Oklahoma, but now we get to hang out with them here, which is great fun, actually. We did brunch together soon after our arrival (see upcoming the “month of Sundays” post for more on that outing!), and we arranged to meet in front of the Pizza Pino on the Champs around 8:30 AM for the bit Fête Nationale. Possibly the earliest RDV of our whole trip, but who knew what kind of crowds would be amassing in the mean time?
So I had to awaken the little monsters, tired from our California connection the night before, and get them in the metro. We brought breakfast with us: baguette and nutella and some fruit and bottles of water (a bottle of iced coffee for Maman), and we were glad to see that the Pizza Pino was on the much less crowded side of the Champs Elysées. M and E were delayed, as the vélib stations near the Champs had been inexplicably closed for the day, but we staked a little claim along the barricade in the meantime. “Formez vos bataillons!” we sang.
There were lots of well-dressed military types in the street, sporting various dress uniforms, some with spats, some with plumed hats, some with swords, some with automatic weapons. We were handed programs by a charming female member of service, and told that we could not bring our liquids in with us (lots of barricades for crowd control, but not difficult to manage. We could leave our bottles by a big tree, where they would be safe and not fodder for passers-by. My glass pot of Nutella was allowed in, however. Such are the vagaries of the system. Good thing, though, as the kids were starving. And the waiting was torture (as my dear Dr. H. likes to say, life in France involves “the torture of waiting.”)! Then there was some music. And the well-dressed brigades stood at attention. With their backs to us. (So that’s why there were three times as many people on the other side!) The good part was, we got to see the faces of the commanders who were inspecting the troops. Which went on for a while, up and down the Champs. And then, more waiting. And then, President Sarkozy rode by, waving at the gathered crowds (The man is short. He could never get elected in the States.) And then, when it didn’t seem like we could wait any more, a nice man with lots of ribbons on his uniformed chest approached us, the masses at the barricades, and asked if we were hungry. And then he handed out Twix bars. Really! I was thrilled that the weather had cooled off, because Twix bars on a hot day would be just horribly melty and sticky. The kids were thrilled.
Finally, finally, the parade began. Right from where they’d been inspected, each group fell in and started down the Champs toward the Place de la Concorde. And then there were planes that flew low overhead, in tight formation. Wow! One of the first passes involved a v-formation of fighter planes that spewed streams of blue, white and red smoke in their wake. This was the highlight for Thayer, I think, and really impressive to see in person. A few more planes, lots more marching, and then --- the skies opened and it started to pour. I mean POUR! We beat a retreat out of there (with nearly everyone else, I might add), and tried to take cover in the Pizza Pino. It was closed. Just across the street, Pizza Roma. Doors open. We go inside, the kids are hungry (it’s about 11 by now), so why not? The maitre d’ says, practically without stopping: “Sorry, we’re full. Sorry, we’re closing. How many in your party?” E laughed and said she could see the panic on his face as a throng of damp spectators rushed the doors.
Our Party of Five climbed the stairs to the upper level, where we could see a bit of the soaking wet parade (all of those beautiful uniforms!), now including tanks and vehicles and flags of many nations (the Francophonie were out in force, celebrating 50 years of independence for many of the former African colonies). Lunch wasn’t served until 11:30, so we had dessert first, crème caramel, pains au chocolat, and ice cream for Thayer. Bubble gum ice cream (yecch.). Then we could get some pizza and pasta. Not the best meal. Not the best prices (hey, it’s the Champs!). Not the best service (when Meredith asked if she could have some bread, the waitress said, sluggishly, “If you want.”). And I was thinking that for some foreign visitors to Paris, this is the kind of experience they have, over and over. Overpriced, pedestrian food and the frazzled servers. But we were dry and happy.
The rain abated, a bit, and we said our good-byes to M & E and crossed back over to the Disney Store, which Meredith had honed in on as soon as we surfaced from the metro. And the skies opened some more, so we wound up spending about an hour in there, I’d say. Without a purchase! Then we booked it to the metro and stopped at the Alimentation Générale near our stop to get some milk. The nice man there gave us plastic sacks to put over our heads for the 1-block dash to our building.
Once home, we relaxed, dozed, and watched “Enchanted” in 11 small parts, courtesy of You Tube. And then I asked the kids if they wanted to do something else, a surprise. That might involve more rain. They were up for it, so we headed out again, this time to the Grands Boulevards, where we went to see Toy Story 3 on its opening day in Paris. We saw the V.O. (original version) with French subtitles. Movies in France deserve a whole different post, but suffice to say that the kids had Eiffel Tower gummies and thoroughly enjoyed the film. I did, too. Those Pixar people are amazing.
Then we went home and it was nearly 10 when we had dinner (soup, bread and cheese) and by the time we were ready for bed, we could hear the thunderous booming of the fireworks. Since the buildings are uniform in height (6 stories or fewer) there’s no sound barrier, so even all the way across town the noise came to us. A happy sound, I’d say. And speaking of sounds, I realized, as I was falling asleep, that we hadn’t heard La Marseillaise (France’s national anthem) a single time, all day! Curious, no?
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