| Paris photographique |
[Jun. 6th, 2009|12:37 pm] |
Oh no, it's photo-travelogue time. Here comes a selection of photos from Paris, from a few days ago.
As ever, most of my souvenir photos are hardly normal postcard style pictures, but just to show I can take nice touristy shots, here's the Eiffel Tower basking in the sunshine. This pic was taken from a speeding Ligne 6 Metro train, Direction Charles De Gaulle, crossing Pont de Bir Hakem, looking east over the Quai Bramly. But you probably spotted that.
This is what the Eiffel Tower looks like when you're half way up it in an interestingly flimsy lift. In fact, the entire tower is constructed from surprisingly small-section lengths of angle iron. I mean, I've got shelf brackets which are more hefty than some of the ironwork in this photo:
And here I am, having a Mary Poppins moment. I was rather disappointed to find that the entire Eiffel Tower is painted in that rather grim poo-brown colour. I had assumed it would be a deep gloss black, with the bolt heads picked out in gold leaf, or something. Not poo colour, for heaven's sake!
And now let's go down in the tube station at midnight en bas dans le métropolitain à à peu près neuf heure dans le soir:
Andi on le métro:
Warning sign on the métro - apparently it's very dangerous to allow your pet rabbit to put his paws in the doors. Liguistic note: I see this sign uses the 'tu' form. Surely 'Vous' should more properly be used?
Below we have another métro sign. At first glance, this is a perfectly normal sign reserving seats for disabled people. We have such seats, and such signs, on the London Underground. But read the small print here - it seems in Paris there's a sliding scale of Special Needs, ranging from anyone over 75 years old, to disabled war veterans - the absolute top trumps of disability. Surely this must provoke arguments...
'Stand aside, sir, I should have that seat. I'm industrially disabled. My foot was chewed off in a lathe!' 'Oh no you dont, mate, I had my foot shot off at Verdun. That means I trump you!' 'Not so fast, sir. Not only do I have a foot missing, but here in my pocket I have a three year old child! My seat, I believe!'
There's an entire Monty Python sketch in there somewhere...
Before we leave the métro, here's another one for the steampunks. Cité station is entered by a spiral staircase set into a huge rivetted cast iron tube. It's a bit like being in a 19th century submarine (and the station is, in fact, below the bed of the Seine). You can also take the lift, but where's the fun in that?
More Paris photos will follow, but for now here's one more. This is a street sign on the Isle de la Cité. It says 'Road Of The Cat Who Fishes' - there's got to be a story behind that!
Plus plus tard, mes petits choux-fleurs... |
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| Comments: |
I went up the Eiffel Tower in '96 and remember also being disappointed by the colour of it.
ooh it looks gorgeous! I agree with the colour- I thought it was black iron.
Are you on facebook?
cheers!
Robyn
I'm not a Facebooker, for reasons I kicked around here.
I really like the Metro sign and typeface. I guess it's the original from way back when and much more interesting than London's Victorian/Edwardian counterparts. | |
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