Foreign Parts

À AIMER: l’heure bleue

There is one benefit to la grisaille (see previous post): each day it ends with l’heure bleue.

“The blue hour” is the time between sunset and nightfall when the Parisien sky turns the most incredible shade of blue. Ah, but which blue? That depends. Sometimes it’s lapis, sometimes it’s violet, sometimes it’s turquoise with a trace of lavender, but always the hour finishes with the color’s inkiest, deepest grade.

To me, l’heure blue is more pronounced in winter, though I have no proof of this. Maybe it’s just that after hours of slate gray sky, the color and light show seems even more fantastic. As the sun sinks, the clouds part, allowing slivers of orange light to hit coveted fifth-floor apartments before turning the sky all sorts of swoon-worthy blues.

Unlike other cities, Paris’s streets come alive during l’heure bleue, not with people heading home, but going out — for a coffee, to meet someone for a drink, or just to stroll. It is by far the city’s finest hour, so fine that in 1912 it inspired a moody, murky perfume by Guerlain and in 1970, a catchy, upbeat song by the gorgeous singer Françoise Hardy.

In January, l’heure bleue occurs about five o’clock, but by June it will happen around ten. When visiting, don’t dally at a museum or try to catch up on your jet lag during this period. To miss l’heure blue is to miss Paris.

À AIMER: les soldes

Yesterday was the first day of les soldes — France’s biannual sales period — and it is something to hate as well as to love.

Why hate? Because when you live here, you have to wait six months for things in the stores to become remotely affordable. If you think by “things” I mean Gaultier T-shirts and Louboutin shoes, I only wish. Those “things” are prohibitively expensive and will remain so, even after a 70% discount. Unfortunately, I’m talking about boring, quotidian items like umbrellas and underwear, pencils and copier paper.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, le pouvoir d’achat (purchasing power) in France is dwindling. Consider this: a nurse brings home, on average, 1,900€ a month, according to INSEE, the country’s statistics institute. A typical 400-square-foot, one-bedroom apartment in Paris will cost that nurse about 1,100€ a month, utilities and mandatory apartment insurance not included. Salaries are low here — even a banking executive makes just 2,730€ a month — and prices are high and rising.

Last December, Le Figaro reported that consumer goods are more expensive in France than in practically every other country. The article was based on a study by the web site Pricerunner.fr, which compares prices on everything from milk to cars. It found that, while a liter of milk costs 1.26€ in France, in Portugal it sells for .60 centimes. The same Nokia cell phone runs 669€ in France, 579€ in Italy and 508€ in New York City. A DVD of the latest Bond film, Casino Royal, is 25.32€ in France, 19.32€ in Germany.

With discrepancies like that, you can understand why everybody waits until les soldes to do their shopping. And this has become a problem for the already stagnant economy. Such a problem that economy minister Christine Lagarde has proposed allowing stores to have year-round sales sections where they can unload items at lower prices. The country’s boutique owners, who the mandated sales periods are meant to protect, are against this plan, as they fear they will be unable to compete against big retailers. The head of their union, Charles Melcer, told Le Monde recently that Lagarde’s proposal is “the first pseudo-good idea of the year.”

The fight, as they say, is on. And in the meantime, we cash-strapped consumers will have to battle it out in the department stores, risking bruised toes and kidneys* just so we can buy a nice pair of shoes at 50% off for exactly the same price we could have bought them for in New York last September, when they were still new and trendy.

Les Soldes, for those of you who will be in Paris, run until February 16, 2008.

*This is not an exaggeration. I have been pushed and shoved all over Paris in the name of a discount. And at the chic department store le Bon Marché, I once saw two tiny, silver-haired grannies having a tug of war over the last pair of black lace panties with matching garters at 60% off.

PARIS: à aimer, à détester

Paris, like every other metropolis in the world, has her charms and her faults. Live here long enough and her celebrated beauty begins to fade; her romantic veneer starts to chip off, sometimes in layers. If you’re lucky, you will see beyond her flaws and still find yourself smitten — even after three or ten or twenty years.

So far, your Foreign Parts correspondent has been lucky; after three years, I still love it here, but that doesn’t mean I’m wearing rose-tinted glasses. I can complain with the most Parisian of Parisians — les parisiens de souche — and I don’t feel the least bit guilty because nobody can grouse like they can. It’s one of their many charms.

Now, about my list: a wholly subjective compendium of things to love and things to hate about Paris. Eventually, I’ll add other residents’ thoughts, but for now the list is all mine.