Day 9: Bottom Line: We Made Croissants Today

Special breakfasts are a complete luxury to me.  Going slowly and starting the day in that way is a gift.  And special breakfasts are even more beautiful when shared with my husband or a friend.  When Dean and I are able to get away together, our breakfasts are always a highlight for me.  It's just something that never occurs when we're at home--alone in the morning, someone to serve us food and beverage, someone to clean it all up, someone to set out every little thing we need.  Maybe there's a newspaper involved, maybe we talk about our day.... For sure, there are lots of dishes on the table--a teapot, cups, silverware, little plates, medium plates, a jar of honey, a small pitcher of milk, a juice glass.  I feel like I'm playing dollhouse except it's really my life at that very moment--like I'm living in my own dollhouse-breakfast-world.  

So when I mentioned to Shannon the previous evening at dinner that I would be thrilled to nip away to a fancy hotel for breakfast one morning, imagine my joy when she said she'd love the same thing!  That happened today.  We got out of bed when we'd maybe have preferred to have been sleeping in and we headed back over to, apparently, the only fancy hotel in Paris I know--Hotel Le Bristol.

We walked slowly through the lobby with marble and beautiful furniture, flower arrangements and rampant displays of shiny, gold brass and mirrors to the breakfast room.  I approached the hostess stand and gave her my best, "Bo-jzhew (smile).  Deux personnes pour le petit déjeuner, s'il vous plaît?"  She smiled back and said something in French and led us to a table with two armchairs and a sofa surrounding it.  You know when you go to breakfast and there's a sofa at your table, you are in the right place.  

But did you read what I just said?  "She smiled back and said something in French...."  This is possibly the most conflicting experience I have had in Paris. I feel a rush of competency and Frenchness when I have offered something in the language to the point that I am responded to in full-on French.  It means my pronunciation was somewhere in the realm of acceptable, my accent was halfway convincing and I managed to give the allusion of confidence--it means I am viewed as being French-ish!!!  And then, the crushing, paradoxical blow:  I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THEY ARE SAYING BACK.  

I am subsequently discovered as a lingual fraud because I have to then change my body language and my facial lines to portray my inner shame as I admit, "Je ne parle pas francais."  And then, as is my habit, I form a small space in the air with my index finger and thumb, and follow it up with, "Un petit peu," with a scrunched-up nose and face which silently asks, "Please don't hate me for deceiving you.  Have pity."  It is especially tortuous for someone who is used to communicating with words to not be able to do that in a foreign country.  I ache to say something beyond my basic phrases and preschool-level sentence structuring.  I keep meaning to google-translate something like, "This meal was life-changing.  I will never be the same again." In my fantasy, I would practice the translation until it's so convincing that the conception of the ignorant American they initially held of me is banished forever into the Parisian sewers to roam freely with the ghost of Javert.

So Shannon and I clinked teacups and spread Échiré butter on our brioche and sipped slowly and laughed and took in our surroundings and caught up a little bit on each other's lives.  It was bliss.

The only thing that distracted me from breakfast bliss was that I was partially fixated on repairing a loose button in a central location on my blouse which came loose while I was getting ready to leave.  I popped over to ask the front desk at the hotel if I could have a sewing kit and they graciously obliged.  So while Shannon was away at the ladies' room during breakfast, I tried to quickly sew it back on.  I do not sew.  But button-reattaching is within my grasp.  I eventually got it back on but not without piercing my thumb with the needle and consequently shedding blood on the white blouse around my button.  Blood on blouses--it's the new thing, so...organic.  Try to keep up, Paris fashion week-ers.

We headed out after breakfast to meet Grace, Emily and Mary Beth at the Musée Jacquemart-André.  It took a little longer than we had figured because, much in the same way as Beth and I mapped driving directions to use for bicycling (Day 7), Shannon and I mapped *driving* directions for walking.  We ended up walking about a mile out of our way on one-way streets when our legs could've just cut straight to the chase.  Somehow, we ended up on the Champs Elysées so we paused for a photo.  If you strain your eyes, you can spot the Arc de Triomphe in the distance.

Everyone sing:  "Aux Champs Elysées!"  If you've never heard the song or taken a French class of any kind, here you go: 

You're welcome.

Eventually, we got to the Musée Jacquemart-André.  Fascinating tour of an opulent 19th century residence-turned-museum in the heart of Paris.  We had a lovely lunch in the cafe, which was the home's original dining room.

Our next stop was La Cuisine--the site of our group class for learning the art of making croissants!  Everyone was excited about this.  But since we had a bit of extra time before the class started, I decided to use it for rest.  I began to feel sluggish and easily bothered at this point, feeling the effects of having not slept in that morning.

I looked down from Quai de Hotel de Ville to the Seine and noticed a nice landing with trees by the river, accessible from steps which went down from the bridge on the other side.  I'm not sure, but I think this spot was pointed out to me by our Fat Tire night bike tour guide, Theo, when Dean was here.  I remembered him saying it was a nice spot so I walked over.  Once there, I banished all feelings of weariness, plopping myself right down on a bench.

I pretended not to mentally reference knowledge of the unsanitary habits of certain French men who have no desire to find an actual toilet in moments when they probably should.  No part of the ground or public hard surface (or the Seine for that matter) in Paris seems to be sacred.  Sometimes you're so tired that your exhaustion overrides any mental battle you might feel and that is what happened for me.  While I rested there, I quieted.  I needed it.

As I left the spot, I noticed a few people in an art class taking inspiration from their surroundings.  They sat with little sketchbooks and small trays of watercolor paints and it was so quiet.  I was excited about the cooking class, but I really could've stayed down there another hour.

I made my way back across the bridge and noticed a couple of quaint restaurants on the way.  Sometimes I would see restaurants like these and even if I wasn't hungry, I just wanted to eat something--if only to get to linger in a cafe.    

But it was time for the cooking class!  Welcome to La Cuisine Paris....

Everyone except Jenny was game for the croissant class.  The seven of us went in to La Cuisine with our wonderful instructor, Diana, who was a pure joy--and who taught us how to make croissants.  We were given recipes and a pencil for note-taking, which I did for the first ten minutes--but then came to the realization that I would never be repeating this process at home, solely by virtue of the fact that I have three children and a regular lack of 5-hour time slots in which to recreate such things.  So I put down my pencil and just listened to Diana and tried to do what she said.  We laughed, we gasped, we whisked, we rolled, we sliced, we kneaded and we sampled our efforts.  And at the end, we had actual croissants.  Unbelievable.  I'm not going to say they were the lightest, flakiest, most professional-grade croissants I'd ever had, but darn it--they were croissants.  That was more than enough.

Shannon gets serious about her whisking. 

 Everyone was trying so much to do everything *exactly* as Diana instructed.  And then something happened--I think Jennifer had a snafu with the almond paste?  Anyway, everyone in the room was watching it happen and we all gasped as if something truly earth-shattering had just occurred.  And then our gasping made us howl with laughter!

 Beautiful pastry dough and pastry chefs!

Here is Grace pictured with Diana, our instructor.  At one point in the steps, we were instructed to knead the dough in a particular way which involved slamming it down on the counter with great force.  For whatever reason, Diana felt compelled to center on Grace's efforts with extended personalized pointers.  Grace's face!  We were all in stitches.  Diana was very...animated about this part.  

Ta-da!!  Can you feel the pride?  Many thanks to sweet Diana for all her patience and instruction!!

Dinner tonight was split because we were only able to get a reservation for 4 at one of the places on our list, Le 6 Paul Bert--the quintessential modern French bistro.  It was decided that the four of us who had been most involved in restaurant-choosing and reservation-making during our trip planning would go, since we probably cared the most.  Fabulous meal.  I recall a mushroom dish that was especially memorable.  

At some point in the evening, Emily spotted the owner, Bertrand Auboyneau.  Naturally, she chatted him up.

We were all so jazzed that we'd even gotten a reservation at Le 6 Paul Bert that when we first looked at the menu (which threw no English translation bones our way) we were mostly at a loss...but playing it cool was a priority.  In other words, I couldn't whip out my Google translate app quickly enough.  This was a mostly helpful exercise, but every once in a while, things didn't really translate.  In the photo, the one on the left was a Google translate misfire which sent us into hysterics.  The one on the right I had to figure out because we strongly suspected the sommelier (who spoke little to no English) was actually making fun of us.  I asked him in French.  It made him laugh.  This is called, "Americans giving it their best shot."  Guaranteed to please the French 98% of the time.    

And then there was that time Emily, who is a rep for J. Hilburn men's custom clothing, noticed a fellow diner's covered buttons and, in short order, was conducting an on-site inspection--much to his great amusement.  

Eventually, we looked at our watches and noticed it was 11:30 in the evening and we still hadn't paid our bill...and we were actually kind of overjoyed at that.  It was a very, very good night.  

And just in case you ever need to know:  Ce repas était un changement de vie. Je ne serai jamais le même.  {This meal was life-changing.  I will never be the same again.}

Bonus:  Taxi ride video on the way home.  Emily is scrolling our driver's cell phone and tries to have a conversation where he repeatedly indicates he is speaking about his "petit frére," which is "little brother" but somehow got interpreted as "girlfriend" or just "little friend."  Which makes the fact that 'she' was involved in WWE especially confusing.  Coupled with Emily's wrestling pantomime and Mary Beth's continual, "Oui, oui," AS IF we understood anything about this conversation brings me great joy in the hereafter.  Wish I'd taken more videos.