Dan Markham

‘But what will happen to all the basil?!’ I cried to my usual vegetable lady. She stared at me blankly and backed slowly away.

“Le Meg”, aka “La Blagueur à Paris“

Paris, in the summer is a ghost town, it appears. It empties of it’s residents, who are all on vacation, and takes on a note of quiet. I always assumed that it was full of vacationers, that, empty of it’s customary denizens, it became the real French Disneyland as thousands of foreigners streamed in to ride “the rides”; to climb the Eiffel Tower and hike the halls of The Louvre.

This is what I have always been made to understand but I don’t see any mention of that phenomenon in some expat blog posts^{1, 2, 3} I have read recently. On the contrary, by all accounts it appears that there is little, if any, activity in Paris during the summer months this time around, that the net effect is that of some rare urban peace and quiet — a hole in a storm — before le rentrée brings the customary bustle of city life rumbling back.

Ahhhh, Paris. Someday I will know your streets as well, or better, than I know those of San Francisco. Until then, I have the vicarious enjoyment of reading the blogs of expats living the life I can only dream about.

Update: “Le Rentrée”? “WTF is that”? I suppose I should have explained but I will let the internet do it for me.