enfin

Nicolas Sarkozy is elected as President of France. Here it is a "fete" today at Place de la Concorde.

parc de Sceaux

Parc de Sceaux, suburb of Paris. Now it IS a time to do picnic!

note: Bebe log is my another photo blog.

disguise

again photo from "carnaval venitien" at Bastille Paris

carnaval venitien

This is Paris. And they are French!

Kabuki at Palais Garnier

I was at Palais Garnier again, second time in the same week. But this time is to see completely different play than ballet. It was "Kabuki", which was first time to be played at Palais Garnier.
You see how it is different from another day? There were so many Japanese people wearing "kimono". Different Curtain on the stage, very Japaneses. One thing I really loved is when they did thier speech in French! Oh my poor camarades! That did make me feel so close to them!

Panache

Panache with french beer "pelforth". Usually, this pelican doesn't hold any flowers in his mouth, but he does on this glass. And it says "Pelforth of Spring". Cute isn't it?

Palais garnier

We were there to see "Proust ou Les Intermittences du coeur" Roland Petit. But of course we students are generally not so rich. So what can we do?
Wait in front of ticket counter from 15:00 until they start selling their tickets of the day at 18:45 then get cheap 10euro sheets.
But one benefit to have these "not very good" sheets at the palais garnier is that we can see the painting of Chagall painted (not sure) on the ceiling.

marronnier en hiver

Tree of marronnier. It's also charming even after all there leaves are fallen and just dead marrons (no? these balls on the tree) But I can't wait when their leaves will come back all around Paris.

same cafe again

Here again same cafe's photos. Unfortunately I am not living that close to be able to go there everyday, so these are taken on the same day.
That day, it snowed very hard but only for about 10 minutes. Thank you, I was in a warm place under the roof.

a good cafe

what is a defenition of good cafe? 1)not too expensive 2)not too noisy 3)servers are friendly and so on.
When I found a good cafe, it makes me just happy.

band

Cold night, young people were playing music outisde maybe for selling thier cds or get some coins. they were jumping, drinking beers and having fun...

laduree

macaron de laduree.... this is a dream, dream of all sweet lovers!

station at midnight

Station Chevaleret at midnight. One of these "rare" metro stations which is not underground.

spring!

Spring has come in Paris! Obviously, there are more people who wear sunglasses. Include ME who is suffering from allergy of pollen .....

new bridge

View from new bridge sur la Seine. And you can see the Bibliothèque nationale de France.

cafe

For me, having a cup of coffee at "cafe" is to take a break alone or to talk with friends. But for these couples of weeks, I didn't have enough time to sip coffee with sitting down on the chair but on the counter.

In Japan, there are a lot of "vending machines" which sells coffees and other drinks. But here it isn't very common, but instead, they can have this "quick break" at the counter of cafe.
And there are some benefits 1)coffees are cheaper 2) sometimes, you can get to talk with other friendly customers.

chinese new year

There was grand parade of Chinese new year around avenue d'ivry, which is the most biggest Chinese district in Paris. There were enormous amount of people to see the fete than I imagined. It was almost impossible to take punctures (but finally we could find the spot where was less people...) and after the parade, my friend and I stopped by a cafe to have a cup of coffee, and there was NO MORE COFFEE at the "cafe" !! That would give you an idea how many people were there.

des roses

I'm sorry for the absence....I've been busy (and tensed) this week because of these petits tests at school. phew c'est le weekend!!!

Tabac

Typical tabac which sells tobacco, stamps telephone cards, lotto and such. Usually Tabac has also a cafe. So there are always some people who is playing lotto, drinking beers day and night...
Yea, this is Paris! non?

le peinture

The same street. Unfinished paintings on the bike and there wasn't a painter around his/her works. They were there very naturally but less carefully on the street. That what made me felt that I am in Paris....not Louis vuitton at Champs-elysee.　

dimanche

It was sunday. There is always some performer on the passage infront of place des vosages. Le Jazz, restraunts, cafes, c'est le paris eh?

spring day

It was like a day in the spring. We didn't need to wear heavy coat, no gloves nor boots. I don't even know why I was enough attracted to take this photo but I was very much into this ordinary building, nothing was special. Usually I can't explain the reason, is it like that for every photographers? Or can you always explain why you wanted to take a photo at that moment?

apres la pluie

No, it is not today. But this is the view from my VERY small 20m2 apartement, that's the reality of student living in a foreign country and someone who chosed not to live in a suburb but real center.

une rue

It's near metro station of port d'ivry. I wish I have a time to take not-bad photos everyday or I have some space in my head just to think about taking photos. But unfortunately it's not like that. No time to stop walking to look around the city carefully, No time to consider my photos that I've taken, No time to chose the words I write.... I'd say, my life in Japan was a lot more busy than now. But sometimes, I do have a few busy days in low then I already feel stressed although for me it'd been always like this before. Look back what I'd been doing in Japan, it makes me wonder how I was okay, how these Japanese workers can keep living like that. Or not, maybe I wasn't okay, and maybe they aren't okay...

Station de Arts et metiers

There you go. The metro station of "arts et metiers". Fantastic isn't it?
I did some lil playing for today's St. Valentine's day as a girl who couldn't be offered any single flowers ::sob sob sob:: Even though tonight, there were more couples on the street than normal weekdays nights. A little bit fun and joke for your life, visit my other blog "bebe log" to see what I did :D

Arts et metiers

Small street around Arts et metiers station.
This area, I think we can call it Chinese district. I was charmed by these red lanterns under the street lights.




I love Chinese antique furniture and such but No offence, Chinese very red decoration sometime gives me a headache like photo of the supermarket on the right. But these pretty lanterns what I saw tonight were obscurely ornamented but they did gave me an strong impression like they are insisting "this is Chinese area".

And again, because of my low photo technique, the first picture doesn't look good as they are and the second picture doesn't look "noisy" as they are.....sigh

strasbourg st-denis

Around Strasbourg st-denis station
This is what I don't like at all about my photography that I am very BAD at taking night photos. (That's how I respect our friend Fabrizio who takes incredible night photos of Torino) They are blur most of the time and they are too yellowish. This happens more in Paris than in Tokyo. Although I find Paris at night is amazing almost like a dream land. But these romantic lighting makes my photos being more far from real Paris...

free paper

There are some free news papers published everyday such as 20minutes and Metro.
Ben Stiller's new movie "Night at the museum" (la nuit au musee)was a cover. Actually, Now this posters are invading Paris, everywhere at the metro station, bus stops. In Paris, it is hard not to know what is on the theater but we are forced to be imprinted these big titles in our heads. Anyway, maybe time for laugh, with the student card, 6euros for one movie during weekdays. Good to be student in Paris, a lot of discounts.

ceremony....

There was a ceremony today at the grand hall of Sorbonne university. I was there to receive my diploma which doesn't mean much at the society level but it means some for me. (well...if you want to see me in that "costume" (robe and hat) you can find a tiny picture on my other blog...)

P.S.
I added your webisites of people who post some comments so far (merci beacoup!)
I hope it doesn't that bother you but if so, plase give me a comment.

moss

Rail road which we can look down from avenue de choissy through the fence. I don't know the exact words to describe this view in any languages but this has been always what attracts attracts me. Moss on the stone walls, heavy but warm nature colours. This is the same condition as what we can often see around the temple/shrine in Japan. That brings me a nostalgia, deep meditation and calm.
Maybe this is a "zen" spirit, Although even I Japanese can't explain what it is, but the word "zen" is used very much for any sorts of products in France.

CGT

CGT (Confédération générale du travail)
The General Confederation of Labour is one of the five major French confederations of trade unions. It seems they were having a demonstration while I was sucking at school to wait a long line for my inscription. When I saw them on boulevard Raspail, it's almost finished and there were just some dust carts, police men and their stickers on everywhere. I don't think I am still in the position who is allowed to talk about French society yet so I won't. But being here for one year, I did see some demonstrations "of course". Manifestation(demo) is their culture, someone says. I wonder how much influence they can have to change something. Is that really effective? Usually when I see them on the street, I take some photos. Some of them (well...not a little of them) smile and wave at me. It broke my image of "demonstration" as the one who had never seen any of them in real before coming here. But as long as something like March 2006 against for CPE won't happen again(broken windows,violence, fire), that wouldn't make me sad...