Arenes de Lutece and World Cup Excitement

Saturday, October 6. A beautiful, clear, sunny, cool day. Perfect autumn weather.

Patty (colleague from S&G) and her husband Joe call this morning. They have been in Paris for a few days and are leaving tonight on the overnight train to Venice from the little Gare de Bercy. Later they tell me they have heard that these trains are being eliminated in 90 days. Does this mean the closing of Gare de Bercy?

Patty and Joe arrive at my apartment, I give them the tour (don't blink or you'll miss it), and we head out for lunch at the Cafe Beaubourg next to the Pompidou Center. I have Croque Monsieur, salad and a glass of red wine, Patty has soupe a l'oignon and Joe has petits raviolis which looks really good. It's almost cold because we are sitting in the shade but the sun is warm. Its such a gorgeous day (and a Saturday) so there are lots of street performers out and about. I take photos of a mime, a puppeteer, and a man doing a sort-of high-wire act (more like a low-wire act) in the open area in front of the museum. But it was very cool and there was a huge crowd watching him.

We walk down r. de Renard, then across Ile de la Cite past Notre Dame and then into the 5th arrondisement, down rue Monge to the Arenes de Lutece as Joe is very interested in Roman monuments. We explore the whole park, then hike back up the hill, up the stairs on the r. de Rollin and over to Place de la Contrescarpe and the rue Mouffetard which I thought they would enjoy. Joe gets a container of a seafood concoction of amazingly fresh octopus, shrimp, and olives at a fabulous fish market. We take the metro from Censier Daubenton back to Pont Marie. They have to head back to their hotel to pick up their bags and get to the train station. It was fun to have them here and they told me about another outdoor market, this one behind the Hotel de Ville!

Arenes de Lutece. One of two monuments left from the Gallo-Roman period (the other is the Cluny baths). Originally built in the 1st c. B.C., it was destroyed by the Barbarians in 280 and lay buried for 1,500 years until discovered by accident when the r. Monge was laid out in 1869! Then the site was meticulously excavated and restored at the beginning of the 20th c. A lot of it is missing (not surprising) but there's enough left so that you can get a sense of the whole. There are schoolboys playing "football" (I take a photo of their backpacks sitting against a fence) and some men playing petanque or boules.

There's a wonderful marble plaque near the entrance that describes what the arena was used for (les jeux nautiques after the period of the gladiators). Note to self: go back and copy down what it says.

Interesting factoid: The r. Mouffetard is laid out over the traces of the old Roman road leading from Lutece (Paris) to Lyon. Sort of an early "autoroute."

Out to the market to pick up a few things. Dinner chez moi. Listening to the rugby brouhaha and "watching" the game on-line (kick-off is at 9:00 p.m.). The game is being played in Cardiff. This will be a very tough match as New Zealand is favored to win. If France wins, I'm afraid it will be a VERY late night what with singing in the streets and all! Fortunately, in preparation for exactly that eventuality, I took a nap. :) Pedometer: 9,332

Later: France wins! Final score: France 20, New Zealand 18. And New Zealand misses a "drop goal" (what must be something like a field goal in football) in the final minutes. So France will face England in the semi-finals. There are a lot of very happy people in the streets below my apartment. So nice. It's now almost 11 p.m. We'll see how long the merry-making lasts.

OK, it's now after midnight and the noise continues unabated! There seems to be a moratorium on the horn-honking ban when France wins a World Cup match. Not only are there still lots of people in the streets, but cars too, honking their horns. I see no police around trying to quell the noise. They're probably celebrating too.