Reflections, old and new, Paris 2° near Les Halles
Autres temps, autres mœurs. ~ French proverb
“Other times, other customs.”
“De 2020, La grande change de l’aire” – The huge change in the social-economic sphere: people, places, and perspectives – a peek at Paris today. Paris has plenty of experiences in advancing conditions for collective and individual flourishing.
Airport Orly to Rue Rivoli
Paris Orly, Terminals 1 2 3 4, has taken on a new look and was expecting to accommodate 32.5 million passengers by the end of 2020; well, albeit the pandemic, Orly has served 31,853,000 passengers after a previous average of 25,000,000 during recent history.
So take hope, dear voyagers, this static will clear and life will move on to an even quicker pace of moving forward. Paris–Orly has expanded in response to major traffic developments and will continue to increase numbers of airlines as well as develop an ever-growing list of international destinations. Paris-Orly united the former Orly West and Orly South terminals and is now a ‘one-roof terminal.’ According to the publicity, a ‘new generation infrastructure’ offers a more adaptable, innovative, and ultimately more pleasant airport experience. The next major development will be a multi-modal station located at the heart of the airport, providing a direct link to Paris-Gare de Lyon in 23 minutes.
Travel enthusiasts use this time to formulate how you would like to create improvements in your world of travel.
Paris-Orly, New Terminal 4
Imaginer c’est choisir. ~ Jean Giono
“To imagine is to choose.”
Mais, … Où Sont Les Gens?
But…Where are the people?
Beccuti Bar, A favorite for a good cappuccino, Rue Rivoli
Departing extra early to take a cappuccino at the Beccuti Bar before having a look about for a new pair of boots, I was disappointed to find the handwritten note stating due to compliance with the new directives the café will provide only breakfast and drinks during the new public hours 11:30 – 15:00.
Crossing Rue de Rivoli on the red, Paris 1°
Choice lives in The Focus.
Dans une grande âme tout est grand. ~ Blaise Pascal
“In a great anima, everything is great.”
Solitude in the City
La parfaite valeur est de faire sans témoin ce qu’on serait capable de faire devant tout le monde. ~La Rochefoucauld
“True valor is to do in secrecy what you could just have easily done before others.”
Rue de Cloître Saint Merry, at the whimsical Stravinsky Fountain, Paris 4°
Music Keeps The Spirit Alive
Daniele Sepe born in Naples is an Italian musician, known internationally for interpreting protest songs from around the world.
Jazz Concert in the garden, Instituto Italiano Di Cultura Paris 7°
Delightfully uplifting concert – the happiest of Italian, historical and global Jazz Sepe – in quartet formation accompanied by three excellent musicians, played music to evoke before us a world that we do not always see – or look at.
Daniele Sepe (saxophone and vocals), Tommaso De Paola (keyboards), Davide Costagliola (bass) and Paolo Forlini (drums).
On ne voit bien qu’avec le coeur. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery
“We see well only with the heart.”
Agnès B., Rue de Passy, 16°
Il vaut mieux prévenir que guérir. ~ French proverb
“It is better to prevent than to heal.”
Be yourself and keep well. Remember to wear your mask, decorate it for the holidays, and show your smiling eyes.
Metro and masks, Paris Line 6
One way route – forward, Paris 2°
Aimer, ce n’est pas se regarder l’un l’autre, c’est regarder ensemble dans la même direction. ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery
“Love doesn’t mean gazing at each other, but looking, together, in the same direction.”
Perhaps that is what is meant by « All You Need Is Love ».
Perhaps all we need is enough love to look in the same direction?
Keep well. Enjoy the upcoming holidays. Change is inevitable. Focus on that which supports a kinder, gentler world in your family and – unless you are indigenous – on why your families came to experience the hope America offered. There only is a one-way route and that is forward. The entire world is in this together and we all form the global family.
Take a good and elegant cappuccino,
Ladurée, Paris 8°
A Simplistic Summary in a Personal Note to My Country
My own history is coloured – as is each and every person’s – by advances through experience. I am confident in my experiences and I have confidence in France. She has centuries of evidence of a single and undeniable thread that stands solid for the rights of the collective as well as the individual. « Liberté Egalité Fraternité » It was devised to break apart from inequalities of a tyrannical monarchy and continues to serve and to guide advances in humanity.
Her people remember this and demand it… always. Paris has and will continue to thrive in sustaining her promise to her citizens, even throughout attacks of all contrived manner on her and her peoples’ safety – from political and personal violence to natural catastrophe and now to the individual and collective essence of what it is to be well. She and her parent country steadfastly face the challenges to continuously support the conditions to sustain human flourishing, thriving – the innate potential of each individual to live a life of enduring happiness, penetrating wisdom, optimal well-being and authentic love and compassion.
I feel safe here, I feel respected here.
My perspective is one of an immigrant. In this I hold the utmost respect for those individuals and families seeking advancement to possibility through hope. Please be mindful of those who yet are suffering in limbo regarding their civil status in California and throughout the country.
The United States, while unable to claim the historical weight through experiences, yet devised the same fundamental values and has demonstrated strength through intense threats to liberty, equality and fraternity. At its origins it also held hope for a future of freedom and possibility. Tyranny is a legacy of humanity – always existed, yet exists and ever will exist. Hold steady, Americans. Continue to demand your individual and collective rights to thrive. It still is, after all, the ‘United’ States.
I typically had excluded “proud” from my vocabulary. It previously has carried connotations of superiority and separation for me. Here I have learned to grow into the feeling, free from superiority or separation, to accept it and integrate it into fraternity and union. I am a free being. I belong to no person, no state or nation, but to Life as a contributor to humanity. And I feel proud to be French and to be Californian.
Thank you, Culture Honey, for making space for my humble voice. “Keep Well and Carry On.”
**Editors Note:
Aurore, thank you for sharing your Life with us – we appreciate it more than words can express – we take the encouragement of your words and the beauty of the vision offered in your photographs as part of the hopeful path forward in all good things!
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