Saturday, September 24, 2016

Please take a moment to download and read my file Fully Funded Public Transit .

There's no doubt about it. ‘Tis a sad day. Two more days to go. Today I will inspect the Jour de Brocante - the market square will be filled with second hand stuff, and I'll walk a little bit around town.

I wake at 7:30, and do a bit of catch-up on my typing of events, then set off for the weekend paper and my morning coffee. Madame Sylvie shakes my hand in greeting, and she represents everyone I am going to miss in the days to come.

Each day in the cafe I pick up more phrases. "Ca fait combien de?"

I have noticed that Madame Sylvie seems to remember what everyone drinks, and given what I have learned about memory that is no mean feat. We all become very good at things we do regularly, and a large part of Madame Sylvie's job is welcoming regulars, and knowing a bit about their lives. There is no doubt at all in my mind that were I to walk back in here in Five years time she would greet me and start making either a Double or an Alongé. She is that good.

I leave the cafe and stroll to the market square. The area is fenced off with thirty-inch high fencing, and security guards check everyone's bags as they walk in.

Lord knows who checked the car-loads and van-loads of stuff that has been unloaded here.

Lord knows why a determined assassin would enter by the gates instead of just stepping over the fencing. A small bomb with a bag of nails and you're done.

On the surface this is a day to buy, swap or sell your second-hand junk. It is part garage-sale and part flea-market. But more than anything it seems to be a place to meet and greet, to talk and chat, to discuss. Small children are everywhere (but not teenagers), and in some cases the kids look fatigued at ten in the morning.

Fifty percent of the stuff on sale is clothing and shoes. Another fifty percent is books and records, and the remaining fifty percent is kitchen goods. One lady has a crepe stand and I buy a strawberry crepe. The crepe is so hot and delicious that I feel I could eat it in the paper napkin in which it is wrapped, and not notice that I'd eaten the napkin.

Most people have tables set out in spray-painted designated spaces, but a few people merely spread a rug on the ground and hope that people will stoop down to ground level to inspect the goods. Very few people seem inclined to do that.

This is also a place to push a stroller while dragging a bundle-buggy, one in each hand, in echelon formation, and I enjoy watching the negotiations when two such parties meet head-on in an aisle. For a while I try to stay behind. I am, after all, on holiday, but then I grow impatient after having to stare at a glass bowl while the person ahead of me considers the quality of a shawl, so I move myself to a clear space and amuse myself for five minutes by trying to stay just ahead of people with strollers. By jig-jagging to left and right, and faking a sideways move, I can keep someone held up for two minutes or more. For the first time in my life I consider a career in professional football.

Stuff is cheap. I hear a lady ask how much for a low-rimmed glass platter. Fifty centimes. About seventy-five cents Canadian.

There is a thing going on next to the crepe lady. I see it as a variation on the Nigerian Scam. For a small sum, I'm guessing a Euro, a parent buys a child the right to fish ducks out of a small artificial river. When the child has hooked ten ducks, they get to choose a prize. Most children fill the bucket with about two dozen ducks, then stop. They choose a prize - a rubber ball or a balloon, or a poor goldfish-in-a-bag, and off they go. In essence each parent is buying a ball or a balloon or a goldfish for a Euro, but the child is occupied for five minutes.

The shortest conversation I overhear is one that I initiate myself. "Pardon" I say as I accidentally bump into someone. "Pardon" they say in reply. The second Pardon is in the form of "That's OK, I pardon you". French people are so socially lubricated.

I spot a pair of multi-bladed scissors and examine them. There are about half a dozen blades that pair up with the other half-dozen. They are the heft of pinking shears, but are scissor blades. What are these used for? Cutting herbs - ideal for parsley. Got it! I put them down, there is no way I can get those onto the airplane. I say thank you, and start to walk away, but the man calls after me in an ostentatious but kind fashion "Bonne Journeé Monsieur!", and I realize that I had forgotten to terminate the exchange properly.

No wonder French people find tourists rude. We are not in the habit of prefacing each conversation properly with "Bonjour", and of terminating it properly with "Bonne Journeé". It is the smallest thing, but without those parentheses it is not a conversation.

On the way back to the hotel I drop into a supermarket and check ice-cream. The only tubs they have for sale are tubs of Häagen-Dazs, at 5.45 for 430 ml which works out to about $72 for four litres. I am ready to return home to Toronto.

I took this shot of Brocante from the steps of the Town Hall. A security guy was there but was OK with me taking a photo.

I took three photos, actually.

Now this I would have loved to buy and take home. A transparent globe. Apart from anything else, this representation stresses how thin is the surface on which we depend.

A typical mish-mash of stuff, with a box of clothes in front. In the background shelves of crockery.

Here are the stall markings sprayed on the ground. I assume that just as is done for the food markets, a crew will come in and hose down everything at the end of the day.

I was tempted, oh so tempted, to buy this 45 rpm disk, but will my smart phone play 45 rpm records at the right speed?

A view across the square. The lady in the foreground has been to Paris.

My crepe en route to being wrapped in a paper napkin.

The little ducky river.

The boy has filled his bucket and is choosing his prize. Note the balls and balloons as prizes.

This little girl was a classic study.

She is deadly serious about each attempt to snare a duck. Probably grow up to be a proof-reader.

I forgot to eat my crepe and moved around to the other side to get a better view. This older boy's technique is to follow the chosen duck around the river until he can no longer see the duck in the glare of reflection from the water.

The little girl continues in her intense study.

Here is a shot of the older boy extending his reach around the tub/river.

Brocante. I've been calling it "Brocolage". No wonder people look puzzled. I am extending my vocabulary, but all too often in the wrong direction.

This is a great place to wander and accumulate regular phrases used in ordinary situations of barter and exchange.

I was tempted (grin!) The screen is a little larger than that of my smart phone.

Especially with the language-translation functions.

The camera has better eyesight than I have with my glasses. I took this to be some kind of oven with baked pastries for sale. How disappointing!

The stalls extend across the end of the covered market.

There is a security guard at one of the gates into the enclosure.

Here you go. If I've done my sums right, it is about $72 for four litres.

As usual I am struck by the flower beds.

As I near the hotel, a shuttle bus sets off for Sartrouville, since the rail lines are shut down.

I dropped into Istanbul and bought a veal sandwich for about 5.00. I could have eaten it in the park next door, but I had other plans.

Although the foreground shows soil, in the rear part there is much green grass.

Three minutes away are the grassy banks of the Seine.

And the old bridge.

Greaves’s rule of benches kicks in, so I sit and wolf down my veal sandwich and swig from my water bottle.

This plaque on the old bridge records the flood of 24th January 1910

Here is a better shot.

Carved into the pillars are roman numerals running up to eighteen. I am unsure of the units, perhaps 10-centimetre divisions, certainly less than a foot.

Just for a change, flowers not-along-a-bridge, but next-to-a-bridge, running along the river bank.

The wind whistles an aeolian tune through the trees.

I will walk along the narrow footpath.

I have walked along the narrow footpath. I am looking back at the old bridge.

I am walking in the shade of an avenue of THREE rows of shade trees.

What is WRONG with Toronto? France puts us to shame.

A wide shot showing the isolated piers to the left.

I am proud of this shot. By accident I captured a span of the new bridge as if it was resting on the piers of the old bridge.

I sat for a while and just watched the leaves pirouette on their way to Le Havre.

The current in The Seine at Poissy

I wonder how the utility companies cope with repairs to these fixtures.

Then it strikes me that that tree just off to the right of centre is a truly massive tree.

I am the foot of mumble-mumble street (goes off to check Google Maps) Avenue Meisonnier. That is bed-bug hotel on the left, just across the railway lines.

Steps lead down to the water. Judi Dench or Katherine Hepburn could arrive here on a Royal Barge.

There's another bus crossing the new bridge, which appears to be loaded onto the pylons of the old bridge.

Another view of the old bridge.

More flowers. Flowers everywhere.

Then I walked upstream towards the new bridge.

People are out water-skiing on the river.

Three cheers for Mr. Puzey who taught us all about wave reflection in high school physics.

This is a floating dock, it rises and falls with the river level, just like Prince Rupert and Metlakatla.

I sit a bit more and admire the new spans.

Two swans come to say goodbye, but with no swan song.

Here is a shuttle bus, hiding from its passengers who are waiting to be shuttled somewhere.