J’Adore Paris: Memories of a 1991 Trip to Paris and My Plans for 2024

I went to Paris only once, with my parents, when I was fourteen and a half. I hope to go back there in 2024.

My mother has this saying about not postponing things, which translates, word-for-word, as “What you can do today, you may not be able to do tomorrow.” So she’s always struggling to match life’s opportunities with indomitable will and application. Trying a little bit too hard, in my opinion, but many of the things we’ve done as a family over the years happened on account of this attitude of hers.

So in 1991, a year and a half after the 1989 Romanian Revolution, we went on a month-long trip to Europe to visit family friends who had fled to various Western European countries during communism. One of our stops was Paris, where we visited three people but actually stayed at the apartment of a friend of another friend’s. We spent two weeks in the French capital at that time and it was amazing. We were too star-struck with Western Europe to absorb the light of all its jewels, but we managed to have a grand time going after all the big attractions: Notre-Dame Cathedral, Sacré-Coeur Basilica, Arc de Triomphe, Champ de Mars and Tour Eiffel, The Dôme des Invalides with Napoleon’s tomb, the Louvre, the Centre Pompidou, The Musée d’Orsay (I don’t remember seeing this one, and yet I do remember seeing many Impressionist paintings in one place—but that could have been in a number of museums), Versailles Palace and Château de Fontainebleau, the Printemps department store, and a few (= many more) other things I seemingly can’t remember anymore. I was only fourteen and a half at the time, and, as I said, coming from a country that was still lacking in glamour after all those years of communism, so to me even the ads at the metro commanded themselves to my attention—vying for the latter with the more interest-worthy attractions.

I remember, for instance, an ad for the coming-of-age romantic movie Return to the Blue Lagoon, with Milla Jovovich, who was at the time of the 1991 release of the movie only a year older than me, and carried that enchanting beauty of early teenage

I also remember Bryan Adams’s song “Everything I Do I Do It For You,” which blasted on the radio and loudspeakers everywhere we went (including, I seem to remember, the metro—do they broadcast music there?). So my trip was colored by these two very romantic productions, even though I never got to see Return to the Blue Lagoon.

I was also very impressionable when it came to clothes, and remember what I used to wear on that trip, especially a pair of Daisy Dukes, the memory of which now makes me cringe. I see young girls wearing them these days, and just like with stay-up-stockings worn with tight shorts, I begin to wonder whether the respective young girls are in fact so sexual as their clothing advertises. I remember I hadn’t awakened at all at 14, but those were different, more innocent times in Romania.

I also remember the gardens at Versailles, how rational they were, and how good at imposing order on nature. I didn’t think in those terms at the time, but I kept taking pictures of the topiary there, at a time when film and photos were rather costly and were best used, according to my parents, with one of us or all of us in the frame—otherwise you could just get a postcard with a better picture, as someone told me at the time.

I liked the interiors at Versailles too, especially as they were rather cool compared to the heat outside—which we experienced for hours waiting in lines. I remember there were huge lines at Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna too that summer. I’m reading now that Schönbrunn has 1,441 rooms, and Versailles 2,300. Whatever for? True, the decorations are so beautiful as to soothe the soul, especially the tapestries and the various fabrics used, but still, why create all this art in one place when it could have been better enjoyed, by both its inhabitants and visitors, in various smaller places across France?

I remember now Museo Cerralbo in Madrid, where in 2015 I spent two-to-three hours taking in the decorations and the various objects in the former collection of the 17th Marquis of Cerralbo. In contrast, our visit through Versailles was so rushed that I probably spent three hours in the whole Palace of 2,300 rooms (well, not in all of them :).

In Paris, among so many feted buildings, I vividly remember Champ de Mars, that long green space that starts northwest at the Eiffel Tower and continues southeast to the École Militaire. I don’t remember much action on the Champ de Mars when we visited in 1991 because it was August and, we were told, Parisians took their vacations in August. Indeed, it seemed that the whole city swarmed with tourists only, much like here in Bucharest on summer weekends (keeping proportions, as we say in Romanian).

I also remember an Asian restaurant with spicy food, where we cooled our palates with citrusy ice cream. At that time, of all Asian food fare, I had only eaten at a Chinese restaurant in Bucharest and was not familiar with Indian or Thai food, for instance. I remember we paid a fortune at that restaurant—and then scrambled for clothes in large bins at a very cheap clothing store, where we were taken by one of my parents’ friends who lived in Paris at the time.

There’s more to my memories of Paris, but for now, as I write this, my mind fixates on the amazing Winged Victory of Samothrace at the Louvre. I hope to be back soon to see it again, and this time I plan to photograph it to distraction, as I always do these days when I come across amazing sculptures. It may not be easy, though. In 1988, when the Louvre Pyramid was inaugurated, there were less than 5 million visitors there. In 2022, however, the Louvre Museum attracted 7.8 million visitors. So it may be a little hard to find enough room to see certain works of art there. But the Winged Victory of Samothrace is on a tall plinth, so at least in this case, crowds won’t be a problem.

I also look forward to seeing the Musée d’Orsay. My mother and brother visited it this year and I got to see the photos—masterpieces all of them, one after the other, from Manet’s Déjeuner Sur l’Herbe (1863) and his Olympia (1983) to Monet’s tribute to Manet’s Déjeuner Sur l’Herbe (1866) and Morisot’s The Cradle (1872) and all the Renoirs, Van Goghs, etc., in between.

Of course, I wouldn’t also miss Money’s water lilies at the Orangerie, the modern and contemporary art at Centre Pompidou, or Brancusi’s sculptures nearby, in a reconstruction of his studio.

I will also try not only baguettes, as I did last time, but also croissants and other pastry products. I also plan to have at least one meal in a (French!) restaurant.

I will take a cruise on the Seine in the late afternoon and make sure I see Tour Eiffel both during the day and at night.

I will see Notre-Dame de Paris again if it’s open.

I will walk the streets of Montmartre before I walk up to Sacré-Coeur.

I may or may not go to Versailles and Fontainebleau again (depending on how long I’ll be in Paris this time) but I will go to Monet’s garden at Giverny.

I will see the stained glass of Sainte-Chapelle.

I will walk through the gardens of Paris at leisure rather than hurriedly, and I will look for outdoor festivals while I’m there (in fact, I may plan my visit according to them): music, theater, and so on.

And I will save money by speaking in French.

What do you remember most from your trip to Paris, and what do you plan to see or do next time you go there?

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Here’s are two T-shirts, a luggage tag, a mousepad, two jumbo totes, two keychains, and mugs with Paris to share my love for this beautiful city.

And here’s a design for a jumbo tote with even more Paris tourist attractions: in the word Treat: Notre-Dame Cathedral, Dome des Invalides, Printemps department store, Louvre Pyramid, Versailles gardens; in the word Yourself: interior of Opera Garnier, stained glass windows at Sainte-Chapelle church, gargoyles on top of Notre-Dame Cathedral, croissants, Sacré-Coeur Basilica, sculpture of Nike at the Louvre, clock at Musée d’Orsay; in the word To: Metropolitain sign at the metro, Sacré-Coeur Basilica; in the word Paris: Sacré-Coeur Basilica, a table at a sidewalk café in the Beaubourg District, the Arc de Triomphe, the Eiffel Tower, and the Notre-Dame Cathedral

That was all for today! I hope you’ve enjoyed this presentation! If you found anything of interest, I’d appreciate a pin/share! and you can always follow the links to see more about these products, of course! Thank you!

To a happier, healthier life,

🙂 Mira