We woke up to a beautiful, sunny Sunday morning, so we decided to get out of Canterbury and spend the day in London. It was a chance to catch up with Aude’s brother for some lunch, hear all about his various trips around the world, and to begin doing some wedding shopping.

Sitting on the train, Aude can barely contain her excitement about travelling to the big City

Matthew, on the other hand, rides this train to work every morning and is a little more apprehensive…

Of course, this being Britain, by the time we were up and dressed it was pouring with rain – and it remained that way for most of the day. We caught the train to London Bridge and met Jerome, then caught the underground to Oxford Circus where we walked to Soho for lunch in a Korean restaurant. I was quite excited about this, because I’ve got the sort of naïve sense of excitement that is easily satisfied by having my food cooked in front of me. I’m equally impressed in Mongolian Barbeques, Japanese Steakhouses, and any French place that flambés anything. Having ordered barbequed chicken, pork, and beef, imagine my disappointment when everything was simply served on sizzling platters. It was like Coke without the bubbles – it may taste the same, but it lacks a certain pizzazz.

Jerome and Aude, not yet fully appreciating the disappointment of not having their lunch cooked at their table.

From there, we went around the corner for a quick coffee at Liberty’s, then Aude and I set off for a series of disappointing shopping experiences across London. It reminded us of two things: first, it’s harder to spend money in London than you might imagine; and second, this is still a city where the majority of stores are closed on a Sunday. Demoralised, we grabbed some shopping and caught the train home.

Jerome looking relaxed after several weeks off lounging in the sun. Still, give him two weeks at an investment bank and he’ll be his pale, tired self! 😉

Matthew and Aude have to make due with a cup of coffee in Liberty’s for their relaxation.

Aude does some window shopping

The highlight of our journey (and maybe our day?) was an onion falling out of one of our shopping bags (stored overhead) and landing in the lap of the rather surprised, but very good-natured, Scottish woman sitting opposite us. Having just re-read the last sentence, please believe me when I tell you it was funnier if you were there.

It’s bloody FREEZING! I think we must have brought the cold weather home with us. After dragging my jet-lagged body out of bed this morning, I was greeted with arctic gales and frosty temperatures, a real change after the very mild winter we’ve had so far. To make matters worse, I was running late and didn’t have time to grab my normal cup of coffee before jumping on the train. It’s a rough way to start the week.

Back to New York. We arrived late on Thursday night, delayed an hour because the pilots had trouble getting to the airport. We had severe winds on Thursday night, downing trees and power lines across the country, and generally making travel of all sorts difficult. The strong headwind also meant that our flight took longer – we eventually arrived in New York around midnight, and got to our hotel around 1am. New York roads are as bad as ever, and I saw my life flash before my eyes several times on the cab journey from the airport.

Lobby of the Sheraton New York. I was upgraded to a nice suite, but Anne Laure and Neil were “upgraded” to a handicapped room, where everything was designed for someone 3ft tall.

We were up early on Friday morning and decided to hit the city. I wanted to hit B&H Photo – closed on Friday afternoons and Saturdays because it’s run by Orthodox Jews – so that was the first order of business. I ended up with a 50mm lens for my camera and a new camera bag. And I talked Neil into buying one as well (…and so starts the addiction!).

Matthew tries to decide which lens he wants.

Neil was giving me a hard time about buying a lot of stuff — until we saw this guy. He must have bought every accessory in the store! He dumped everything out on the floor and packed it into his new camera bag.

We stopped off for a Mexican lunch, then headed to the International Photography Center, where we saw the Henri Cartier-Bresson exhibition I had wanted to see in Paris. I thought it was fitting to see his photos, a sort of “tribute” to a 50mm lens, in light of my new purchase.

Friday evening we met up with my friend Peter and his girlfriend for a few drinks at the W Hotel at Times Square, then headed out to dinner at Les Halles, Anthony Bourdin’s original NY restaurant, where Aude and I split a piece of steak just slightly larger than my head.

At the Whiskey Bar, beneath the W Hotel in Times Square. (Photo courtesy of Peter)

MG rode up from her home-away-from-home in New Jersey on Saturday – her first trip to New York. We picked her up at Penn Station and went straight into Macy’s – start as you meant to continue. On a tip from Peter’s girlfriend, we all met for lunch at Golden Bridge in Chinatown for dim sum – and were pretty much the only white people there.

Dim sum with everyone at the Golden Bridge restaurant in Chinatown. (Photo courtesy of Peter)

After gorging ourselves, we spent the afternoon exploring the city – Times Square, Fifth Avenue, the World Trade Centre site – then onto the real New York landmark – Century 21! Famished after hours of shopping, we headed to Little Italy for dinner. We had some fantastic veal, then went around the corner to Ferrara’s bakery for some dessert. After trying unsuccessfully to hail a cab, I managed to blag a ride home in a passing limo.

We were up like clockwork on Sunday morning, Neil’s stomach calling out for food. There was no avoiding it – we needed breakfast at a Jewish deli. We went into Carnegie Deli on 7th Ave and had a traditional deli breakfast with all the trimmings – including a waitress who looked like she’d been working there since the turn of the century. The nineteenth century.

The gang at the Carnegie Deli, shortly before being abused by the pre-historic waitress.

Clearly unimpressed with our unfamiliarity with deli procedure, she served us cheerlessly with her patented “service without a smile.” Still, it could be worse. She yelled at the retired travellers behind us for ordering a side-order of cream cheese, complaining that she had to walk all the way back to the kitchen. Funny, that’s what I thought her job was.

She added a 20% gratuity to our bill.

I got to thinking – if she keeps her tips ($14 on our $70 bill) and serves ten tables an hour, she’s clearing $140 an hour in tips. Assuming she works a 4-hour shift, five days a week, that’s $140K a year – a significant portion of which, I assume, does not get reported to the tax man. It’s easy to look at a 70+ year old woman and feel sorry that she has to work as a waitress. But then I did the arithmetic and my sympathy was tempered somewhat. She’s laughing all the way to the bank.

Some completely mad people running a half-marathon in Central Park in the middle of winter.

Laden with food, we headed up to Central Park, where we caught the tail end of the half-marathon that Peter was running in. We didn’t manage to catch him (he was too quick for us) but we did get a chance to see some of his slower competitors bringing up the rear.

Skaters in Rockefeller Center.

Neil finds heaven on Fifth Avenue.

Heaven, like God himself, takes many forms. For MG, it comes in the form of Prada.

After discovering that all the shops on Fifth don’t open until 11am on a Saturday, we headed town to the Staten Island Ferry.

Neil is, frankly, a little skeptical of my subway navigation skills.

Aude, on the other hand, is totally unimpressed and threatens to leave me for one of the rats that run down the tracks!

The New York subway.

In their wisdom, someone put me in charge of navigating the Metro. I learned a number of embarrassing lessons about riding the New York subway.

1. You can only swipe four people through on a Metro card. Which means that, if you’re the fifth guy, you look like jackass when you then try to swipe yourself through, instead getting impaled on the barrier.
2. Colours and lines do not correspond 1-to-1. Which helps explain why it took four separate trains to get from 50th to the South Ferry.
3. If ever your swipe card doesn’t work, wrapping it with a dollar bill to clean the sensors is a surprising effective trick.
4. Trains are infuriatingly infrequent on a Sunday. Particularly if you need to change four times because your map-reader doesn’t quite understand the subway system.
5. If you’re going less than 20 blocks, take a cab. It’s just as cheap, and a damn sight quicker and more convenient.

After a ride on nearly every subway line, we finally reached the Staten Island Ferry.

Anne Laure and Neil on the Staten Island Ferry.

Matt and Neil enjoy a New York delicacy – a hot pretzel with mustard.

After the Staten Island Ferry and the Statue of Liberty, it was back to 5th Ave for some more shopping. We worked our way down until we eventually ended up at Macy’s again – MG was jealous of the cheap cashmere sweaters I had found and wasn’t going to leave Manhattan until she had some of her own.

We reconvened with Anne Laure and Neil on Sunday night – a low key dinner at Sushiden (fantastic sushi and very accommodating waitresses, endlessly entertained by Neil’s “sake bombs” but not terribly fluent in English. When asked what something was, our waitress helpfully informed us that she “knew the name in Japanese”.) Early to bed, we were up at 5am for our trip back to JFK.

So there you have it – three days in New York. It actually felt much longer. We hit all the big sights, did our bit for the US economy, grabbed a few bargains, and ate enough to feed an army. Best £200 I’ve spent in a long time.

Celebrity sightings while in NY:

1. Richard Wilkins – Australian TV presenter and recent winner of “Australia’s Worst Show Biz TV Reporter” in the 2006 Fugly Awards.” Staying at our hotel.
2. Jean-Baptiste Requien, Gordon Ramsay’s right-hand man, at Ramsay’s restaurant in New York. Anne-Laure tried to sweet-talk her way into a table, but no dice.
3. Crazy “I Surrender” Guy – clearly a man who has spent quite a while in incarceration. Spotted walking off the Staten Island Ferry, hands in the air, trying to surrender to anyone in a uniform – Transit Police, dock operators, and the hotdog vendor. Could have been a relative of Henry Earl.
4. “Dances With Cats” – spotted on the Staten Island Ferry with a curiously noisy shopping bag.
5. Fat “Shouts at Passers-By” Guy, spotted shouting at passers-by at the corner of 44th and 5th.
6. Mr Rhetorical Questions, spotted countless examples of these fellows (and ladies) who speak endlessly to themselves.

Another one of New York’s colourful characters!

Seems like the perfect character to set off the one above!

Still, it wouldn’t be New York without characters like these.

48 hours later, I’m back on the Eurostar again after a grey, cold weekend in Paris. Despite the weather, we had a great time and caught up with some old friends.

I arrived late on Friday night and managed to convince the ticket machine at the Metro to sell me a ticket. French machines, being French, refuse to speak in Foreign, so I was left relying on my schoolboy French to get me across town. That wasn’t a problem, but trying to work out where to stick my money into the machine was – the machine was designed to take coins or credit cards, but not Euro notes – unlike the ticket machines on the Tube. So there I was, stupid tourist, trying to stick notes into a machine that clearly didn’t take them, much to the annoyance of the French.

Having finally convinced the ticket machine to take my credit card, I met Aude and her friend Anne Laure at Bastille for a few drinks. We ended up in a bohemian bar down a side street. The waitress gave me a hard time for being American…

We jumped into a cab and headed for our hotel – a nice enough place, but near the Peripherique (beware Priceline’s interpretation of “near the Eiffel Tower” – we were as near to the Eiffel Tower as I look like George Clooney).

Aude rides the Metro into Central Paris

November in Paris features a special photography month, a subject near and dear to my heart. On Saturday morning we grabbed the Metro into central Paris to see an exhibit entitled “Children of the World” by Kevin Kling (a woman, despite the name) that was being exhibited outside the Jardin du Luxembourg and where we’d seen an exhibition of the best 20th century press photography when we were last in London. It was a great exhibit despite poor weather conditions.

A group of nuns take in the exhibition

Aude looks at one of the photos in the “Children of the World” exhibition

Inside the Jardin du Lumembourg

Inside the Jardin du Lumembourg

Inside the Jardin du Lumembourg

No, not rays of light coming from her head. Rather, something to stop the pigeons crapping down her front.

Sailboat rental

It was Remembrance Day in France, with flowers placed on most of the war memorials

We spent a lot of time like this. Never underestimate a woman’s ability to shop!

We were also going to try to see the Henri Cartier-Bresson exhibit – an interest to me because he shot nearly his entire portfolio using a 50mm lens. I’ve just bought a 35mm prime lens (the digital equivalent of a 50mm lens in the digital world, and very close to what the human eye sees naturally) and have been looking for inspiration. The 35mm Nikon lens is acclaimed as one of the best Nikon lenses ever produced, but I can’t seem to get it to work its magic for me. (Incidentally, all of the photos in this blog entry were taken with the 35mm lens – your feedback and constructive criticism is welcome!)

Lunch was a couscous at a restaurant on the Left Bank – with a friendly cat that took to Aude immediately.

Proof that you can also find a Mexican in Paris!

As we walked past an Italian restaurant, Aude suggested I snap a photo of the chap in the window as a potential boyfriend for our friend MG. Innocent as I am, this is what I snapped.

Proof that Aude is a bigger pervert than me: Laughing at my picture, she pointed out that I’d entirely missed the point (no pun intended). This was the fellow she had in mind!

We decided to walk from the Jardin of Luxembourg towards Monparnasse, where the Cartier-Bresson exhibit was being held, doing some shopping on the way. Cue the first of many times getting lost in Paris (and the first of many sexist jokes from me). Due to a slightly unscheduled detour, we spent the afternoon shopping and gave up on the Cartier-Bresson exhibit due to my aching feet. On the upside, I did get a kiss from a strange woman – it was her hen night and she was kissing every passing man!

In a scene that was to become uncomfortably familiar, we find ourselves in front of a map, not knowing quite where we are…

We still had a few hours to kill and needed an activity that didn’t involve a lot of walking, so I suggested we catch a bateau mouche. Cue the second of many times getting lost in Paris. Determined to catch the bateau mouche at Pont Neuf (but holding the map upside-down), we ended up walking around nearly the entire Ile de la Cite before finally giving up. Instead, we went to Plan B and headed for Alcazar, the Conran restaurant I had booked for dinner.

Despite being unable to travel by bateau mouche, I was able to take a few pictures of Paris by night – when Paris is at its most beautiful in my opinion

After an ‘Ultra Violet’ for Aude and a Manhattan for me, plus a couple of kirs, we were in a much better mood. We went downstairs for dinner and had a beautiful meal – Aude started with foie gras and then had venison, I started with escargot (leaving me smelling like a true Frenchman all night) and followed with veal. I asked the sommelier for a wine recommendation and he suggested a Corbieres. When the wine was presented, it was a bottle of vintage Pomerol – lucky I paid attention to his suggestion and didn’t take the wine that arrived at my table – it would have been a very expensive mistake!

Sunday morning we met some old friends from Canterbury for a Moroccan brunch – Alain and Faouzia, Julien and his girlfriend Karine. I did my best to order my breakfast in French, but asked that I be served no eggs – and mixed up my article. Cue more piss-taking from a French waitress (and more muttering of C’est pourquoi tout le monde deteste les Parisiens). Despite clarification from my French-speaking friends, she still screwed up my order. No tip for her – he who laughs last, laughs best.

In any case, it was great to catch up, and my friends were all pleased to hear all the gossip and goings-on that had happened in Canterbury since they’d left (although Julien was ahead of the game, being a regular reader of my blog).

Julien & Karine

Alain, Faouzia, Julien, Karine and Aude outside the restaurant

Alain, Faouzia, Julien, Karine and Matthew outside the restaurant

L’église Saint Eustache

The Opera

Aude poses for a photo

Matthew poses with the smallest flowers he’s ever seen at the Grand Hyatt in Paris

Cafe culture – what Paris is a famous for!

Matthew standing in Place Vendome

No trip to Paris would be complete without a photo of the Eiffel Tower at sunset, would it?

Paris Metro

We left them mid-afternoon and went for a walk, stopping for a coffee at the Grand Hyatt, then walking down Place Vendome and through the Jardin du Tuleries. Back to the hotel, then we grabbed a cab which took years off my life (and reminded me: I need to update my will) until we finally arrived at Gare du Nord.

Aude smiles on Eurostar despite her reluctance to go back home

Matthew looking somewhat more skeptical

Beats a McDonalds!

Sauteed veal on Eurostar. Remember when food on the plane was like this?

A few hours later, and here I am again on the Eurostar (today’s celebrity sighting was James Blunt, having a drink in the Eurostar business class lounge), heading back to Canterbury at 300km per hour, eating another lovely dinner and drinking a glass of wine. I trust I’ll be greeted by two very friendly, very hungry looking cats.

Back to work tomorrow, but only for four days – we’re off to a Scottish wedding on Thursday night. Such a jet-setting life we lead. I’ve already packed my man-skirt.