This “Institute of the Arab World” was built in the 1980s and was inaugurated on November 30, 1987 by the President of the French Republic, François Mitterrand. The institute is intended as a “cultural bridge” between France and twenty-two Arab countries. From the top (ninth) floor there is a fine Read More …
April 15, 2019, was a Monday, two days before I was scheduled to leave for Paris. As it was the first day of the Easter vacation in Land Hessen, I was not teaching that evening, so I was at home in Frankfurt, working at my desk, when a notice popped Read More …
Student housing in France is usually not very elegant, but the big exception is here at the Cité Universitaire at the southern edge of Paris. The Cité was founded in 1925 and was intended “to promote peace, exchanges and friendship among peoples after the trauma of the First World War.” Read More …
Don’t worry, I’m not going to do a Skyline Countdown for Paris like the one I’m doing for Frankfurt, and even if I did, the 96-meter Chambord Tower (Tour = Tower) on Boulevard Kellermann wouldn’t make it since it is only the 39th tallest building in Paris. From the name Read More …
The name “Sorbonne” originally referred to a college created in 1253 by Robert de Sorbon, the chaplain and confessor of King Louis IX of France — the king who is now better known as Saint Louis because he killed so many infidels in the Crusades. Later the word “Sorbonne” came Read More …
Universities in France are often known by their initials. A student who was enrolled at the UPMC between 1974 and 2017 would have called it exactly that, “UPMC”, and would have assumed that you knew what the initials meant. Such a student would also have expected you to be duly Read More …
For those of us who arrive by train from central or southern Germany, this “grand” two-star hotel (grand being a French word for large) is conveniently located just half a block from the Gare de l’Est, i.e. the East Station. For a single room on the fifth floor I paid Read More …
On the pleasant and lively street called Rue de Bretagne there is a covered market with the unusual name Marché des Enfants Rouges (Market of the Red Children). It turns out that this is the oldest market in Paris. It was created in the year 1615 during the reign of Read More …
For those who have just tuned in, let me point out that the Hôtel d’Ecquevilly is not a hotel in the modern sense of the word, but rather a private mansion that was built in 1636 in what was then a new and upcoming aristocratic district of Paris, Le Marais Read More …
This free museum in the Marais district belongs to the City of Paris and is devoted to the history of the city from its earliest beginnings to present times. In addition to documents, statues and antique furniture, the Musée Carnavalet also features hundreds of original paintings that illustrate various epochs Read More …