Whether you’re celebrating New Year’s Eve on the Champs Elysees in Paris, or with a small group of friends chez toi, if you’ve planned it right, chances are you’re going to wake up with one heck of a gueule de bois (hangover) come Friday morning. What better way to Frenchify your New Year than with a Bloody Mary? Bet [...]

It’s New Year’s Eve and time to pop a cork. And on both sides of the pond, champagne is de rigeur. But here in France, the home of the real deal (anything else is just sparkling wine), champagne is actually an every day kind of drink. Well perhaps that’s going too far. A drink so [...]

There’s no shortage of night clubs in Paris, especially if you like techno, hip-hop or generic pop dance music. But some of us get a little nostalgic for real rock and roll music, and even those classic slow dances where you get to dance a little…closer. Luckily, king of Parisian nightlife entertainment Nicolas Ullmann has decided to [...]

In France, instead of sending Christmas cards, it’s more popular to send New Year’s cards. New Year’s wishes can arrive up to a few weeks after the 1st of the year,  which means that I can take my time writing them, and my family and friends can receive and enjoy them away from all of the [...]

We discovered Speculoos, the delicious cinnamony Belgian cookies, all on our own and now thanks to one of my kids’ best school chums who is Belgian, we’ve now been introduced to the spread which I can only liken to crack that’s spreadable with a knife. Yes, I like peanut butter and no, I don’t care [...]

When Wendy Lyn moved to Paris twenty years ago she found herself living out a foodie version of the book series, Eloise. Instead of the Plaza hotel, she had the famous Paris bakery Poilâne as her delectable dominion. With the luscious scent of buttery pastries as her alarm clock, she’d run down from her chambre de bonne on the top floor of [...]

The other day I went to Sceaux, just south of Paris, where a dozen or more vendors were selling santons, the terracotta figures native to Provence, that are special to the Christmas season. The essential santons are the actors in the nativity scene. But why stop with just Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, a cow, a [...]

The last time I was in snow ecstasy was in February. The photography gods were thoughtful enough to shake me awake at 5 am, and I went forth into the darkness, camera in hand, to capture the spirit of the snow. That morning, as I wandered alone in the silence, I understood the meaning of [...]

“A Bright Room Called Day” was written by American playwright Tony Kushner in 1984. It presents a group of young German artists and activists in the dawn of the Nazi regime as well as flash-forwarding to acharacter in 1980s who is an activist against the Reagan administration. It is a powerful and engaging play. For [...]

Strangely, the Gare de Lyon has always been prominently connected to my Parisian visits and life. I don’t pass by there on my daily commute, or live close to it. So it could have been one of these places of which you know exist, but just hardly ever see. But on my first ever visit [...]