Our little coffee shop around the corner was a local affair. Nothing fancy, but the proprietor remembered I wanted milk in my coffee and he made it hot and frothy, and you could have coffee and a croissant for under $2 Euros. Sitting here we watched parents walk their kids to school, and businessmen dragging briefcases on wheels to work. On a street not any wider than two cars there was a stream of bikes, motorcycles, taxis, cars and the occassional work truck that navigated the narrow passage.
We started our days here and then caught the metro stop at Emile Zola to make our way to the museums etc. It began to feel like OUR neighborhood in the short time we were there. Language is an issue though. We found so many people willing to help us, but it was a bumbling experience where conversation is limited to what and where and many hand signals.. And there were so many times Susan and I wish we spoke more French to really HAVE a conversation with these interesting people and their lives in Paris. Perhaps next year Susan's French will be good enough to string sentences together instead of just words. As she says, when she would try to speak French someone would perk up and say in English where do you want to go? Susan says that her French confuses french-speakers....so they convert to English to answer us. Here most people speak atleast two languages...but sometimes it is French and German. The parking lot attendant who was from the Ivory Coast of Africa spoke his dialect AND French, German and English. Wow!
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