August 2018

This was a pretty full month with some unexpected turns. We began by taking the train to Lille to stay for a month as it was cooler than Paris. We even had rain – what a relief from the 80’s and 90’s we’d had in Paris.

We’d booked a studio apartment out of the center of town but close to a metro. The studio was a bit larger than the one in Paris and was a third of the cost.  So far, we had been unable to secure a permanent apartment in Paris and decided to look at Lille as an alternative. Close to the border of Belgium, it would be an easy point to use as a base for traveling further into western Europe. It is called one of the two friendliest cities in France (Nantes, further south and warmer, being the other).  It has four major universities and as many smaller colleges, which explained the amount of students we saw on the streets. There are close to a million people living in Lille but a majority are located in the suburbs. The city has a population of around 250,000 with a majority in their 20’s as it is heavily populated by students.

We met the student who owned the studio, for entrance. A very nice young woman who had an internship in Paris, which is why her place could be leased. After dropping our luggage in the apartment, we headed back to the train station in town because the week’s metro ticket I had wasn’t working. After procuring a new one, we walked along the main street of Rue Faidherbe, window shopping.  Passing a shop called Interieur Creatif, we saw some unique pieces of furnishings and wandered in. The owner, a young man by the name of Flo (pronounced ‘flew’), enjoyed our compliments regarding his furniture pieces and we fell to talking. He’d grown up in Lille, loved the town and couldn’t recommend it enough. After he discovered we were apartment hunting, he left the shop to his assistant to march us around the corner to meet his cousin, an immobilier who knew Lille’s apartments.  His cousin had an appointment but turned us over to his assistant, Candice. Within five minutes, we had a viewing scheduled the next day.  It was amazing. Candice also let us know that most of the apartments were already booked by the wave of entering students and there was not much variety left to pick from.

We wandered further into the center of town, impressed by the Flemish-influenced architecture. The square is ringed by huge structures; an old stock exchange building, their Opera House and the Notre Dame Cathedral.

We were charmed by the cobblestone streets which wound in a variety of directions, dotted by small shops and eateries. At a certain point, we stopped for a pint of one of the tasty local beers at the Peacock Cafe. We received an enthusiastic greeting by the manager as we sat at the bar, who proclaimed we were ‘the first American’s to sit’ at his bar. When we shook our heads in disbelief, he gave a hearty laugh, explaining that it was his second day in business. Another delightful guy, he proceeded to tell us that he too, loved Lille and was sure that we should live there instead of Paris. Then his cousins came by to congratulate his opening and have a pint. Even though it is known as a college town, it was the second time we were shown evidence of a strong family presence as well.

We took the metro back to the apartment, stopping for groceries along the way. As an aside, Lille was the first to use an automated, driverless metro system in the world. We took advantage of it and the bus system during the month that we were there. They have music playing in the stations and the escalators are automatic, so they don’t start up until they sense someone approaching. The stations are clean; one of them has aquariums in the walls!

The studio had no washing machine and since we would be here for a full month, we would need to wash a few loads. Once we located the nearest laundromat (which wasn’t near at all), we were thankful that we had bought a new gadget called the “Dolfi” which would wash an entire sink of clothes by ultrasound. We had tried it out before leaving the states and it actually worked.

The next day the Eurail passes, which we had ordered, arrived and we began to talk about the best way to use them. The original plan was to travel from Lille up through Brussels, Amsterdam, Hamburg, Copenhagen and perhaps Oslo, Stockholm and Helsinki. The passes were good for a month once they were first stamped, for a total of travel in 28 countries.  But in researching the countries we’d earmarked, it was repeated often that summer months, including August, were the busiest tourist season and that fall was the perfect time to truly enjoy each destination. So we tucked them away and turned our attention to getting to know Lille and traveling to areas nearby.

Our third day in Lille, when we discovered that a particular restaurant which we’d picked to try for dinner was closed during the month of August, we sat down at a place across the street for a pint. Called ‘Les Delices De L’lnde,’ which served mainly pizza, we began to talk in length to the owner, Singh. He had traveled the world as a young man and when he arrived in Lille thirty years previous, he loved it so much that he stayed. He opened this business, raised a family and was getting ready to retire, passing it on to one of his sons.  We asked him to serve us his favorite pizza, which turned out to have Chorizo sausage, Pepperoni, bell peppers, cheeses and topped with a fried egg. Utterly delicious. And an enjoyable late afternoon.

As the month continued, the temperatures were regularly about ten degrees cooler than Paris, which made exploring much more pleasurable. We tried several restaurants, the regional cheeses, beers and dishes, although most of our meals were in the apartment. One particular meal, at a restaurant off the square, of ribs and pork was SO enormous, that we had to take a picture. It fed us for four more meals at our place.

We took the train to Dunqerque (Dunkirk) for a day which, for all of it’s historical significance, was a rather sleepy marina town. It was walking through the cemetery that made clear the sacrifices endured there. It was sobering to see the countless gravestones lined up in two separate areas, of  WWI and WWII soldiers, carrying both English and French names. The most impressive building in the square was their city hall and we could fortunately access the lobby area to view some of the plaques regarding their history.

It made for a long day by the time we pulled into Lille and although we’d already purchased tickets to Brussels for the following week, it was clear we needed to limit our day trips to end with transport by 4 pm. The tickets to Brussels we had purchased had us return on the 7 pm train, which was it’s last, because the train before it left too early to really visit the town.

Arriving in Brussels (a quick 30 min TGV ride), we walked from the train station to the main square that tourist books proclaim needs to be used as a starting point. On the way, we passed more fabulous Flemish architecture and quite a bit of small businesses lined up, sporting a variety of colors which reminded me of Cuba’s colors. No graffiti or trash, which was refreshing but a worn area of town. Once in the square, we were again rendered small by the scale of the historic structures. The buildings included Notre Dame Du Sabion, the King’s palace, a historic museum, a lace museum, a beer museum and the Galaries Royales Saint-Hubert. There were no less than 5 separate tour groups, clearly marked by a huddle of people surrounding a person carrying a flag or bright umbrella.

Our first order of business was of course to taste fresh Belgium beer – and it was very tasty. Then we wandered around the square and the shops before wandering the shops of the beautiful Saint Hubert Royal Galleries with glass roofs, then stopping at a little restaurant called “Cafe Restaurant de l’Ogenblik.”

Only after being seated did we spy the Michelin stickers in the window. They were already out of our first picks but we still had the most delicious lunch of beef steak in a light buttercream colored sauce that had tarragon and chives. The beef stroganoff was like none we’d ever tasted. Instead of a brown gravy over wide egg noodles, this was not served on noodles. The utterly delicious sauce was canary yellow with fiery red bits – tasting of mustard and tarragon.

Finishing with an espresso, we hit the street again and fell across The Maison de Toone, a working marionette theater. We picked up the theatre schedule with an eye on returning for a show in the future. We may have to make it sooner rather than later as the Brussels government has canceled it’s funding and they are struggling financially. Anyone who can translate the website, it is http://www.toone.be and has an interesting tale of the marionette history, dating back to 1830. After stopping at their famous chocolatiers we headed back to the train station.  No surprise to us that it was 4 pm, per our energy quotient, and we were ready to go home. We realize there’s lots more to see and do in Brussels, however, we went for a day trip and were ready to go back to Lille. Unfortunately, there was a three hour wait for the next train.

At 6pm, the marquee board had a notice that the train was delayed until 7:30. With an hour and a half to go, we decided to step across the street for a light dinner. It had been too long a day and we were really beat.  Getting back to the platform at 7:10, we saw it pulling away from the station, along with a few other unhappy ticket holders. Marching down to the ticket office, we engaged in a disagreement with the clerk, who adamantly denied that they had posted a late departure for the train, on the board. We were to get no compensation for funds spent on the unusable tickets, nor were we to get a discount on the bus tickets we now had to purchase. There was only one bus going to Lille that night and it didn’t leave until 9 pm.

If we were exhausted before, we were in another stretch of misery once we boarded the packed bus, finding our assigned places were on the last bench at the back, which seats five. Sandwiched between people, the seat in front of me was broken in the recline position. Although I felt badly for the passenger assigned to that seat, being forced to recline the entire trip, I felt more sorry for having the seat inches away from my lap the entire time. Adding to this picture was a teenager on my right, who continually flicked her hair in my face while texting on her mobile (where are the scissors when you need them) and the fact that the bus had no bathroom or air, with the interior temperature rising above a stifling 80 degrees. By the time we arrived, peeling ourselves out of that tight space, the heat had also taken on the smell of old gym socks. At least we could be thankful that there WAS a bus to be had and that no one was traveling with a goat or a chicken, as they do in some rural areas in other countries. Crawling into bed after midnight, the phrase, “never again,” was repeated numerous times.

Towards the last half of the month, our quest for a permanent lease began to serpentine.  We hadn’t been able to get a situation with the Paris leasing agent so when we walked Lille, almost daily, we would peer at the postings in a variety of immobilieres. It was a surprise to us to discover that unlike the US, here the leasing agents don’t share the pool of available apartments for lease or sale. When it is illegal to use more than one realtor at a time in the states, here they can not show you a listing that they do not have under contract in their office nor do they have the ability to show other office’s, sharing the fees. No sharing means that you must go from one immobiliere to another to find a listing that fits. In Paris we had never contacted another agency, thinking that the one we were working with would have access to everything available.

Everyone we met seemed to enjoy extending their conversations and were quite forthcoming in their love of Lille. One evening, when we were dining at an outside cafe table, there was a group of three friends enjoying cocktails and each others company, next to us. There was a woman, whose presence caught my eye, who was wearing fun colors and a whimsical necklace. When she saw I was looking at it, I gave a gesture to let her know that I thought it was very nice. To my shock, she got up, walked over, took it off and handed it to me. As I handed it back, she would not take it – she said with a smile, in English, “It is my pleasure.” We had to know her better and we joined their merry group for a bit, carrying a piecemeal conversation with French, Spanish and English. They were a fun bunch and we parted, sharing business cards.

Other adventures included two trips to the movie theater to see US films. The first was in English with French subtitles and the second was in French with no subtitles. It was not clear to us which would be the case and fortunately the second movie was a Pixar animation, so the plot was not hard to follow. Unlike the Paris cinema we tried, we were able to access the theater without standing in line outside until the doors opened, which was nice. Another nice find was ‘The Sherlock Pub”, meticulously decorated after Sherlock Holmes with little smoking pipes atop their beer pulls, period newspaper wallpaper, filled bookshelves with both books and curiosities and a life sized Holmes plaster character entering  a mural, in deerstalker hat, carrying a magnifying glass.

The food shopping never fails to give us something new and interesting; little things like the construction of the shopping baskets, being able to pick out your own eggs and quantity or the wonderful smelling bread deliveries on every street. We came to find that Lille also has the diversity that Paris has, not only because of the influx of international students but the traffic garnered by it’s proximity to other countries. It is known for it’s youthful vibe and for it’s shopping and farmers’ markets.

After leaving more emails for the Paris leasing agent, we found a listing online for a one bedroom a block away from our Paris studio. We sent him a message, inquiring after it and he told us that it was owned by the same delightful landlords of the studio we have through the end of October. Incredibly excited, we put in a bid to rent it for a year, starting after the current tenant was slated to leave in December. It was a gamble that we would be able to extend our studio stay 6 more weeks until the one bedroom opened. At last we could shelve our search for a permanent place.

Just as we were patting ourselves on the back, we became ensnared in an issue of US banks communicating with our French bank with a few other financial tangles included. The outcome of this is that what we could safely count on using, was reduced enough to exclude a Paris rental altogether until we could get things to work smoothly. There was no guarantee that it would be a swift process. With heavy hearts we let go of the bid to rent the one bedroom and we were now back in the land of apartment looking.

On the last weekend (which was the first weekend in September) that we were in Lille, the entire town closed it’s downtown streets to house it’s annual Braderie – the “Largest Flea Market in Europe.” It is a huge deal because garage and yard sales are only allowed bi-annually in France. The event attracts 2-3 million people, which was quite the picture when we stepped off the metro. It was like a combination of a yard sale and a retail sidewalk sale that stretched in every direction, every street, to the outer edges of the city center. Retail sale tables with items like discounted clothing, shoes or bath towels side by side to private citizen’s tables, stacked with used kitchen goods, linens, garden accessories and such. It was a zoo.

We were done with it by the end of two hours as we had no plans to buy anything and the crowds were daunting. In addition, we had begun to realize that those cute cobblestones were hard on our feet, curbing our stamina. We have decided thicker soled walking shoes should be added to the list. But we did stop to have a pot of mussels and fries, their signature dish for the market. The cream sauce with tarragon, onion, celery and parsley was so incredibly delicious that it made us fans, even though mussels were never a favorite choice.

Our last day was on the 4th and as we readied to leave Lille, one of the immobiliers we had contacted had received a listing for an unfinished apartment in the center of town at a price that fit our new budget. We met his assistant, who showed us the space and we were pleasantly surprised at the amount of room and the beauty of it. Built in the 17th century with arched, stained glass windows and doors, the building even boasted of an elevator. We took many pictures and talked over lunch of the cost of furnishing it, along with the needed appliances. Deciding we could swing it, we put in a bid for the space and returned to Paris. In returning to our studio in Paris, we were struck with how much we would miss this neighborhood, despite the fact that we had only arrived June 1st.  It was bitter sweet to have found such a wonderful space but that it was not located here on the Ile Saint Louis.

The month had ended with a completely different outcome than we had ever expected. But we realized at the very beginning of this journey that we would need to be flexible on this move. There truly isn’t an end to this apartment hunt until our bid on the Lille apartment has been accepted and even then we need to find out all the intricacies required to setting it up. A last note on the Dolfi; it made tackling a bigger load of wash easier than washing individual pieces but you still need to rinse, wring and hang it all. Also thick items like towels, required two to three cycles to truly get cleaned. It is a useful gadget for travel as it fits in the palm of your hand but it does not really replace the function of a washing machine. As a final aside, the metro tickets do not do well placed in ones pockets next to the new magnetic backed mobile phones. They are scrambled and made useless – a lesson learned after replacing my metro card three times.