A quick trip to Paris

I took a quick trip to Paris for some meetings... I love Paris. I've been lots of times and it never loses it's romance.

On the first night, we go for a meal with some friends. It;s very nice to be integrating with local france... It;s a very nice bottle of wine, but we have early meetings, so it's an early night, without seeing much paris.

...............

After a day of meetings, beside the pompidou centre...








..... its a social dinner in an unremarkable restaurant followed by (expensive)unremarkable beer in an unremarkable bar. There's so many of these little bars in Paris. I call them "Amelie bars", the atmosphere in them is very far from my preferred drinking environment.... so to bed without seeing much more Paris....

..............

Friday, and another day of meetings. This time, we have the evening to ourselves, so we head off to my favourite restaurant:



Vin de Pyrenees is a restaurant I discovered by accident the first time I came to Paris. I was visiting the street where Jim Morrison died, and by the time we found it, we were really really hungry and tried to get into a little restaurant beside Jim's flat.

The maitre d' was the usual parisian surly when I asked if he spoke english.... I then told him I was Scottish and he welcomed us in..

It was one of those places where you have a candle lit dinner for two but on long tables with benches, so we had to step over other patron's knees to get to our table - or more correctly our bit of the table. The food was wonderful....

I finally found it again, a few trip sto paris ago, and it's changed owners a few times, but the food is at least as good, or possibly better.

We survive the sticky weather by having a rose before we get stuck into some Cote De Boeff....



Satiated, we head off back to the hotel with a meander round the Marais....















FInally I got to see some of Paris. The Marais is always great, and tonight is no exception... it's dark, but there's so much light, and its the middle of the summer, so everything iss bathed ina beautiful glow that(coupled with the protein overdose), makes everything seem absolutely beautiful.

.........

We have a half day of meetings, and then I head back up to Amsterdam. My trip is entertained by Lego Star wars:



It;s great to combine star wars with lego.... and you feel like you're 8 yrs old...

...back in Amsterdam, I head straight to the pub to meet The Kiwi for drinks... I'm shattered, but the weather is good, the beer is cold, and a summer of travelling has just begun...




Bon nuit...

......said Florence....

I'm off to Florence, which is a refreshing change from the western European mediocrity of what I'm used to..... Nothing against Leeds, Brussels, Paris and Luxembourg, but I've kind of seen them before....



I've seen Florence once before:
Uffizi

This time rather than the tail end of the year, it's approaching spring... So hopefully I'll see a slightly different perspective on the city.

Florence airport is closed, so I have to fly to Bologna and then get the train down...

I arrive in the airport early in the hope of getting a Shiatsu, but lady luck has put m at the other end of the airport, and clock watching followed by a sprint seems to defeat the purpose of Shiatsu slightly..

I arrive in Bologna after an air trip reading this....



...while listening to...



I need to get a bus to Bologna station and then a train to Firenze, so there's lots of humphing around bags. Once I'm on the train, the views of Tuscany I had looked forward to were shrouded in mist, I'm completely chilled and unprepared for this trip - I have no idea how far Bologna is from Florence... no phrase book.... no map, just an iPod and a book. I blame the gym.....

I get out at Florence station and I manage to find my hotel, its on the dodgy side of the station. Only one block dodgy, but I still feel like less of a tourist. It's a nice hotel, and the first thing I do is head to the gym to chill out a bit..

30 minutes jog later, I'm swearing at the cheap weight machine..... The fitness rooms in hotels are just an encouragement to do something, there little advantage over a few press-ups in your room, but I head down anyway and do some of the free weights.... afterwards its into the pokey one man sauna.... then sleep like a baby...

....The conference turns out to be in a department of the University which is in a Villa at the top of a hill. It's really quite nice, and as the spring haze hangs on the lush green hills of tuscany it looks pretty marvelous....










I had assumed that Aula di Superiori Fisica translated as Hall of Advanced Physics, turns out its nothing so grand, its a little classroom with fold down wooden chairs and slanted desks, and reminds me of the scene with the nun in the Blues Brothers.

Day one passes without incident, and I get back to my hotel about 9.30pm, its then off out tot he supermarket for a picnic style dinner after I've been for a jog on the treadmill. Touristing round florence will have to wait, cos all I'm interested in is bed....

.....Day two off meetings is similar, except this time I risk getting the bus up the hill rather than a taxi, at a Euro for the 20 minute trip its pretty good value for money, and I feel more like I'm integrating as I bop away to the Beastie boys on my ipOd with all the other commuters(Although granted they are probably listening to something a little more cultured and refined than Hello Nasty):



At night I manage to sneak off early for a quick gym session before we meet up for dinner.

It's a touristy but quite quaint traditional Florentine fair:

antipasti


Wild Rabbit Pasta


Florentine Steak


Escalope


Mushroom Risotto


Tiramisu


....washed down with...

Chianti


Its a good filling meal and after the jog, and the slow eating of 7 meals, I feel vbery chilled, we head off for a walk through the centre:







After friday, I'm pretty knackered, so rather than another night walk round Firenze, I opt for a quick run, a sauna and then a relaxing night in bed with some DVD's and a book.....

That puts and end to the trip to Florence this time.. I didn't see much, but I'm now an old hat at booking into Hotels with Gyms and keeping fit while I stay... It makes for a much more relaxed me during the boring meetings, but maybe I see slightly less of cities..... Will I ever make it to outdoor jogging???? Hmmmm I'm not sure.

Paris

After last week's uninspiring trip to Leeds, we have the more inspiring city of Paris this week. Nothing against Leeds, I think it's more to do with the content of the meetings.

I've always loved Paris, and I like the atmosphere no matter what the time of the year. We're popping down for a few meetings, but it's quite a leisurely pace, so we have a little time to explore. We arrive late on the Wednesday and enjoy a few beers in the centre before heading for an early night and enjoying a good sleep before a day of meetings the next day.

The meetings are in the Universite Marie Curie. It is a concrete monstrosity which is just across the seine from the Notre Dame. It is absolutely horrible, even getting into the place, you are reminded of 1980's cheap concrete buildings. It looks like a a communist power station. Possibly a nod to Marie Curie's Polish roots:



we eventually find our roots, and discover that there is a wonderful view. Not just because you can't see the Universite Marie Curie from the Universite Marie Curie, but also as our host tells us, he's been in the same office for years, and never seen Paris in the same light:



These are the views that make me love Paris. After hours and hours of meetings, our host suggests that before we head off to the other end of Paris for a meeting, that we should get some lunch and enjoy the weather by the Seine. we then have a meeting sitting on the Seine:



This really is the life. we have canals in Amsterdam, yet we never use them. I can't think of a better location for a meeting while we tuck into Cambenbert Baguettes.

For the Afternoon, we are heading to Place De Italie for a meeting in a different building. We are on the 9th floor in some very Plush offices, so we get a different view of Paris from the lift:





After the meeting, we have a few beers on Place de Italie, and once he's headed off, we get in a taxi to 17 Rue Beautreillis. This is where Jim Morrison died. I'm not there purely to listen to Crystal Ship and marvel at the enigma that was The Doors. I also know from a trip to Paris in 1999 that there is a damn good restaurant on this street. My boss(Not a doors fan), is a little dubious, but after a beer across from Jim's Balcony, we head for the restaurant:



Before long we are tucking into Carpaccio de boeff, Cote de boeff and fine french wine. My boss is now impressed enough for him to believe that the trip was based on more than just teenage rock idolisation. Suitably refreshed, we head off back to the Hotel.

Our quick trip to Paris is over and all we have is the leisurely trip home courtesy of Thalys.

Brussels

Day in Brussels for a meeting.



Nice as Brussels is, 9 times out of 10, I'm here for a meeting in the bit which has only concrete buildings and building sites. Yawn!

Winter in Paris

Paris Pont nuef???
Originally uploaded by furbyx4.

........Its 8am its a saturday, it's far too early to be at work, it's cold, I'm hungover, its snowing, the coffee wasn't very good in the hotel, I wish I'd brought a warmer jacket, it's my first time in Paris in the winter(If late February is winter)

I've been to Paris loads of times, a few times for holidays, but mostly for meetings, conferences etc. Its always in the summer, and I always like Paris. I love the joie de vivre(I also can't speak a word of French).

Despite the cold, this was a beautiful crisp morning. A little snow flutters around. Not the brown slush collecting at the side of the road that you get in less classy cities, but romantic wistful snow, that makes you want to write poetry.

Maybe my brain has been affected by lack of sleep, too much work, boring meetings, pointless discussions, cold toes, not enough coffee, too much beer....

January has been boring

I have very little to report. January is the time of writing papers for summer conferences. I am writing far less than last year. I think the novelty wore off. My work is different than it was last year, I have some software development, some open source distribution sites to do, a new big project, but little in the way of results to report. We have kind of announcement type papers for our new big project, which basically involve copying and pasting bits and pieces from internal departmental documents. It doesn't feel as creative.

Maybe I need to get my finger out and dust off my guitar. Even tho garageband(Apple music making program), is wonderful, its pretty rare that I take the time to sit down and actually do something with it.

I'm bored, at a loose end, have nothing to report. I think it's time to arrange a gratuitous meeting. This seems to be the thinking of everyone else in the world.