Paris Encore!

18/10/2012

Bonjour mes amis!

Let's stay in Paris for another day, okay?

While we were walking by the Eiffel Tower, guess what we saw?  There's a special Exhibit going on there that was drawing lots of attention...

The United Buddy Bears Show...

Here's the premise for this Exhibit, straight from the Buddy Bear website...

"We have to get to know each other better ...
... it makes us understand one another better,
trust each other more, and live together more peacefully."

Under this motto, the UNITED BUDDY BEARS promote living together in peace and harmony on their global tour. Around 140 Buddy Bears (each 2 m tall) represent as many countries recognised by the United Nations.

Since the first exhibition in Berlin in 2002, more than 30 million visitors world-wide have been able to admire the United Buddy Bears.

Perhaps you have gotten to see these Bears already in another city.  We strolled around for a while and took some pictures of individual bears that intrigued us...

Mali!  Took this one for Missionary Friends who served there!

Bulgaria!  Took this one for our Pastor's Family who served there as Missionaries!

This one's from Cuba...what was your first clue?

The good old U.S.of A.!

 As an aside...did I show you France's Statue of Liberty?  We saw this as well...

Now, back to the Bears!

...and France gets the GOLD!

It started raining hard after we viewed this Exhibit, so we made our way, thanks to our friend, Bret, who lived in Paris for a couple of years, to the Rodin Museum, which we all enjoyed so much.  Here's some of our pictures from the Rodin...

First, the most famous Sculpture of all...

The Thinker!

The Flowers in the Garden were beautiful despite the rain!

The Three Shades!

The Gates of Hell!

 This photo came out very well (thanks, Dr. J), but it doesn't do the sculpture justice.  There is so much detail and anguish and amazement in this Sculpture!  You really need to see it up close!

Did you spot the Eiffel Tower off in the distance?

Inside the Museum, there were not only Rodin's Sculptures and Paintings, but other artists as well...

This one is called, "The Gossips"!

This is my rated PG photo of "The Kiss"!

 If I were a Sculptor, I would want my pieces featured in this round room...Amazing!

Sorry...I get a little distracted by beautiful gardens and iron scroll work!

The Burghers of Calais!

That gold domed building in the distance holds the Tomb of Napoleon!

I promised to show you where and what we ate in Paris.  Well, our return train to Orléans was at 9:30 PM, not quite enough time for us to have a long, leisurely dinner in the evening in Paris, so we opted to have a long, leisurely lunch at Le Vauban.

Our lunchtime view!

Can you believe what Bret poured for Jewel Jr.?

Looks like a good year!

 These are just the Starters!  The first beauty was an Eggplant Dish, but I didn't manage to get the picture before Bret "dove in".  It was gorgeous!

 ...and I had a Beef Carpaccio Platter...just the Starter, mind you...

We had a wonderful, relaxing lunch dinner.  Jewel Jr. and I had Duck, while Dr. J had Fish.  Don't know how I forgot about taking pictures of all the food.  Dessert for two of us was the classic French "Crème Brûlée", and Jewel Jr. and Dr. J had a beautiful Strawberry Tart.

Upon completion of our meal, we looked across the street to see this...Gendarmerie!...(the Police)...looks like some demonstrators are thinking of causing some trouble!
 

I have so much more to show you, so I'll be back again tomorrow to share!

I hope you have a "Jewel" of a day!

Jan