From Our Window

With only two days left, we thought we'd share a few sights we've seen just looking out our window.  We didn't even have to leave the apartment to see interesting things!

One of the first weeks we were here, we heard jazz music seeming to come from right below us.  Looking out the window, we saw this promotion for Ricard, which is a brand of pastis (anise flavored drink served as an apértif).  The "parade" stopped at several of the bars below us, and the drivers served samples out of the backs of the two huge R's.



There was also this activist march for RESel, a group protesting high rents and evictions (100,000 per year).  We heard the chanting and looked out the window just in time to see them go by.

On August 12, a group of what appeared to be students marched down the street singing songs accompanied by drums and guitars.  Unfortunately, I have no idea who they are or why they were marching, and I can't make out the flag they are carrying.  It looks like it's red, white, and black with some kind of insignia.  Any ideas?

The most interesting for sure was when we kept hearing someone yell "Action!!" down below, and then he would shout other verbal cues "You look at her!!!  You keep going!!!".  Curiosity piqued, we looked down and sure enough it was a commercial shoot.

From what I could tell, the one model (fully dressed) was walking down the street eating some kind of baguette.  But then, a sassy topless model walked past her eating some other kind of bread (maybe a croissant -- I couldn't tell, I was distracted by the lack of clothes).  They did about 20 takes.  I'm sure the bar patrons at Grappe d'Orgueil were riveted.

About a week ago, the Ricard's promoters came through again.

And this was the view of the houses across the street just before a very heavy rain one evening.

Technically this one wasn't shot from our window, but it was just down the street....there are all kinds of street performers who perform regularly in Rue Montorgueil.  These breakdancers got a bit of a surprise when an elderly lady decided to join in the fun.