Nostalgic Paris

Time seems to be passing even more quickly since returning from Nancy so we thought that we'd better do the nostalgia thing before we run out of time.
In another life we both worked for Qantas and so we travelled quite a lot including coming to Paris in 1986 to get married. The ceremony took place in the Australian embassy (which is not far from the Eiffel Tower) and then we spent a lot of time running around Paris via the Metro taking pictures of ourselves in romantic places before retiring to Maxims for our "wedding breakfast". This was before the days of lightweight digital cameras so we dragged the Pentax SLR and tripod with us everywhere we went, set it up, and stood back waiting for the timer to count down - it was fun, especially having to doff our coats and stand in the chilled air pretending that it was a warm summers day. Now we do the same as everyone else, hold the digital camera at arms length and press the button.
We had always stayed in the same hotel in rue St Dominique in the 7th arrondissment. The hotel is about halfway along this long narrow street which runs from boulevarde St Germaine (near the Musee d'Orsay) to Parc du Champs de Mars (the long grassy park that runs from the foot of the Eiffel tower to the Ecole Militaire where Napoleon was trained as a soldier). Since we are now staying a long way from this area we decided that we would catch the Metro to Trocadero (from where you overlook the Parc and the Tower) and walk down the hill, across the river, under the tower and along the Parc in the opposite direction to our old walks. We hadn't realised before that the tower building at Montparnasse (the first high rise in Paris) is in a line of sight with the Eiffel tower from Trocadero.
It's all changed of course even though it remains superficially the same. The buildings are dirtier, there is graffiti on the granite, the crowds at the foot of the tower are incredible and the grass in the parc is fenced off. Nevertheless it IS memory lane for us and we talk about how it was and what we did and how much our lives have changed since those days. We also recognise that for most of the people crowded around the tower waiting their chance to ride up and look out over Paris from this 109 year old "temporary" structure it is all fresh and new.
By the time we get to middle of the Parc where rue St Dominique begins a light rain starts to fall so we find a bus going in our direction and jump aboard (one of the benefits of a monthly pass with unlimited travel). Amazingly it travels the full length of rue St Dominique and eventually drops us off one block from the Cite.
On Wednesday, on our way back from Porte de Champerret we got off at place de la Madeleine where Fauchon's is located which, as Frommer's Guide says, "is a hyper-upscale mega-delicatessen that thrives within a city famous for its finicky eaters. It's divided into three divisions that include an épicerie (for jams, crackers, pastas, and exotic canned goods); a pâtissier (for breads, pastries, and chocolates); and a traiteur (for cheeses, terrines, pâtés, caviar, and fruits). Prices are steep, but the inventories -- at least to serious foodies -- are fascinating". There is also a Brasserie Fauchon where you can wile away the time (and your money) enjoying things like a "Paris-Brest, a ring in the shape of a bicycle wheel that's loaded with pastry cream, almond praline, butter cream, and hazelnut paste capped with almonds". We decide to conserve our funds and our waistlines and continue on past the church (which is based on a Greek temple design similar to that of the Pantheon) to rue Royale and Maxims. The restaurant is closed but next door they have opened up a gift store where you can buy almost anything with the Maxims label on it - merchandising to the max (another souvenir to take home from Paris!)
In a side street we stumble across an unusual market which seems to have been set up to promote delicacies from various parts of rural France. There are wines and cheeses and dried meats and we are intrigued to discover the largest brioche we have ever seen.
Afterwards we turn up rue du Faubourg st Honore past all the "name" shops including Chanel, Hermes, Lanvin, Cartier, Boucheron (I just discovered a "mimosa" diamond brooch this week made by them for the 1889 Exposition) to the "heavy" end of the street where the British and US embassies are located alongside the Elysee Palace (where the French President resides). Understandably there is more security here than we have seen anywhere else in France. One side of the street is blocked off and there are police everywhere, not only guarding the front of the buildings but directing the traffic and making sure that it keep moving quickly past the palace. Security appears to be a way of life in France today. There are armed security, police or soldiers patrolling on buses and trains and around all important sites such as train stations and buildings like the Louvre. In fact, while we sitting in the bibliotheque at Arts Decoratif this week a group of three soldiers (they all travel in groups of three) with automatic rifles at the ready walked past the window looking very purposeful (a constant reminder of wars that always seem so far away when we are in Australia.
On the way back we turn into Place Vendome where the column at the center was erected by Napoleon to commemorate the Battle of Austerlitz in 1805. It is made from cannon from the battle and the statue of Napoleon crowned with laurels is on the top. It is also the location of the Ritz hotel where we came for afternoon tea the day after we were married. Nothing appears to have changed but if you look beyond the facade of some of the old buildings you see new structures made from very modern glass and steel. As we were leaving a young girl stoops down in front of us and picks up a gold wedding band and asks if it is ours. We tell her it is not and start to move off but she says that we should keep it anyway for luck. We tell her to keep it but she insists and pushes it into our hand. As we go to leave she asks for some money for coca cola and we realise that our first instinct had been correct - she was a nicely dressed gypsy and this is just a new trick for collecting funds.
Thursday, a visit to the old Bibliotheque National de France (BNF) in rue de Richelieu which traces its origin to the royal library founded at the Louvre by Charles V in 1368. By 1896, the library had become the largest repository of books in the world and was sought out by intellectuals from all over the world e.g. it was the place where Lenin came to study before the Russian revolution. Most of the books have now been moved to the huge new Bibliothèque François Mitterrand on the left bank of the Seine (down past the Jardin des Plantes) but there is still an art library here (we couldn't actually get past the lobby as we do not have a readers card which accesses the automatic doors). It is a grand old building and reminds one of the New York public library or the old Mitchell library in Sydney.