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Photographers have taken pictures of Paris in every way imaginable, but photographer Philipp Klinger aims to show us all just how symmetrical and full of patterns the City of Light really is, if you see the city through his viewfinder.
There’s an optically pleasing gallery of images to be seen at the DesignTAXI link below, try to keep your eyeballs in your head!
Link –via DesignTAXI
This video by Olivier Campagne and Vivien Balzi emulates the 1910 Great Flood of Paris with CGI. It’s incredible to imagine the entire city submerged in water, and even more impressive to see how realistic the animated waters are. -via Fast Company
How would you like to fly from New York to London and an hour? Or how about London to Tokyo in two hours? Some day you might be able to if the ZEHST plane gets off the ground.
A new hypersonic jet, dubbed ZEHST for Zero Emission Hypersonic Transportation, was revealed at the Paris Air Show on Sunday. The plane, which debuted in mockup form, will reach speeds of 3,125 mph, or roughly four times the speed of sound (Mach 4), the Daily Mail reports.
Ah, Paris, the City of Lights. Every year, more than 45 million people visit the city but roughly about 1 million of those starry-eyed tourists (mostly Japanese) fall sick with what has been dubbed the Paris Syndrome – what could cause such a strange effect?
Dan Lewis of Now I Know (That’s Half the Battle!) explains:
Paris Syndrome is marked by a psychiatric breakdown suffered by the visitor, often including physiological side effects such as dizziness, an increased heart rate, and otherwise unexplained sweat. Extreme cases come with increased anxiety, a sense of persecution, and even hallucinations. Most of those affected are Japanese, but on occasion, a non-Japanese tourist will fall prey to the syndrome.
The cause? Most likely, it’s a mix of a few factors: jet lag from the long trip; elation (similar to Stendhal syndrome) from taking a once-in-a-lifetime vacation; the language barrier; and, most critically, culture shock. As the BBC noted in its discussion of Paris Syndrome, "[m]any of the visitors come with a deeply romantic vision of Paris [but the] reality can come as a shock. An encounter with a rude taxi driver, or a Parisian waiter who shouts at customers who cannot speak fluent French, might be laughed off by those from other Western cultures. But for the Japanese – used to a more polite and helpful society in which voices are rarely raised in anger – the experience of their dream city turning into a nightmare can simply be too much." And, also according to the BBC, the Japanese embassy there takes culture shock seriously, staffing a 24-hour hotline for citizens and expats who suffer culture shock while in La Ville-Lumière.
Link – via Look At This
Luke Shepard created stitched together 2,000 photographs of Paris at night to create this stunning video clip called Le Flâneur. Magnificent!
Hit play or go to Link [Vimeo] | Interview by Anne Ditmeyer for Intelligent Travel
Paris is offering free sparkling water to promote tap water and to dissuade its residents from overuse of plastic bottles. The fountain in the Jardin de Reuilly is connected to the public water system and uses six taps to provide both sparkling and flat water.
“We chill the water between 6 and 8 degrees Celsius,” said Philippe Burguière, the spokesman for Eau de Paris, “and then we inject carbon dioxide into regular tap water to make the bubbles thin and tasty.”
At about 128 litres (about 34 gallons) per person each year the French consume one of the highest per capita amounts of bottled water in the world. In northern Italy 215 similar fountains have been installed and have proven to be very popular.
by a scientist who is a Paris native and who requests anonymity
Seasoned visitors to the City of Light always factor in their travel plans the two most prevalent facts of life in France: vacations and strikes. Fortunately, school vacation periods are scheduled in advance with clockwork regularity. Strikes may be nearly as predictable. This preliminary study suggests a strong correlation between occurrences of the two.
(Image credit: Flickr user Trey Ratcliff)
The right to protest and demonstrate in France is a fundamental part of life, and not limited to the employed. In fact, foreign visitors in Paris in December 1997 might have witnessed a somewhat surreal event: hundreds of unemployed people on strike, demonstrating in the streets, demanding an end-of-the-year bonus.
But if there is one thing the strikers will not sacrifice, it is their hard earned (and constitutional right to) vacations. Witness the school teachers who went on strike in May of 2003, suspended the strike at the end of June for their summer break, and came back at the beginning of the next school year, in September, to resume the strike. Indeed, major issues had remained unresolved.
Needless to say, strikes are very unlikely in July and August (summer break), as at least three quarters of the workforce are away on vacation, and so is most of the government. At this time of the year, Paris is populated with tourists and the grumpy quarter of Parisians who got stuck at work while the others are chilling out on the Riviera or camping in Normandy. (This might be an explanation for the poor image of Parisians tourists tend to have, but that is a topic for another study).
In September vacationers come back in town, broke, to find out that the cost of living (public transportations, food, gas, etc.) has gone up while they were gone. Vacationers have to go back to work, days are getting shorter and the weather is worsening. Expect strikes from mid-September to beginning of October. Not too late in October, though, because that would interfere with the first school break (All Saints break, from end of October to beginning of November).
The next high occurrence period is mid-December, when the days are getting really short, the weather is downright miserable and people feel broke and start worrying about the holidays. Some privileged categories of indispensable workers regularly threaten to go on strike during the holidays, but generally the issues get resolved in time for everyone to enjoy the end-of-year festivities.
In January and February, the outdoors activity on everybody’s mind is winter sports. Two school vacations, the winter break (late February to mid-March), and the spring break (mid-April to early May), help Parisians survive until the return of warm weather. Everyone is relaxed from the last break, and the anticipation of the next. There is hardly any time left in between to get back to work, let alone sneak in a little strike or protest.
(Image credit: Flickr user malias)
May–June is quite a complex period, due to the number and distribution of holidays in May. May 1st is Labor Day and May 8th is the WWII armistice. In a good year both occur on Monday or Friday, providing two long weekends. On an excellent year, they occur on Tuesday or Thursday, and with the “ponts” (“free” non-working days granted to bridge one-day gaps between holidays and week-ends) that’s two four-day weekends. Ascension Day comes 39 days after Easter, and that is a Thursday in May. In an excellent year, that Thursday does not coincide with the other holidays, and that’s another light week (or very long weekend). In fact, in a really good year, an employee can get the whole month of May off by taking about 10 official vacation days. Of course, even in France, not everyone can do that at the same time, so about half the people are away, and the other half are stuck at work, a day or two per week, and not doing much anyways.
When June comes, the weather becomes really pleasant, the Roland-Garros Tennis tournament (French Open, end of May to beginning of June) signals that the end of the school year is close, the summer vacations are around the corner and everybody is eager to get outdoors. After the end of the French Open, expect major protests with demonstrations en masse. This is the favorite time of the year for students to take to the streets (as end-of-the year exams approach). The strikes and demonstrations will most likely stop on time for Parisians to travel to their favorite summer spot come July.
Note that on a bad year, the May holidays coincide with weekends. The French feel cheated: expect the pre-summer protests to start earlier (although demonstrations are unlikely during Roland-Garros).
(Image credit: Flickr user Les Hutchins)
So this is why April is clearly the best time to visit Paris: the weather might not be great yet, but the chance of major social disturbances is low, and the Parisians, either coming back from a vacation or about to go on a vacation, are likely in the best mood they’ll be in all year.
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This article is republished with permission from the May-June 2008 issue of the Annals of Improbable Research. You can download or purchase back issues of the magazine, or subscribe to receive future issues. Or get a subscription for someone as a gift!
Visit their website for more research that makes people LAUGH and then THINK.
In 1815, Cossacks returning from the Napoleonic Wars established a village in what is now the Chelyabinsk oblast of Russia. They named it Paris, and their descendants later erected a miniature Eiffel Tower. At the link, you can view several pictures of the site.
Link via The Presurfer | Photo: Victor Borisov
An 18-month-old boy in Paris fell out of a sixth-story apartment window Monday afternoon. He bounced off a canopy over a ground-floor cafe and into the arms of a doctor who was passing by!
The man who caught the boy was walking by with his wife and son, who spotted the boy falling.
Another witness told Le Figaro that the doctor positioned himself by the awning and caught the boy in his arms after he bounced off it.
The witness, Francois, said the boy cried a bit at first but quickly calmed down.
The doctor, identified as Philippe Benseniot by France Info, said it was pure luck.
“I was there at the right time,” he told France Info.
The child was taken to a hospital but was found to be uninjured. Link -via Fortean Times
The Apaches were street gangs that roamed eastern Paris prior to World War 1. They adopted their name after Buffalo Bill brought his Wild West Show to Paris in 1905. They lived wild, criminal lives and could be recognized by the distinctive clothes they wore. The Apaches took their clothes very seriously and were reputedly willing to kill for the right pair of shoes.The shop on Rue du Faubourg du Temple, above, where they bought their distinctive fashions still bears the original Tailleur sign.
Each gang was dressed slightly differently, often wearing something such as a red scarf that would be both a sign of belonging and a means of identification in other territories. However, certain elements were the same in all gangs. All wore a certain type of trouser, tight at the knees and flared at the bottom, known as a Bénard. These were named after the tailor who made them, a certain Auguste Bénard, and the word is still used in Parisian slang today to designate a pair of trousers (bénard, ben’ or bénouze).
On their heads there was always a hat of some description, generally something flat in the form of a sailor’s cap, but it was what was put on the feet that was the most important. Claude Dubois in his depiction of the Bastille area of Paris (La Bastoche, 1997) describes the ideal pair:
“Le comble de la coquetterie apache étant les bottines jaunes à bouts pointus cirées de frais avec des boutons dorés”. (The height of Apache vanity was a pair of freshly polished pointed yellow boots with golden buttons).
If you’re caught jumping the turnstiles or sneaking through the exit barriers on the Paris Metro, you’ll face fines up to $60. Sacrebleu!
Subway freeloaders have banded together to come up with the perfectly logical solution: a scofflaw insurance fund!
The answer, here in the land that gave the world the motto "All for one, one for all," is as typically French as it is ingenious: They’ve banded together to set up what are, essentially, scofflaw insurance funds, seasoned with a dollop of revolutionary fervor.
For about $8.50 a month, those who join one of these raffish-sounding mutuelles des fraudeurs can rest easy knowing that, if they get busted for refusing to be so bourgeois as to pay to use public transit, the fund will cough up the money for the fine.
It provides a little peace of mind, however ethically dubious, in a time of economic uncertainty.
But for many of these fraudeurs, cheating the system and forming a co-op isn’t just about saving money; it’s about striking a blow against a capitalist state that favors the haves over the have-nots. Fare dodgers of the world, unite!
Henry Chu of LA Times Column One has the story: Link
The blog 2M40 is about one underpass in Paris that has a clearance of only two meters and forty centimeters. Many truck drivers either do not read, do not understand, or do not believe the clearance warning. Several times a month, the underpass wins the battle against these drivers and 2m40 posts the pictures. The blog is in French, but the pictures tell the story. The tagline is “Un blog impactant,” which means “An impacting blog.” Link -via the Presurfer
Why is customer service in Paris so horribly rude? It may have roots in the French Revolution (they really do take the égalité part of the national motto "Liberté, égalité, fraternité" seriously).
Emma Jane Kirby of BBC News discovers first-hand that the customer isn’t always right in Paris:
The fact is Parisians employed in any service industry simply do not buy into the Anglo Saxon maxim, "He who pays the piper calls the tune."
The revolution of 1789 has burned the notion of equality deep into the French psyche and a proud Parisian finds it abhorrently degrading to act subserviently.
This Sunday, a Parisian friend of mine waited in line at the fruit and vegetable stall of his local market. When it was his turn to be served, he asked the seller for a kilo of leeks. "They’re at the other end of the stall," snapped the vendor waspishly. "Take a bit of exercise and get them yourself."
There is no mistaking the undertone, "I’m not your slave."
Link (Photo: AFP)
Two feuding French mayors have taken steps to make their constituent’s commute into Paris extra painful. The mayor of Levallois-Perret made D909 into a one way street to help reduce commuter traffic going through his district. However, this created more traffic congestion in neighboring Clichy-la-Garenne.
The mayor of Clichy-la-Garenne responded in the obvious neighborly way of also making his district’s portion of the same street one way also -in the opposite direction!
Thousands of commuters travel through the two suburbs each day into Paris, and municipal and national police were called in to redirect traffic away from the gridlock.
From the Upcoming 
ueue, submitted by 
Everland is a hotel with only one room including a bathroom, a king-size bed and a lounge. What makes it so different is that – because it is also an art installation – this hotel travels! The Everland has been ‘parked’ in the most unsual places, like the roof-deck of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Leipzig, Germany.
Now the hotel is in Paris, high above the city, with a spectacular view on the Eiffel Tower from its place at the roof of Palais de Tokyo.
Considering how unique a night in this hotel is, the price is not so crazy: you can get the only room and the unique view for 333 Euros during the week, 444 Euros during the weekends.
From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by scbr.
In the 18th centuary, when the cemateries of Paris ran out of space for the dead, the city began to store the bodies in vast underground catacombs.
These days Paris catacombs are no longer used. The city does offer tours, but only around a small area of these expansive underground tunnels.
That’s not good enough for these inquisitive photographers known as Urban Explorers. They headed off the beaten track to take a look around the areas that most tourists never see.
Check out their stunning photos of a world that many people don’t even realise they’re standing right above.
From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Jake.
