It’s almost been a month since we’ve been here (4 weeks on Sunday) but seems longer.

It’s not that we’ve been idle, with French and art and the gym as our basic activities. Although we “live” here, we clearly remain observers as it would take a while to integrate into the community, I am sure, and our sabbatical has a fixed shelf life. Meanwhile, we certainly interact with the neighbours on the elevator, the newsagent, the people at the gym, etc., so to some extent, I guess we’ve started to blend into the environment although somehow they know we’re anglos especially when I speak French, despite the classes. Sandy is better, sans doute.

Had a different culinary experience today. Down the street there is a Japanese patisserie which does an Asian twist on traditional French pastry. The patissier studied with Pierre Herme among others and opened his own shop some years ago (which gets mentioned in almost every food guide we’ve seen). We’ve eyed the very pretty, dark jade green tea éclairs for some time and shared one at lunch. Particularly tasty and unusual.

Finally figured out that movies have to say “VOST” for sub-titled films. Saw “Duplicity” which was fun, near the Opéra, after which we had a few glasses of wine at a tasting by the owner of Chateau Pape-Clement.

For dinner, we had a few oysters and a bottle of Chablis at Le Bar à Huîtres 33, rue, Saint-Jacques, in the 5th arr. and that was it for the day.