Leviathan

A building with its own skyline

Approaching the stunning 16th-century Château de Chambord is more like a seeing some natural wonder than a man-made structure. At the end of its long allée, it shimmers with elegant bulk, much like Monument Valley or Devil's Tower from extreme distance. It is designed like some enormous organism, with interior and exterior bilateral symmetry along two axes. The beast's "spine" is an innovative double helix staircase, said to have been inspired by a design by Leonardo. On it two courtiers could ascend and descend without ever meeting, but still admire (or disdain) each other through the apertures in the central axis.

The core of the double helix

The place seems too big for mere furniture. One might as well clothe a brontosaurus. The roof is a veritable sculpture park--or to perpetuate the metaphor, the back of a great spiny leviathan, from which visitors could float on an ocean of lawns, watching royal hunts miles in the distance. 


With 440 rooms, 282 fireplaces and 13,000 acres of parkland, it is by far the largest pile in the Loire. In conception as much as size, everything else seems puny by comparison. Not a building to love, really, but one to inspire fear and awe--the emotions of the sublime.

© 2012 Nicholas Nicastro

How to Insult a Frenchman

Start with a different goal in mind. In this case, I needed a ticket I bought online but forgot to print from my laptop. Not entirely sure what kind of shop I should go to, I tramped around the area around the Paris Bourse (stock exchange) before going into what appeared to be some kind of electronics store. There I was told to go to a place they called "o-FEES di PO". Since I was near the Blvd des Italiens, my jet-lag addled brain assumed this was some kind of reference to the Valley of the Po River in Italy (yes, I actually thought this).

            Unable to locate this place, I went into another shop to ask directions. I didn't pay much attention to what kind of business it was--there seemed a lot of paper and office supplies. Inside, a well-dressed younger man was chatting with a somewhat tired-looking older gentleman behind the counter. Using a combination of broken French and English and gesticulations, I asked where I might find the "o-FEES". This provoked a spat of angry French from the monsieur behind the counter--something about "Americans" and "Francais", and although I didn't hear the exact word "idiot", his tone definitely implied it. Amused, the dude turned to me an explained (in good English) that the "di PO" was a strong competitor for his friend's business, and that he was "very shocked" that I would come in and ask for directions there.

            I explained that I was directed there by others--French others, in fact--and that I didn't care where I needed to go, as long as I could get my document printed. Could he help me? Alas, he could not--with an expression suggesting a sympathizer with the French resistance fobbing off a German officer during the Occupation, the owner regretted that his computer was "broken".

            This treatment, I thought, might explain why he was having so much trouble competing with the other store--but of course I said no such thing. Instead, I offered apologies and gratefully accepted the younger dude's directions. Meanwhile, the shop-keep went on and on about "colonizers" and (I think) learning French before I came to France to insult people. The dude, deeply amused, winked and said "I will take care of him."

            I did manage to find "o-FEES di Po". Alas, it had nothing to do with the Valley of the Po, but was an ordinary outlet of Office Depot, albeit one of those shrunken versions of a US big box store found in Paris. Chagrined, I waited for the my tickets to print and contemplated the magnificence of my comprehensive faux pas. Simultaneously, I had managed to insult the man's business, to active the resentment of every Mom and Pop small business-owner against their out-of-town corporate competition, and to play my part as the arrogant, ignorant American abroad.

            I wondered if I could buy a small, travel-sized printer for my computer. Maybe they sold them at the "di Po"?

© 2012 Nicholas Nicastro

Five Minutes in Paris

Paris, "City of Lights", core of civilization and mother of clichés. For there are few other places in the world that seem to invite cliché, that stock of expected images and experiences, with such intensity. The grand architecture, the sharp-shouldered Haussmannian boulevards, the little shops and the women in their little draped scarves--all are there on the surface, the presumed garnishments. And yet, it's all just a tease, an invitation, for what lies beneath and around this little "island of France." The word "cliché" itself has become so commonplace in our language that we forget it is French.

            Americans in Paris are almost as hoary an image as the street cafe. We provincials come to Paris, and have been coming here for more than two centuries, to get our first taste of difference, of the realization of life based on separate assumptions. In America, it often seems we live in spite of those around us, those other people with their competing needs and the shadow of institutions looming over us. We see life as a struggle, and happiness as something to be "pursued".    

            Call it a truism, call it cliché, but Paris presents a different conception. It's one where contentment isn't chased, it is merely inhabited. Parisiens are often seen as aloof, or grumpy, but at root they live out an optimistic idea. People-watching is the pastime of Paris because people--not natural vistas, not money--are the real story.