The U.S. Embassy in Paris holds a Fourth of July garden party every year but most of those on the guest list are French. I was relieved to learn that last week while on a private tour of the U.S. Ambassador’s Residence—relieved because I no longer feel snubbed for not being invited; I simply feel American. So when someone asked me this morning if I was going to the embassy event I proudly replied, “No, I’m American!”

There were various other Fourth of July parties in Paris, of course, but I didn’t get invited to any of them either. I could have gone to the Franco-American Fourth of July ceremony at Lafayette’s tomb, but I’d been there last year (if you missed the article I wrote about that last year you can read it by clicking here or watch my audio slide-show of the event by clicking here.)

Still, I was feeling a bit red-white-and-bluish (not to be confused with the colors of the French flag which is blue, white, and red) today, so I accepted an invitation to Cupcake Camp.

Cupcake Camp was organized in Bistrot Vivienne, an otherwise pleasant bistro in the 2nd arrondissement that had been cleared of its pleasantness for the occasion, by Cat Beurnier, a cupcake baker who operates Sugar Daze, and Bryan Pirolli, a master’s student and part-time cook (photo left).

I’d hoped to learn more about Cat and Bryan during Cupcake Camp but they were quite the busy camp leaders since the bistro was a-swarm with people trying to make the best out of the 10-euro entrance fee which allowed for all the cupcakes you can eat plus one drink.

From the looks of things this afternoon it appears that if you give a couple hundred Americans (and assorted French friends) a choice of any beverage with their cupcake the majority will pick Diet Coke—or Coke Light as it’s called in France where no one will ever admit that she’s on a diet but where everyone wants to feel light.

“Proceeds from the event,” to quote Cat and Bryan’s press release, “will support a group spearheaded by friends of Cupcake Camp Paris, Rebuilding Haiti Now.” I’m not sure what the group actually does but I must say that only Americans are capable of using cupcakes to raise funds for earthquake victims, just one more thing we can be proud of.

The press release also states that “Cupcake Camp is a tradition that hails from California, created by Ariel Waldman” and that “the cupcake can be considered the US’ defining culinary contribution to the world.”

I know nothing about Ariel Waldman and won’t bother Googling the name because as far as I could tell Cupcake Camp Paris was simply an occasion to bake and eat cupcakes with proceeds going to charity. It didn’t feel like something that would “hail” from anywhere, let alone California, or need to be “created,” let alone by someone named Ariel Waldman!

Nevertheless, today’s Cupcake Camp was a rousing success to judge by the donations/entrance fees, the crowds, the general good cheer, and the quantity of cupcakes and Coke Light consumed.

Still, I’m a bit concerned about that “defining culinary contribution to the world” line. I only tried three cupcakes of the 30 or so varieties that I saw in the boxes, and there may have been many more that I didn’t see, so I can’t judge overall quality from my small sampling; I nevertheless came away with a vision of a dozen young women baking through the night while getting slaphappy on sugar and going heavy on the icing. Some things just weren’t meant to define us abroad.

Even as out-of-the-loop as I am regarding American baking trends, I have naturally been aware for a number of years now of the cupcake fad back home. When in the U.S. I can’t visit anyone with children under 25 without being offered a cupcake. At one party in New Jersey last year, ostensibly a Thanksgiving gathering, the oohs and ahs came not with the presentation of the turkey but with that of the cupcakes. A half-dozen tweens and teens stood around the dessert table waiting to see whose creations the guests would choose, each one smudging the icing of the competition so that hers would stand out as the prettiest. They were so disappointed when I didn’t pick one that I nearly felt unpatriotic for going for the pumpkin pie.

Oddly enough, going to Cupcake Camp on the Fourth of July didn’t make me feel any more patriotic. In fact, I was surprised to see how little effort was made to make the connection between our “defining culinary contribution” and Independence Day.

Entries to the “Most Patriotic Cupcake” competition (above) were so scant that I wondered if Cupcake Camp founder Ariel Waldman might have disallowed the combination of red, white, and blue icing in the camp rules. Either that or blue icing is hard to come by in Paris and no one realized that blueberry season has just begun.

Anyway, as you can see from the photos above, the entries to the various competitions did look quite good, and I’m sure there were some true winners among them.

The judges also looked quite good, as you can see below.

On the right is travel writer Heather Stimmler-Hall. Click here to read an interview with her on France Revisited following the release of her book “Naughty Paris: A Ladies Guide to a Sexy City.”

In the middle is Synie Georgulas, a professional baker, owner of the bakery-tea room Synie’s Cupcakes, whom I’ll be interviewing later this month in further explorations into cupcakes.

On the left is Lindsey Tramuta, whose cupcake credentials include her musings on the blog Lost In Cheeseland.

I should note that the photo above was taking prior to the start of their judging duties, which may explain why they look so happy to be there.

Just kidding, Cat. It was a great event, just lacked a bit of Fourth of July spirit.

Speaking of cats: the Fourth of July, also known as July 4, is also my cat’s birthday. He’s now 11. Happy birthday, Moumoon!

In 1996 I was awarded FrancePress’s Prix d’Excellence for my guide to France published by Fielding Worldwide. I didn’t know about the award until my brother Jon told me. He’d learned from a patient who’d brought to his office a copy of the magazine in which the prize was announced.

Though few others noticed the award, it has nevertheless allowed me ever since to call myself—and better yet to have others call me—an award-winning travel writer.

But 1996 was a long time ago and that Fielding book had a short shelf life, so for a while there being referred to as an award-winning writer felt like I was trying to get mileage from winning honorary mention in a 9th-grade essay contest.

Imagine then my pride and relief when last year I received a second award for travel writing, making me not only a double award-winning writer but a recent award-winning writer.

I am therefore proud, relieved, and honored to show you my new award for travel writing: the New Jersey Native Garden Award.

My first award referred to my work as “informative and entertaining,” which may seem to have more gravity than the “charming and delightful” of this second award. Nevertheless these new adjectives are a welcome addition to my resume.

This latest award refers to the Arbor Day piece that I posted on this page one year ago. You can read it by clicking here.

In reading it you will discover all the hope and pleasure that went into my planting a sprig of silky dogwood last April. The certificate announcing the award was accompanied by a letter from Ginger Young, president of the West Trenton Garden Club, in which she wrote, “I hope the Silky Dogwood is doing well… Mine is about 4’ high now.”

Well, it turns out my sprig was gone before the award arrived.

I’m pretty sure the guy on the lawnmower seen over my shoulder in the photo below was to blame. He claimed he never saw it, which sounds like evidence to me.

That picture was taken yesterday, Arbor Day 2010. Like last year at this time I was in West Trenton, New Jersey visiting family and it was a beautiful spring day. This year I wanted to honor the day while also doing something to halt erosion of the lake on my brother’s property. So, having planted 10 junipers along water’s edge earlier in the week, I planted 10 more yesterday.

While shoveling holes I may or may not have cut the wire to that lamp post beside me in the picture. I can’t tell because no one seems to know where the switch is anymore.

I don’t expect to receive an award for this year’s Arbor Day piece, however I do expect the junipers, at least some of them, to last longer than the silky dogwood. And what does a juniper need with recognition as long as it has a place to grow.

Links:
Arbor Day
West Trenton Garden Club
The Garden Club of New Jersey
The National Garden Clubs, Inc. Nuture the Earth, Plant Natives, Plant Organically Project

Henri-Francois de Breteuil in front of his home, Chateau de Breteuil. Photo GLK

I’m fascinated, both personally and professionally, by the way individuals, place, culture, and history fit together and/or play off each other. Sometime this winter I’ll get around to writing about my encounter with Henri-Francois de Breteuil and the rewards of visiting his home, which is open to the public and gives a glimpse into the interplay of historical nobility and contemporary culture. But I’m in the U.S. this month, where aristocracy, past and present, scarcely enters my mind.

Until I was in Philadelphia the other day, that is. Walking through the historical city of the Founding Fathers, by Independence Hall and the Liberty Ball, I was shocked to see posters for an exhibition currently at the adjacent National Constitution Center entitled “Diana: A Celebration.”

The National Constitution Center, is, to quote its mission, “an independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to increasing public understanding of the U.S. Constitution and the ideas and values it represents… [and] serves as a museum, an education center, and a forum for debate on constitutional issues.”

How Princess Diana serves that purpose is beyond me, and it’s clearly beyond the presidents, former and current, of the National Constitution Center itself since their explanation for the show is strikingly flimsy.

In October, when the show opened, the NCC’s then-President and CEO Linda E. Johnson, expressed the hope that this exhibit would “have broad appeal, which will allow the Center to expand its audience and, in turn, introduce more visitors to the remarkable stories of ‘We the People’ celebrated here every day.” In short, an acknowledgement that Diana has no relation to the Constitution but promises to bring in visitors willing to offer up a $23 entrance fee and fill their shopping carts of Diana trinkets to muscle up NCC’s coffers.

This fall a new NCC president and CEO, David Eisner, took over, and he was apparently equally clueless as to the link between the disturbed and tragic princess and the U.S. Constitution. “This stirring tribute to Princess Diana,” he claimed earlier this month, “is a way of exploring America’s historical relationship and fascination with aristocracy.”

National Constitution Center. Photo GLK

Bullshit! Whatever sympathy or regard or celebrity-awe one feels for Diana, celebrating her in no way explores America’s historical relationship with aristocracy but simply celebrates celebrity.

Back in France, anyone with an ear open to cult and culture of history hears debates about national treasures such as Versailles trying to balance the interests of historians and preservationists, the need to draw paying visitors, and the desire to keep Versailles “alive.” Last year, a wonderful occasion for such a debate was the decision of curators to display kitsch contemporary works by Jeff Koons, including an enormous, pink, balloon-like dog, against the exuberant prima-kitsch of 17th and 18th –century royal apartment. I didn’t care for the dog, and Versailles is less significant today than the U.S. Constitution, but it was a worthy debate.

Yet Diana at the NCC isn’t even debate material let alone a teaching moment or anything else warranting the show here. In fact, the premise of the show (I did not in fact go but read the press kit) makes a mockery of the public that the NCC is intended to serve, telling us: Let’s face it, you’re too stupid to understand anything about the Constitution so come over here where we can show you some teary and feel-good fluff: Diana’s wedding gown; dresses and gowns designed by Versace, Valentino, etc.; Elton John/Bernie Taupin’s song about yet another dead blonde; Diana’s eulogy from her brother; home movies of her childhood; brunch with Diana’s personal chef on Dec. 20; and did we mention that we have gift shop?

The U.S. Constitution in all that? Nada! But she was such a humanitarian, some will cry—or, as a man who had just spend $140 on Diana paraphernalia for his shrine back home said, “You just don’t like her.”

Perhaps, but more to the point I like the idea of discussing, understanding and appreciating Constitution. I’ve got nothing against a Diana show but why here? Call her a humanist rather than a humanitarian and her story may be worthy of debate regarding the Constitution, say that she wanted a ban on bearing arms rather than on landmines and you can get a good argument going, but celebrating Diana’s celebrity offers the public nothing but ignorance about the Constitution.

America’s historical relationship with aristocracy would be more appropriately explored through a show featuring Queen Elisabeth II, the Emperor of Japan, the Shah of Iran, the King of Thailand, or even the Count of Breteuil. We have nothing to learn from Diana regarding the Constitution except how low the NCC will stoop to draw visitors.

Nevertheless, my personal distaste for the premise of this show is on the wrong side of history. I came to that sad conclusion yesterday when reading the syndicated “Today In History” column in a local newspaper in New Jersey. Among the “highlights in history” for Dec. 9 was noted:
“In 1941: China declared war on Japan, Germany and Italy.”
“In 1990: Poles elected Solidarity labor union founder Lech Walesa president in free elections.”
“In 1992: Prince Charles and Princess Diana of Britain announced they were separating but had no plans for divorce.”
“In 2001: The United States disclosed a video in which Osama bin Laden said he was pleasantly surprised by the extent of damage from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvanis.”

If Diana’s separation from Charles with “no plans for divorce” can earn a place in the above list then maybe that Versace dress does have something to do with the Constitution. If anyone can tell me which article I’d much obliged.

Diana: A Celebration at the National Constitution Center, Oct. 2, 2009-Jan. 3, 2010, 525 Arch Street, Independence Mall, Philadelphia, PA. www.constitutioncenter.org.

The Rance River separates the old port town of Saint Malo with the 19th century seaside resort of Dinard. Dinard remains a luxury-minded town, the kind of place where one is invited, as Henri and I were, to a party whose bilingual invitation reads: “Dress code: smart casual – blue and white of course!” on the English side and “Tenue marine de rigueur: en bleu et blanc naturellement!” on the French side.

My brother Jon would have loved Dinard. He liked anything with the word resort in it: beach resort, ski resort, island resort, tennis resort. Wearing “smart casual” or “resort casual” came natural to him. After he died in a plane accident in 2006 my three other brothers and I inherited his clothes. They either didn’t fit the others or they weren’t interested, so I brought some back to Paris.

I rarely wear any of them but when I received the invitation to the party in Dinard I immediately remembered they were in my closet.

In this photo I am dressed in Jon’s clothes in Dinard, the sweater studiously thrown over my shoulder as it should be in such places. The photo doesn’t show my (brother’s) blue loafers.

The invitation called for blue and white not only because those are the colors of seafarers but because those are also the colors of the Virgin in the grotto along the Promenade du Clair de Lune at Dinard, which is where I am posing. This Virgin echoes the highly celebrated one in Lourdes, which is where one of the hosts of the party is from.

To me, the strangest thing about this photo is that I find that I’m not only wearing Jon’s clothes but also his smile. He would have loved having his picture taken on his way to a party in Dinard.

The couple hosting the party held a brunch beginning at noon the following day, which required another set of smart blue and white clothes. The invitation was actually unclear as to whether blue and white was de rigueur for the entire weekend or just for Saturday evening, so while some guests treated the Sunday brunch as an afterthought others kept up appearances.

I don’t often shop with “smart casual – blue and white of course!” in mind, and to be honest I don’t often shop at all, so for Sunday brunch I looked for my mother for inspiration.

At my age you might think it would be embarrassing to admit that my mother sometimes dresses me, but in my family we’re never too old to be given clothes by our mother. For nearly 55 years—for 9 children, then 28 grandchildren, and now 2 great-grandchildren—she has had an uncanny ability to spot a shirt or hat or a pair of pants from yards away and know exactly who it will fit and who might wear it. And if she gets it wrong she simply gives it to someone else.

Before going to the Sunday brunch, I had Henri take this photo so as show my mother that I finally found the occasion to wear that shirt and that hat she gave me last time I visited. You need to imagine the white short and the sandals—I’m sure my mother can.

Travel, as I like to say, isn’t just about where you’re going, it’s also about where you come from. I now add that it’s also about where your clothes come from.

Gospel’s got a special place in the soul of Europeans, who, generally speaking, hear it not as a call to praise the Lord but as the exotic voice of religion in America, a foreign, typically ethnic form of expression. For the French in particular, “Oh, Happy Day” is shorthand for religious life in America the way that for Americans “La vie en rose” is shorthand for romance in Paris. Two wonderful clichés. 

Yesterday I went to hear “Oh, Happy Day” and a dozen other African-American sacred songs at the American Church in Paris, performed by the Charleston Symphony Orchestra Gospel Choir. A Francophile correspondent in the choir had invited me.

Among the standing-room-only crowd there were a few of amen corners and raised hands, invariably Americans, along with an international mix of divinely beaming faces, but most simply let their appreciation be shown by thunderous applause and exit donations (entrance was free).

This was the third and final concert in Europe for the all-volunteer choir, under the direction of Sandra S. Barnhart, after performances at Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London and Bath Abbey in Bath.

The American Church in Paris is an interdenominational Protestant Christian church that claims to be the first American church established on foreign soil. Its first sanctuary was established in 1857, but its main period of growth came after WWI with the presence of American soldiers in France followed by the American tourist boom of the 1920s. The present church at 67 quai d’Orsay dates from 1929. It is home to two bilingual elementary schools, a variety of “twelve step” recovery groups, basketball leagues, other church and community-based services, and a free concert series.

Last night I attended Swinging Life, a musical revue of soul, jazz, gospel, and blues songs that have been heard on Broadway, playing through July 31 at the Alhambra, a 600-seat theater in the Canal Saint Martin Quarter.

I went to Swinging Life because the PR rep offered me a ticket and because the theater is 300 yards from my apartment, certainly not because I had any expectations of a good show. Paris may have an impressive record of playing adoring host to African-American music and musicians, but it also has an underwhelming reputation when it comes to Broadway. There’s a tendency for small productions, and sometimes large, to try to ride high on great songs without sufficient quality of voices, musicians, acting, or choreography to back them up.

Case in point earlier this year, Hair, which set out from January through March to show how meaningful that tale of peace, love, and freedom can be 40+ years down the road, only to reveal how little the producers and the director knew about musical comedy.

In 2007 I wrote for a Connecticut theater magazine an article about how national and international theater producers were becoming increasingly tempted by the adventure and finances of bringing Broadway to the City of Lights. Two years later Broadway-sur-Seine—or West End on the Right Bank, if you prefer—is definitely on the up-and-up.

Case in point, Swinging Life. Swinging Life is not a Broadway musical per say but rather a four-act assembly of choice soul, jazz, gospel, and blues tunes from various shows (Broadway opening year in parenthesis): Play On (1997), Blues in the Night (1982), The Life (1987), The Color Purple (Broadway, 2005), Smokey Joe’s Café (1995), Dreamgirls (1982). All of the songs are sung here in English with only an occasional line of French dialogue between songs, so the show if fully accessible to non-French-speakers.

What surprised me last night was how proficient and professional the show was, especially considering the ticket price: 30€ for 1, 45€ for 2; 15€ for students.

Only in the past few years has Paris has truly begun to renew with the tradition of the actor-singer-dancer that is so familiar in the United States and England. With a dearth of opportunities until recently, it’s understandable that there hasn’t been a huge pool of well-rounded talent. Things are apparently swinging in the right direction.

Swinging Life may not have Broadway/West End-quality singing-acting-dancing through and through, but its eight performers maintain the rhythm, movement and voice of the show at a consistently good level, with notable performances by Germaine Depry, Anandha Seethanen, Mélina Mariale. Significantly, all but one of the eight had a role (mostly minor) in Paris’s recent production of Le Roi Lion (The Lion King), which to me is a sign that the actor-singer-dancer talent pool in France, while still shallow compared with the U.S. and the U.K., is deepening.

Here’s a video of one of their voice rehearsals that gives a sense of the spirit of the show and the quality of the voices.

The adept orchestra led by Jan Stumke, the arranger, on piano, reinforces the fine professionalism of the show. And I was especially surprised by the quality of the direction and choreography since that’s where I’ve learned to keep my expectations particularly low in Paris for inexpensive musical revues. Though the emphasis in Swinging Life is more on singing than dancing, Jean-Michel Fournereau’s direction is both efficient and energetic, with wise use of the limited stage space and only a few what-the-hell-was-that-all-about distractions.

The one failing of the show is that on several occasions the performers weren’t able to express the emotion of the song, particularly in the first and third of the four acts due in part to the absence of a storyline in which to embed the emotion or the song. Nevertheless, Swinging Time is well worth considering for English-speaking travelers and residents in Paris.

A further attraction is the fact that the Alhambra is in the canal quarter, an ever-so-pleasant area for a summertime evening stroll, with plenty of laid-back, non-pricey cafés-restaurants to choose from within a two-minute radius of the theater. The show ends shortly before 11 p.m., when most places in the area stop serving food, other than salads, so you might come at around 7/7:30 for an early dinner before the show. Afterwards take a romantic walk along the canal, and perhaps stop into a café to prolong the evening, as everyone else will seem to be doing. Altogether a enjoyable evening for a couple or a family, without NY or London prices.

Swinging Life, Tues.-Sat., July 2-31, 2009, at 8:30 p.m. at L’Alhambra, 21 rue Yves Toudic, 10 arrondissement, Metro République or Jacques Bonsergent. The show lasts two hours, plus a 20-minute intermission. Reservations: 01 40 20 40 25. Tickets: 30€ for 1, 45€ for 2; 15€ for students. Since the Alhambra has open seating and is unlikely to fill in summer, I suspect that little to no advance reservation are necessary. Dress lightly, the theater can be warm in summer. For more information see www.myspace.com/swinginglifemusical.

The Alhambra, a 600-seat theater in the Canal Saint Martin Quarter, is largely devoted to concerts by contemporary artists (hip-hop, jazz, rock, pop, etc.). For a schedule of concerts see www.alhambra-paris.com.

The next big things. Two big productions are coming to Paris this fall, accompanied by significant marketing money: Mozart, l’opéra rock, a French production, opening Sept. 22 for at least a 10-week run at the Palais des Sports, and Zorro, whose London run ended in April, opening later in the fall at the Folies Bergère.

U.S. President Obama, French President Sarkozy, British Prime Minister Brown, and Canadian Prime Minister Harper visited the Landing Zone in Normandy on Saturday but I beat them to the punch, spending a few days there earlier in the week before the crowds arrived. The photo log below shows many (but not all) of the main D-Day sights and cemeteries that one can see over about three days if setting out from Paris.

In an article to appear next week on France Revisited I’ll be outlining a series of possible itineraries, but for now I invite you to join me on a portion of my own itinerary last week.

I lucked upon a string of sunny days, hence the blue skies in the photos, which is a rarity in Normandy, as anyone who has read about the events of June 1944 knows. Though my own trip also included a visit to Deauville and Honfleur before visiting the Landing Zone and Le Mont Saint Michel, Saint Malo, Le Mans, and Chartres afterwards, this photo log focuses on sights along and inland of the Landing Zone of June 6, 1944.

However, I can’t help but begin with images of Monet’s Garden and House at Giverny since it’s only a slight detour on the way to Normandy. In a sense, the day was too blue when I took the picture below left of Monet’s water lily pond since there was nothing in the sky to be reflected in the water as there often was in Monet’s work. The garden, below right, was in full bloom.

The road to Normandy from Paris more or less follows the Seine downstream towards the English Channel. After Giverny I backtracked upstream along the river to visit La Roche Guyon. I planned it that way because if visiting both it’s advisable to arrive early at Giverny. Furthermore, La Roche Guyon makes for a better lunch stop between the two.

La Roche Guyon naturally rings far fewer bells than Giverny, but it’s an interesting stop for a WWII tour because the chateau in the photo below left is where German Field Marshall Rommel set up his headquarters when he was appointed by Hitler to oversee and reinforce defenses along the Atlantic Wall. Many of the Landing sights that you’ll see in Normandy were personally inspected by Rommel from January to May 1944. The chateau of La Roche Guyon has a 1000-year history that I won’t go into here. The main marks from Rommel’s period are the casements where ammunition was kept, which now present an exhibit about that period. Otherwise, the chateau is a wonderful mishmash of periods with a beautiful view over the Seine. I typically think of Giverny as a pain for a daytrip on its own from Paris, but I do like the idea of a day combining Giverny with La Roche Guyon, though it’s necessary to have a car to do so or good biking legs from Vernon. La Roche Guyon is a pretty Seine-side town. The photo below right is a view upstream from the town.

Approaching the D-Day sights from the east, i.e. with the British and Canadian Landing Beaches, the first stop is Pegasus Bridge, which was rapidly taken by British airborne troops arriving in three gliders on the night of June 5-6, 1944. The bridge was taken in order to cut off German troops—and especially tanks—that might arrive from further east once the landing started and to prevent them from crossing the Orne River. The bridge that now goes over the Orne (below left) is a higher tech replica of the original bridge, which has been moved onto the grounds of the Pegasus Memorial Museum a few hundred yards away, which tells about the British airborne landing.

The Merville Battery was also captured by British airborne troops arriving by parachute and glider on the night of June 5-6, 1944. This was a major German battery between the coast and the right bank of the Orne whose guns were capable of firing on Sword Beach, the easternmost of the Landing Beaches. I won’t tell here the heroic and bloody story of how it was taken, but I will say that after reading about it and visiting the site several times before I was fortunate to hear first-hand last week when I met Alexander Taylor, who landed on a glider that night.

The Landing Zone is worth a visit at any time of year, but those who visit in the days surrounding June 6 may well encounter visiting some of the men who took part in the landing. During the 20 or times that I’ve visited the Landing Zone, beginning in 1992, I’ve had the opportunity to speak with visiting veterans on various occasions, but this is the first time I actually stood at the very spot where a man landed on D-Day and had him describe the event to me as he lived them. When I asked him his name also told me his dog tag number, 22543202. Here is Alexander Taylor, 22543202 standing tall at the Merville Battery, which he helped capture and render unusable at the age of 20.

I am sorry to say that I gave the Canadians short shift on this visit. Though I did stop at Juno Beach (where pit bulls and rottweilers are not allowed, I note in case you were planning on traveling with one), I didn’t visit the June Beach Center, Canada’s Second World War museum, which is by the beach at Courseulles-sur-Mer. Nor did I visit the Canadian Cemetery, which is a few miles inland at Riviers. Apologies to my Canadian readers. If anyone has a photo of the Canadian Cemetery I would like to post it here.

Arromanches is the town at the center of Gold Beach. It was here that the British built the artificial harbor known as a Mulberry. Some remnants of the harbor still remain just offshore. (The photo below, with clouds, was one that I took last year on June 6.) The D-Day Museum at Arromanches shows how the harbor was built and how it operated, along with other displays about the landing and the various nationalities that took part.

The only German battery along this coast with its canons still visible are those at Longues-sur-Mer. The photo below is one of four 155mm gun emplacements at Longues that were a danger to the landing of British troops at Gold Beach as they could fire up to 12 miles. Visiting the complex you’ll also see the position of its command center by the cliff and other concrete elements of the Atlantic Wall. Three of the four canons were put out of commission by naval fire within the first hour of the landing, but one was occasionally operational until about 5 p.m. The garrison here of 184 Germans surrendered to the British the following day.

Americans tend to visit only the American Cemetery but I think it’s important to visit those of other nationalities so as to have a sense not only of their loss and sacrifice but of their approach to their war dead. Here’s a section of the British Cemetery at Bayeux.

The American connection with Normandy begins with D-Day, but the British connection goes back much further, beginning with William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy, who took the crown of England after the Battle of Hastings in 1066. William is buried at the Abbaye aux Hommes (Men’s Abbey) at Caen.

The tapestry was made in about 1080 to be hung during Christmastime in the Cathedral of Bayeux. Inside the cathedral a plaque honors British troops who fought in the WWI.

In visiting the American sector, i.e. Utah and Omaha Beaches and related sights, I generally recommend starting out to Utah Beach, the westernmost beach, then visiting your way back towards Omaha rather than the other way around. On the way to Utah you might first stop, as I did, at the German Cemetery by the village of La Cambe. This cemetery contains the largest number of dead of all of the cemeteries in the region, over 21,000, including 207 unknown soldiers buried beneath the mound that dominates the cemetery.

I neglected to take any pictures at Utah Beach but here are pictures of the nearby village of Sainte-Mère-du-Mont, right, where men and women were playing soldier and parading around with their wartime jeeps. You’ll come across these collectors (I suppose that’s the word for them) at any time of year but especially around the anniversary of D-Day. Hundreds were gathering for the 65th anniversary this weekend. Few of them are American or British. I mostly heard French and Dutch last week.

I was in a little bar in Port-en-Bessin one evening when a jeep sporting a U.S. flag parked right out front. Out popped a big man with a long gray beard and a short plump women, both dressed in U.S. army uniforms, looking like Mr. and Mrs. Claus on a Bob Hope special. They entered the bar and the man demanded beer. That’s all he said, “Beer,” and he held one hand about 18 inches above the other to show that he wanted it big. The bartender asked where he was from. He said, “Czechoslovakia,” and he meant it.

The photo bottom right is of Sainte-Mère-Eglise, the town taken by American airborne troops on the night of June 5-6 and securing the bridges and roads of the western edge of the Landing area. The parachute hanging from the steeple is a wink to paratrooper John Steele who got stuck there. The Airborne Museum at Sainte-Mère-Eglise is quite good and has an excellent introductory film to both the overall landing operation and the specific events in and around Sainte-Mère-Eglise. 

The guns at Pointe du Hoc were a danger for the landing at the two American beaches, Utah and Omaha, and even though the Rangers who climbed the cliff discovered to their surprise that the guns had been moved inland and weren’t operational, the site is nevertheless one of the most dramatic of those in the Landing Zone. In addition to the drama of the events of June 6-8, 1944 that took place here as the Rangers took and held the battery, the site also reveals the construction and workings of the German battery complex and the extent to which it was bombed. The bomb craters here, unlike most craters elsewhere along the coast, have not been filled in. The top photo below shows the Pointe du Hoc and the cliff that the Rangers scaled. The bottom photo shows some of the bombed out landscape.

The American Cemetery is about 15 minutes east along the coast from Pointe du Hoc. The cemetery overlooks Omaha Beach, the bloodiest of the five Landing Beaches. I’ll be writing about Omaha Beach, the cemetery, and all else that’s mentioned above in a separate article. For now I just point out the three images below: a view of the cemetery (top left), the memorial to American youth rising from the waves (right), and Omaha Beach (bottom left).

As noted above regarding Alexander Taylor, 22543202, encountering men and women somehow related to the events of the war—whether veterans, their children, Normans who lived through it or their children—is enormously enriching in exploring this zone. Below is a photo of Bernard Lebrec, whose apple farm produces the three main alcoholic beverages produced in the department of Calvados: cidre, pommeau, brandy. His farm, originally purchased prior to the war by his grandfather, is located in Englesqueville la Percèe, a village between Pointe du Hoc and the American Cemetery. You might stop in for a tasting, and if you do so be sure to inquire into the wartime history of the farm. As with many of the large farmhouses along the coast, that of Mr. Lebrec’s grandfather’s was requisitioned by the Germans during the war. Then, after the landing, it was occupied by the Americans. The American 147th Engineer Combat Battalion made it their headquarters and built an airstrip in the family’s apple orchard in the early days of the Invasion of Normandy. I photographed Mr. Lebrec below standing in front of the monument erected on his property in honor of the 147th.

So ends my photo log from the Landing Zone. More detailed articles will follow on France Revisited’s France/Northwest section this month.

I went to Philadelphia last week to attend, along with about 55 other guests, the friendly Francophile ceremony by which Joanne Silver received the decoration of Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Palmes académiques, the most prestigious honor a scholar or academician can receive from the French Government. Adding further weight to the decoration is the fact that the French ambassador to the United States, Pierre Vimont, in person came to Philadelphia to pin the palms on Joanne.

The Palmes académiques, established in 1808 by Napoléon Bonaparte, recognizes those who have advanced the cause of French culture, education, and the arts and made active contribution to the expansion of French culture throughout the world.

Joanne fit the bill for her years of teaching French, her involvement with the American Association of Teachers of French (AATF) and other Franco-American organizations, and her work as publisher of Francophile books, in French and in English, at Beach Lloyd Publishers, whose mission is “to recognize the strong historical and ideological ties that bind France and the United States, and to view those ideals globally.”

Before the ceremony began, former Honorary Consul of France to Philadelphia Daniele Thomas Easton introduced me and France Revisited to Ambassador Vimont. I didn’t dare ask the ambassador to sign up for the France Revisited Newsletter seeing as half my friends have yet to do so, but the three of us had a nice chat about this site nonetheless.

Below is a photo, left to right, of me, the ambassador and the former honorary consul. Michael E. Scullin, current Honorary Consul of France to Philadelphia, was caught in the photo to the right. (Click on all photos to enlarge).

Below is a photo of Ambassador Vimont pinning the palms on Joanne’s lapel, after which he gave her the traditional kiss on each check that seals the deal.

Joanne then posed for the official photograph with Ambassador Vilmont, left, and Honorary Consul Michael E. Scullin, right.

Below Joanne proudly displays her palms, freshly pinned.

Also in attendance among the Francophile luminaries of Philadelphia and illustrious guests from the U.S. Canada, and France were some of the members of the Board of the Alliance Francaise de Philadelphie. Among them, left to right in the photo below, were Alliance Board Members Delphine Lawrence (Secretary), Martine Chauvet (Executive Director), Joanne Silver, Lynn H. Miller (who has contributed an article about Frenchtown, N.J. to France Revisited), and Diana Regan (President).

Bravo et félicitations, Joanne!

I don’t get much of a chance to dig into the soil in Paris. In fact, there are few places in the City of Light where one can even walk on the grass. Not that I was much of a gardener before moving to Paris, but I do recognize the pleasure, at least in theory, of crouching in the soil, digging, weeding, and watching things flower, grow, take form. My planting thumb, though rarely exercised, turns out to be inadvertently green to judge from the plants on the small balcony of my apartment in Paris; they survive no matter how long I’ve been gone, even though the balcony above mine prevents them from receiving much rainfall.

I’ve been in the U.S. for three weeks now taking an East-Coast road-trip, doing some consulting, having meetings, and seeing friends and family. When I get back to Paris next week I’m sure to find my plants looking dry and forlorn but alive and willing to be nursed back to health through the spring. The secret to raising plants, I’ve found, is to not get too attached to them.

So I’m trying not to get too emotionally involved with the silky dogwood that I planted in my brother’s yard in New Jersey on Arbor Day, April 24, but I confess that I’ve been checking on it several times a day and will probably inquire about it often when I return to Paris. I hope that one day it will take its place among the other hearty blooming trees in the yard such as the pear tree below.

That’s my mother in the photo above. Proud as she was to pose with it on Arbor Day, she’s actually quite the fatalist when it comes to new plantings. No sooner had she taken the picture of me (below) with the newly planted dogwood then she told me that between the deer and the lawnmower I shouldn’t get too attached.

What I especially like about this sprig of a dogwood (it’s the foot-high twig the shovel in case you don’t see it) is that I planted it on Arbor Day. You see, one of the great pleasures of travel is to hit upon a local holiday, even—or perhaps especially—when you’ve simply traveled back to your old backyard. And so it was with me and Arbor Day in West Trenton, New Jersey.

Truth be told, I wasn’t aware that it was Arbor Day until I went to the Ewing Public Library and was happy-arbor-dayed at the entrance by two kindly women from the West Trenton Garden Club who were handing out the sprigs of silky dogwood (cornus amomum). They seemed to be the only people in the area who knew it was Arbor Day. For the rest of the day I went around trying to spread the word, but few people believed me. Most assumed that I meant Earth Day, which was two days before, while one person suggested that I was confusing Earth Day with some French holiday. Another insisted that Earth Day had actually replaced Arbor Day since he couldn’t recall anyone mentioning Arbor Day after he left elementary school.

Arbor Day is actually a great unsung and original American holiday. It is a rarity in that it promotes neither politics, nor religion, nor nationalism, nor veterans, nor an ethnic group, nor much in the way of commerce, the combination of which explains why it passes so unnoticed. No one outside of garden clubs makes an effort to claim it—or recuperate it, as the French would say—as their own because there would be little immediate advantage in doing so.

Arbor Day is also a rarity on the American calendar in that it originated on neither the East Coast nor the West Coast but smack in the middle, in Nebraska, where civic-minded tree-lover J. Sterling Morton organized the first Arbor Day in April 1872. Within a decade it had spread to other states, with school districts often being the local purveyors of the greening of America. National Arbor Day is now celebrated the last Friday in April, though some states prefer the last Monday, others, particularly in the southeast, celebrate it earlier in the year in keeping with the arrival of prime tree-planting season to the region, and a few northern border states opt for May.

Arbor Day is indeed now overwhelmed by Earth Day. Despite the latter’s laudable goal of placing concern and care for the environment on our national agenda, there was something suspicious about Earth Day from the start since it was intended to teach and demonstrate rather than truly celebrate and honor.

I was in 6th grade when the first Earth Day was declared in 1970. As the school bus was approaching the school that April 22 morning there was a tremendous traffic jam since some progressive-minded older students had apparently decided that we should all get out of the bus and walk the remaining half-mile to school. What I remember of the first Earth Day is therefore cars and buses idling for an hour or two and a long walk past a hundred exhaust pipes. What I remember of last week’s Earth Day is radio and television commercials appealing for Earth-loving consumers to drive out to the mall to buy stuff that will biodegrade sometime before North Korean uranium rods.

Earth Day is a fine idea both nationally and internationally, and some day a traveler from Mars will get the kind of thrill of traveling to our planet for Earth Day that travelers now get by going to Holland for the Queen’s Birthday (April 30). For the time being, though, Earth Day isn’t pagan enough to have much cultural interest and it’s too vague to offer anything but an occasion for national and international corporations trying to outgreen each other. Arbor Day, on the other hand, means the planting of and caring for trees, and so has little place in the economy but lots of place in the backyard or the local park.

Faithful readers may want to check back in 5 or 10 years to see how my silky dogwood is doing, that is if it manages to escape the dual threat of the deer and the lawnmower.

In the meantime, put Arbor Day 2010 on your calendar and don’t believe the Earth Day commercials.

For more about Arbor Day and state by state dates see www.arborday.org.

Well, I’ve finally gotten word from one of my culinary spies in Philadelphia that Olivier Desaintmartin, owner of Caribou Cafe and Zinc, has finally corrected the spelling of the sign to the rest room at Zinc. It now reads Toilettes, as one would expect in a French restaurant owned by a Frenchman.

Actually, the spy in question is Olivier himself. Just goes to show the importance of investigative journalism in the fight for freedom, justice, and correct spelling. If France Revisited can get a man 3000 miles away to add an “s” to his toilette, just imagine the possibilities! (Admittedly, Olivier might have done it anyway, but he can go get his own blog.)

Now that this disturbing toilettes issue is out of the way I look forward, as a citizen, to revisiting Zinc on my next trip to Philadelphia in the spring. And as a member of the media I look foward to moving onto other important issues that affect us all.