A morning in Paris

Sometimes, I think that I've forgotten how to be a tourist in a leisurely way, as I've become quite adept at exploring some of the world's great cities in short blocks of time. Paris is a city I've visited quite a number of times, but never for more than two days at a time. I usually end up trekking around a new neighborhood each time I end up with a long layover at CDG. 

Today was no different, as I made my way by train from the airport to the Gare du Nord and then hiked a bit to the east to the neighborhood of Montmartre. I've certainly seen the neighborhood before. It is hard to miss, sitting on top of the highest hill in Paris, with the soaring Sacré Coeur Basilica sitting at its summit. 

The weather was more reminiscent of late March than late May -- cold, rainy, and in the 50s Fahrenheit. 

Paris is one of those cities that can, at times, seem a bit more trouble than it is worth. The swarming herds of tourists from every corner of the globe certainly take a bit of the edge off the charm. Yet I never fail to find a quiet, lovely backstreet with beautiful views that makes it all seem worthwhile. 

The Sacré Coeur Basilica is a beautiful space, filled with art that uses ancient techniques and subject matter (mosaic, religious iconography) but with a distinctly modern styling. I found myself strongly reminded of two churches of the same era in Russia and Ukraine - The Savior-on-the-Blood in St. Petersburg and St. Volodymyr's Cathedral in Kyiv. Both were decorated using the same kind of mosaics-with-a-modern twist by the Russian artists Vasnetsov, Nesterov, and Vriubel. I can also see shadows of art and architecture in Vienna from the same time period. There seems to be a commonality of melding together ancient and familiar religious forms with artistic expressions drawn more from popular folk culture. 

A small-scale mosaic in the aisle, looking up into the central altar dome of Sacré Coeur

All of these grand civil/religious structures, together with so much of the grandiosity of cities like Paris, Vienna, and St. Petersburg reflect the fascinating and short-lived period when social, historical, economic, and geo-political realities allowed the great powers of Europe to build such monuments. It was a time of deep fascination with the intersection of nationality, tradition, and modernity. It now seems a world quite far away. 

Paris today is far removed from the city that spread below Montmartre in the early 20th century. Many neighborhoods around the area are now filled with African cloth and haircare shops, halal meat markets, and North African restaurants. I saw signs in Arabic, Turkish, Tamil, and Chinese. It's bewildering. In many ways, the attempts of synthesis of the ancient and the modern that is visible in the Sacré Coeur is still happening in its shadows today.