Downtown Toulouse looked just the way I thought a French city should look: a rabbit warren of narrow streets winding between centuries-old buildings, broad tree-lined boulevards, plazas surrounded by shops and cafes, graceful bridges arching over the Garonne. The only thing missing was an accordion playing in the background.
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| Grand Hotel du Capitole |
Our hotel was right off the Place du Capitole, which is the Toulouse city hall and mayor’s office. It’s an immense Baroque palace fronting a plaza the size of an entire city block. Our hotel was on one corner of the plaza, through an undistinguished archway set in a wall with an unlit sign above it – had we tried to find it on our own, we’d have surely missed it in the night. Once we passed through the archway, we were in a lovely courtyard and garden where the “real” entrance to the hotel was located. The lobby was two stories high, with columns and chandeliers. Densely flowered fabric covered the walls from the intricate wainscoting to the ceiling. Feet sank in deep, rich carpeting. A staircase – the wood on the treads easily 300 years old – wound up from one corner of the lobby to the floors above. And – oddly enough – a two-storey mirrored elevator rose up next to the staircase – sounds bizarre, but it worked.
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| Hotel Lobby |
When I entered my room, I was struck by the vivid use of color. Thick, red carpeting, red mahogany wainscoting and woodwork, red velvet walls, red velvet drapes, red velvet chairs, red & white bed spread over the king-size bed, cream colored ceiling and crown molding – I told our admin, who had booked the rooms for us, that the style was Early French Brothel! The bathroom walls and floor were completely done in light gray marble. All this for little ol’ me!
When I wasn’t working, I spent as much time as possible strolling around the streets and alleys of old Toulouse, peeking in shops, sampling the wares of cafes patisseries. Everybody was very, very friendly and helpful. All that stuff you hear about the French being snobby and rude was just so much hogwash. Nobody was even the slightest bit rude to me the entire time I was there. I speak only a very, very little French, but nobody snubbed me. Those who could speak English, did so gladly; those who couldn’t speak English were still willing to try to communicate with you. You would have laughed to see the linguistic gyrations a charming young lady with Green Peace went through trying to explain to me that if I bought two of the postcards her group was selling, the money would go to help “dee lee-tel sheel-dren.”
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| My room decorated in Early French Brothel style. |
The food was out of this world. I ate my way around Toulouse. And they don’t believe in rushing meals either. They believe that eating is a leisure activity. Not much fast food there; every meal took at least two hours, even at the Airbus facility. They have a cafeteria-style restaurant at Airbus Central Entity (corporate headquarters) that rivals some of the finest restaurants anywhere in America. When you first enter, you’re confronted with a display of the day’s entrées. There are usually six of them ranging from vegetarian, to poisson (fish), to viande (meat), to magret (duck), to something ethnic (Italian, Cajun, Japanese, etc). You pick up your tray and enter an area of salads and deserts – two displays of salads flank you on either side, each salad plate artistically designed and displayed; a large display of several dozen deserts occupies the center of the aisle. After getting your salad and desert, you move into the entrée area, where you choose one of the main dishes. Next, you select your beverage: water, juice, soda, beer or wine – the latter two always on tap. Lunch at Airbus takes about 1½ hours, with lots of conversation. After lunch, you still don’t go back to work though. Instead, you head across the hall to the caféteria, where you spend about 30 minutes talking over coffee. Only when the coffee is finished do you go back to work.
The streets of old Toulouse – as I say – are very narrow and paved with cobblestones. There are narrow sidewalks running along either side, with ornamental steel barriers to keep the cars off of them. And the cars and scooters race up and down these narrow, winding streets like they were on a freeway. I determined that the prime rule of driving in France is that you go as fast as you can possibly go right this second. It doesn’t matter one bit that you might have to stop 100 feet ahead; right now, you can go 70 kph, so you do. Even if all you’re doing is inching forward half-a-car-length, you do it as fast as you can. And, of course “lanes” are just a suggestion! When driving in France, you follow the shortest path between two points. Of course, the cars are all very tiny, the smallest being the Smart car, which is only as long as most American cars are wide. Most of these cars will never appear on American streets, though, and more’s the pity. They get outstanding gas mileage.
But the best thing about France – hands down – are French women. Wow! I have never seen so many drop-dead gorgeous women assembled in one place in my entire life. You couldn’t swing a dead cat without hitting a beautiful woman. Dark hair, olive skin, big dark eyes, prominent Mediterranean cheek bones and noses – it was like being at a fashion model parade. And they have so much style! French women dress with flair, with pizzazz! It isn’t so much what they wear as how they put it all together; although, to be honest, they do have some clothing items that you don’t often see here. They’re big on scarves, for instance, wearing them all the time. And they also go in for very fancy, brightly colored eye-glasses – no plain steel or black plastic for them. And if they do wear black plastic, the design is unique. All in all, everything you’ve ever heard about French women being beautiful is true.
Well, that’s France for now. More when time allows.
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