Entre Les Murs

Bricolage

The apartment was stripped to the walls when we arrived, as I gather is customary here. Having decorated our new house a year ago, picking light fixtures, towel rods, and so on, we are repeating the process in Paris. We have kitchen cupboards, sinks, toilets and counter tops, but everything else we have to select and install ourselves. Fortunately there seems to be at least as much selection, and we've found a departement store in the 4me, BHV, that fills most of our needs in one place - a big improvement on the trek to the boutiques at Dufferin and Lawrence, even without a car.

We obtained a couple of quotes to have the apartment painted, since its previous tenants lived there for many years and left the walls dingy and in need of some repair. Since the best quote we got was for upwards of €5000 (cash, and cutting a few corners), about $8000, we opted instead to look upon it as my employment for October. It's going to be a huge job, since the ceilings are high and there is a great deal of detail: built in cupboards, paneled walls, crown mouldings, radiators (I hate radiators), ornate window frames and the like. For some reason, the baseboards are very plain.

Gratifyingly, we are conducting all of our transactions, including having paint mixed, without reverting to English, or charades. Even when the woman at the grocery checkout tried to close her cash in front of me (and the half a dozen customers in line behind me), I was able to kick up a fuss entirely in French. (I don't know that I made sense, but the cry was taken up by others and the cash didn't close.)

posted 3.10.05