Entre Les Murs

Volleyball de Plage

B and I went downtown this afternoon to roam around BHV's hardware section. Janet has been re-reading Adam Gopnik's Paris to the Moon, and she recently read me this, very resonant to us, passage about BHV:

BHV - the Bazar de l'Hotel de Ville, the City Hall Bazaar - is always called by its initials (bay-aish-vay), and it is an old store, one of the great nineteenth-century department stores on the Right Bank that are the children of the Galeries Lafayette. As I say, it is on the rue de Rivoli; in fact that famous Robert Doisneau photograph of the two lovers kissing is set on the rue de Rivoli just outside BHV. This is doubly ironic: first, because the narrow strip of the rue de Rivoli in front of BHV is about the last place in the world that you would want to share a passionate kiss - it would be a bit like kissing at the entrance to the BMT near Macy's - and of course, it explains why they did it anyway. They are not sundered lovers but a young couple who have managed to buy an electric oven and emerged alive. Anyone who has spent time at BHV knows they are kissing not from an onset of passion but from gratitude at having gotten out again.

We also discovered that the square in front of the Hotel de Ville, as in the winter it had been turned into a skating rink, is now several beach volleyball courts.


A row of cooling misters had been set up by the fountains at the North end, under which a small, grateful crowd congregated.

The heat has been oppressive, but a wild thunder storm swept through this evening, so relief is in sight.

posted 26.7.06