The best address for a vacation in Paris

Shopping (and other pleasures) in the Marais

    Did you say you like to shop? Come to the Marais; you won't need to go any further.

    It's hard to know where to start shopping in the Marais. You might, for example, simply amble (flâner) east along the long street called the rue Rambuteau which begins at the Pompidou Center. Rambuteau changes its name three or four times before it ends near the Place de la Bastille, but the pleasure is constant. You will walk through the Place des Vosges; on your way you will pass a collection of art galleries, charming cafes (including our current favorite, Le Bouledogue), irresistible shops and spectacular hôtels particuliers. Be sure to peek into the courtyard of Crédit Municipal de Paris, the National Pawnshop, a place that regularly holds public auctions of pawned items, including paintings, jewelry and furniture.

    On your way you might decide to pick up a pair of shoes at Meknes, a shop whose sign boasts shoes for "Flamenco, Drag Queens, Tango, Ballroom and Jazz", or stop for a snack at the Salumeria, an Italian shop across the street from Meknes that is almost as good as the Traiteur Italien in the Enfants Rouges market. Pause to window shop at Les Milles Feuilles, a shop that features an outstanding collection of striped fabrics. Check out the old movie posters, photographs and other unusual art works on paper at the Galerie Yves et Maria. Pop into Why and pick up some pasta in the shape of the body part which the French called le "zizi"; or some edible undies, or a flying plastic cow to go whirring around the ceiling in the kids' room.

    Not sated? Amble down the rue de Turenne and learn some magic tricks at Le Magasin de la Magie. Join the trendy Parisians who shop on the one-block-long rue Bourg-Tilbourg, cruising for hip men's fashions (or for hip men themselves). Trendy teenagers like to amble along Bourg-Tibourg; so do trendy housewives, who might be looking for the amusing house wares from the thirties, forties or fifties sold in this fashionable little boutique.

    Or you might amble pleasantly along the rue des Achives or Veille du Temple and select one of the fifty or so cafes, gay or straight or mixed, that attract a sophisticated clientele from all over the globe.

    Walk along the rue de la Verrerie, a street truffled with dozens of irresistible shops. Or walk along the rue du Temple to check out the jewelry, handbags, scarves, watches and miscellaneous tiny shops featuring womens dresses or blouses or belts.

    The Marais is one of the world's great urban neighborhoods. It is the center of Jewish life in Paris (the rue des Rosiers still has many kosher shops and restaurants); in the last few years the Marais has also become an increasingly important center of Chinese life in Paris (you can always find an open Chinese grocery on the rue de la Mairie, just a block or two from the rue Dupuis). Did I say Chinese? In the heart of our local mini-Chinatown we discovered this tiny café where we heard a terrific program of Bolivian music. And the next day we had lunch a block away at this highly-new age vegetarian restaurant before taking in a flick at La Latina, the best latin movie theater-cum-nightclub in Paris (all movies are in the original language, with French subtitles where necessary).

    Finally, the Marais boasts the best department store/hardware store/home furnishings store in Paris (BHV, near the Hôtel de Ville) and of course an unparalleled cornucopia of wonderful restaurants and cafés, a special list of which we will leave for you in your apartment. (We'll give you the address of both the super-chic health food store where you can watch the models nibble at tiny stalks of celery, and the bookstore specializing in cookbooks. Both are around the corner from the rue Dupuis.)

    All of these diverse elements live comfortably together in our neighborhood. All of them make the Marais a place in which you can spend a day or a week or a lifetime, and never grow bored.

Nearby

   The Marais is our favorite neighborhood in Paris. Tourists as well as locals appreciate our museums, galleries and unparalleled shopping. But tourists sometimes forget that Paris has more to offer than elegant museums and trendy boutiques: it is a great European city that accommodates dozens of radically different cultures and life-styles, many of them distinctly non trendy, all living happily together cheek-by-jowl.

   You might, for example, plan to see the Sacré Coeur, for example. The Sacré Coeur, a talismanic site for visitors to Paris. Tourists easily find their way to the Sacre Coeur; but not many of those people know that right at the foot of the Sacré Coeur is the neighborhood known as Barbès, the place where Parisians of every social class (and hordes of foreigners go to buy fabric and the accompanying needles, cushions, and fittings for whipping up anything that the imagination of a couturier or decorator might concoct.

   Here, for example, in "A Little Corner of Egypt", you can buy the materials to make your belly-dancing outfit; here, in "Ali-Baba's Cave", you can buy gauzy voilages with bangles and sparkles; and here, in "Tissus Ronsard" we found the material that we used to make the curtains and cover the sofas for our apartment on the rue Dupuis. That's Salah on the left; Salah sold us the material and made the cushions, and then he came to the apartment to make sure everything was correctly installed.

   From the Place de la République right behind the apartment, you go four subway stops (about 10 minutes) to Barbès; when you emerge from the subway, you're in a different world.

   Paris, truly, is a never-ending cornucopia of delights.