THE CHRISTMAS SPIRIT

A mélange of Christmas activities in Paris and in Scotland, where I have been for the last few days with my family. I bought my first ever tree for my own flat in Paris this year, and that sensational smell really kickstarted the Christmas spirit, along with the permanent lingering scent of mulled wine from the litres and litres that were consumed at my Christmas party in mid-December. Back in Scotland at last on Christmas Eve, having navigated the grèves at Charles de Gaulle and witnessed a punch-up at the check-in, I drove into the city and experienced that familiar thrill of the gothic city of Edinburgh in the thralls of the Christmas spirit. My Christmas present this year? My nearest and dearest are doubtless bored stiff with my devoted praise for - yes, a new camera. I am now the proud owner of a Canon 5D Mark II, and the most beautiful part, a 85mm f/1.2 portrait lens. Here are some of my first snaps.

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS

With this Helmut Newton polaroid (below) in mind, I took Zora along for a night-time walk between the city's shadow-ridden structures. Paris really is the city of light - everything is illuminated. Walking from la Place de la Concorde, up the lower Champs-Elysées past the Grand and Petit Palais to the Pont Alexandre forces you to confront, with multiple stomach-flips, the gargantuan and almost frightening beauty of French Victorian (rather Belle Epoque) power. The last giants. They loom over us, eternal in their solidness. From the golden gate, rising like heaven's own door from the steps of the Petit Palais, to the winged beasts standing sentry over passing cars on the Pont, we scurry like tiny ants beneath their vast shadows. We are like the inheritants of Egypt - surrounded by relics of a vanished empire.

Helmut's girl climbed up onto the bridge in high heels. An uncharacteristic meekness suddenly came over me, so I perched instead.

A SUNDAY COCKTAIL 20.11.11

Photography by Ari Marcopoulos & Jeremy Kost, as seen at the Unfound Photo Fair 

I once spent a year in Paris, I think it was on a Sunday.

So said W.C. Fields, except it was Philadelphia, rather than Paris, but I share his sentiment.  As a notoriously irritating morning person, I have dedicated my Sundays in Paris to engaging with the world, whatever that might be. Here, for this week's Sunday Cocktail, are some of my recommendations for a Sunday in Paris, or a Sunday spent anywhere.

Photography by Audrey Rodgers, Kate Woods, Zora Beer & Hugh Ferguson

...Explore one of Paris' many temporary and permanent exhibitions. Seen above, the Unfound Photo Fair 

The Upstairs Library at Shakespeare & Company has a vast selection of diverse reading material to be explored in the reading room. The library seen here during the launch of literary arts journal A Tale of Three Cities, which can be bought from the bookstore.

... Watch the winter sun disappear behind one of the city's glorious architectural wonders. Above, the Petit Palais as seen from the courtyard café.

Photographed in Café de commerce, 75018 and Les Parigots, 75010

Chance upon a Kate Moss print. Photography series : The New Gypsies by Iain McKell

Photographed at Le Petit Palais / Sarah Bernhardt by Clairin

...Admire the beauty erected to honour the dead of the past century. Pick your hero, bring a picnic. Photo from Père Lachaise, Paris 75020.

N O R T H E R N L I G H T

Last weekend I returned home to Scotland for graduation. My Mum's graduation! After several years of a fair bit of strife, by Mum can now be called a Master of Science Master of the Universe - no small deal. The ceremony at Edinburgh's Usher Hall was followed by a reception at the top of one of the city's seven hills, at Craighouse, where a spectacular old academic hall was the backdrop for the reception. I was completely mesmerised by the interior, in fact I was rather mesmerised by everything: the nostalgia of returning home to arguably one of the most beautiful cities in the world, the perfect 'Northern Light' - that hung purple-blue and ethereal over us and the fast-russetting leaves. And the city itself- it too hanging, as if suspended between its seven hills, with gothic spires of varying reaches marking out memoried haunts of mine across town.

Now that my Mum is officially a Master of Science Master of the Universe, I feel it's high time she was given a platform on this old blog. Not just because she is responsible for a few of the photos,  and the correction of (*cough* very few) spelling and grammatical errors, when I occasionally get an email including the phrase 'by the way, its hebdomadaire with an a' or 'THEY're, remember? If you want to be a journalist...' Then there are logistical favours, seeing as I gave up learning to drive at 18 after I failed my test the first time, and yes, as it turns out, you can't go everywhere on the bus, especially not with 3 suitcases of furs and hats, a sewing machine and a papier maché elephant sculpture. And she won't want to forget the 70kg hardwood hippo sculptures that had to carried out of my Uni halls either. Then there's the huge acts of self-sacrifice, the smallest perhaps being the sacrifice of said Master of the Universe degree work to devote a ridiculous amount of time to organising my outrageously ostentatious, D-I-Y bollywood themed 21st birthday party this summer. There was a fair bit of time spent driving (thank you!), but also quite a bit spent covered in scratches, nettles, and later mud, as you single handedly complied with my plans to remodel the whole garden in the name of a party. And then there are the things that no amount of expensive education, work experience placements in different industries, or documentaries can teach me. Only my Mum can diagnose my illness from a different country, or tell me where to find the gas meter, or always have change for the bus when I never do, or remind me to wear my retainer when she's seen a facebook photo where my teeth are getting a bit squiffy, or teach me a few simple recipes which will always impress boys, and will actually get out of bed and come running to the kitchen in the middle of the night when I scream "Oh god! My pavlova mix! It's all sloppy, quick! HELP ME, HELP ME!'

So to my Mum, who I know will be reading this (and checking for grammatical errors), congratulations on your degree, lord knows I'm proud. You really are Master of the Universe. And to everyone else, think about how amazing your Mum is, and then tell her. And then you can join Audrey and I's 'Amazing Babe Mom Club'.

My Mum, looking disgracefully young, working a classic Eight London blogger pose.

OCTOBER BALLOONS

Sunday afternoons in Paris are for tearing up new neighbourhoods with an open heart and a string of stolen borrowed balloons. Burnished leaves fringe cobbled streets, and brisk winds drive us from twilight graveyards into warm maroon cafés with unsentimental names.

Photographed in Montmartre with Chris Weir and my new musical kindred spirit Zora, who is the only person I've met so far in my life who adores Echo & the Bunnymen as much as I do.

I am now also micro-blogging on Tumblr under Arcadian Eight, as a sideline for my stray photographs that had no home to go to.

THIS SPLENDID TABLE

"If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast." – Ernest Hemingway

I have now been living in Paris for 45 days. 
When you come to a legendary city as a tourist, you try to immerse yourself in a foreign idealism as quickly as possible - forcing yourself to see as many myths as possible in a day, swallowing language, spitting out clichés. A long weekend is spent treading pavements, denying fatigue and perhaps on the last evening you sit in a half-rate bar somewhere near Saint Michel after gloating  round Shakespeare and Company and say 'Yes, this is it! Ah, Paris - it's mine!"
As a new resident, the city opens itself to you slowly. For the first few weeks I was here, I didn't stray farther than the 11th arrondissement where I live on the East of Paris, Le Marais, the Left Bank and the 1st, where I work.  You begin to realise that going for 'dinner' and just drinking wine is the only way you can afford anything on the menu, and that the Sacre Couer actually looks far more spectacular from the Pompidou Centre balcony than the steps of Montmartre themselves. You learn the opening times, and then the cooking times of the bakeries in your quartier off by heart and that you MUST be seen out for 'aperos' with your work friends on a thursday night but never on a Saturday night. 

Paris' speciality is grandeur - sheer scale, size and splendour. What other city's Police HQ resembles one of King Ludwig's castles? Paris's Prefecture de Police on l'Ile de la Cité does. Sometimes the landscape can be overwhelming, so I went in search of a different kind of grandeur - one of decay and names lost in time. A personal splendour, to be found in the Père Lachaise cemetery in the 20th. My brother came for the weekend, and we went in search of our lost heroes, dressed in black and dark glasses. Edith Piaf, Proust, Chopin, Oscar Wilde are buried here amongst Communists, Jews, Artists, Playwrights, Mayors, Poets, Lawyers and burned out Lizard Kings - yes, Jimmy Morrison also lies here. 

I have always had a fondness for cemeteries. The monuments erected to honour the dead far exceed any praise for the living cast in stone or marble. I could have wandered the cobbled paths for hours, counting stained glass windows and dried purple roses. The tomb of Oscar Wilde has been defaced in the name of love - I don't consider it disrespectful as I know the man himself would consider it all a right lark, up there in heaven surrounded by a harem of young boy cherubs...

Pont Alexandre - the most spectacularly grand bridge in Paris

Oh Oscar, you rogue.

View from the Italian galleries, the Louvre.

Tributes for the Lizard King

Parisians are ants