Today is Thursday, March 23, 2023. Yes, I’m back from Paris and Israel and, no, Donald J. Dumpf has not been indicted yet, which is what I was hearing on network news in France most of the time I was watching TV there. I was so hopeful that maybe this could have been the day, March 21, 2023, that the would-be American dictator would have been held accountable – finally – for the many misdeeds he’s done with impunity, that I asked a friend to buy me papers from that day for me to keep for posterity. Of course, this would not be the day that we all had hoped for. It will have to be another day, I’m afraid.

As for our trip, I must say that we had a lovely time, despite the obvious turmoil festering in both countries during the time we were there. In Paris, the sanitation workers started a one-week strike right around the time we left the city to travel on the TGV (France’s intercity, high-speed rail service) to Nice, where we stayed for five days to take separate excursions to the French Riviera. In Israel, the state was embroiled in protests against the conservative prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his attempt to weaken the Supreme Court of Israel which outraged Israelis to the point of taking to the streets. I watched a huge demonstration taking place in Tel Aviv at the apartment of Elliot’s cousins in a suburb of Tel Aviv. This was some spectacle from what I could see. Women were dressed in handmaid costumes and solemnly walked into a circle, while other demonstrators stood outside them.

In Paris, we actually came upon a protest march on one of the days we walked through the city’s neighborhoods. At least this particular protest was peaceful; subsequently, the demonstrations became more extreme and violent as time wore on. We thankfully missed those. So all in all, I consider ourselves very fortunate travelers this time, considering that we also got out of Paris a day right before a nationwide strike was called, which would have been today. Who knows what might have happened if we had reservations to leave today? Most probably, we might have been stuck in Paris for who-knows-how-long. The city could have very easily been brought to a total standstill.

For such a labyrinth vacation entailing about five hotel stays, five jet excursions, one TGV train ride, and various SNCF rail trips out of Nice, we were extremely fortunate that we had only about two setbacks.

The first one occurred at Ben Gurion Airport after we landed in the Holy Land. We were on a Dreamliner jet which should have been the clue to the glitch that was about to happen when we disembarked from the plane. The jet, I later learned, had two exits. So it was without thought that I exited the plane first, expecting to see Elliot a few minutes later moseying down the ramp. However, in about 20 minutes or so, there is no Elliot. This never happened before in all the times I would leave the flight first: Elliot would generally make his way out of the open doorway. But not this time! I didn’t know what to think when I didn’t see him; I actually went back onto the plane and asked a flight attendant if everyone walked off the plane, and she said, there were some people waiting for a wheelchair to take them off. So I just decided then and there to move away from the area and look for Elliot outside somewhere. I had to use the bathroom before anything else, and I did. Finally, a few feet from the bathroom, near the wall facing the line for Customs, I espy Elliot. Of course, he assumed that I would be waiting for him at the exit ramp where he got off, and at that time, we still didn’t know that there were two exits. I railed at him for abandoning me, and before long, I was afraid our shouts would attract a crowd. Before I could say “wet,” Elliot took the bottle of water I bought at the airport and dunked my jacket and me with it. I was surprised that we weren’t taken into custody at that pivotal moment, but people seemed nonplussed by the drama unfolding in front of them. It took awhile before we reached a rapprochement and started talking to one another again without raising our voices at each other. But this was the only sore point during the whole vacation.

The second setback occurred in Nice at the Victor Hugo Hotel named after the illustrious French author when we approached the outside gate and a locked front door and we weren’t able to get into the building. This happened after getting off the TGV on our seven-hour-long journey and taking a cab to the hotel. Somehow we got through the front gate when a resident walked through and let us in, but we still couldn’t get into the building. Finally, I asked a passerby in English if he could call the telephone number on the gate that had Victor Hugo’s number in case of an emergency. The good man called and got only an automated message, so we were left with the prospect of sleeping in a park with our luggage next to us. We found a button to the side that opened the front gate and we exited the area. We started walking down the block, and miracle of miracles, I saw an illuminated sign for an Amour Hotel. We walked to this second site that was indeed open and talked to a front deskperson to see if we could book a room for the night. Thankfully, there was an opening at this late time; we also were able to have dinner downstairs at the hip restaurant that attracted a young, trendy crowd.

The next day, we woke early and went downstairs with our luggage. I rushed back to the original hotel, and this time, I was able to get into the architecturally impressive residential building, and speak to the friendly hotel manager, Gilles. He explained that we were at fault since there was a note on the back of the reservation that said if we intended to be late, we had to call earlier to make arrangements with him. I soon learned that the “hotel” was really composed of only one floor and not the entire building and was managed by only one person, Gilles. So he, Gilles, would have every right to leave his desk sometime after sundown. Eventually, I went back to the reservation itself that I printed on my printer here in Forest Hills, and by golly, there is that note on the back of the page, which both of us failed to see. In our defense, who would expect a hotel to be closed after sundown? I don’t think many of us would come to that conclusion. Most of us would expect a hotel to have a deskperson on during all hours of the day and night. It’s not like we intended to check in after 12 midnight. The hour was closer to 8, I believe. But the proviso was clearly on the second page. So we now checked into the first hotel on the first full day instead of the night before.

Despite our not-too-pleasant introduction to the Victor Hugo Hotel in Nice, we had an otherwise pleasurable five days at the hotel, especially with our encounters with the hotel manager’s lovely dog, appropriately called Cosette, who you should know is a character in Hugo’s Les Miserables. Every morning, she greeted us at our door and scampered inside the small breakfast area to scrounge for food from us by sitting directly below our seat and waiting for us to break down and offer her some of the delectable French bread being offered every morning by our gracious host. We also made friends with Gilles, who gave us several good restaurant recommendations and other travel suggestions.

So we thoroughly enjoyed taking the train rides on the SNCF to various locales on the French Riviera, including Antibes where I went to the Picasso Museum, Cannes, where I was photographed on that famous red carpet by Elliot, Monaco-Monte Carlo, where I entered the world-famous casino and took several photos, and Eze, a seaside town known for its view from the sea from its hill top and has a well-known botanical garden, which I went through, alone. This last site was quite hilly and was hard to navigate. You could say it wasn’t “Eze-y” getting around Eze. There were an incalculable number of steps one had to climb to get to the various shops and restaurants dotted throughout the small town. But it was worth it, just for the magnificent views from the top of the botanical garden.

Anyway, it’s getting late here and I’m still adjusting to the time lag here. My body still thinks it’s five hours ahead, which would make it about 3:30 a.m. in Paris at the moment. Last night I was so tired that I retired around 11:38 p.m. which is early for me. I nodded off to the conclusion of Season 1 of The Last of Us, which behooves me to rewatch the final episode when I’m fully awake. I’m a little better tonight, though.

So it’s good to be back. By the way, I passed my three-year mark of writing this blog around March 20, three days ago. It was certainly a different world three years ago. As for the specter of COVID in Paris or Israel at the time we were there, we saw very few instances where people wore masks inside restaurants or shops. Elliot certainly went around maskless most of the time, while I still resorted to wearing one on occasion. People wore masks generally on planes, however. I did too.

Stay safe and be well.

We all know what this is, don’t we? Isn’t this so splendid looking at night?

This is the famous Le Negresco Hotel in Nice, a few doors down from our hotel on Victor Hugo Boulevard. It’s located on the Promenade des Anglais on the Bare des Anges and it was named after Henri Negresco (1868-1920) who had the palatial hotel constructed in 1902. Celebrities who stayed at this five-star hotel include Salvador Dali, Grace Kelly, Elizabeth Taylor, and the Beatles, to name just a few.

This is one of the many alleyways you find in Nice.

This cobblestone street is found in Eze.

These are some of the succulents found in Eze’s botanical garden.