I’m spending a few days in Paris, trying if not entirely succeeding in getting away from it all (well when I’m not writing letters/reports etc). But I did get to stroll along “Path of plants†from the Bastille to the Bois de Vincennes (built on an old railway line – raised through the central part so you get a great different angle on Paris) on a lovely sunny winter’s day.
At the “forest†(well it is really more like Hyde Park), I got to expand my French vocabulary with the posters indicating the names of the (generally not so wild) animal life. I was taken by the names for house martin and swifts (Hirondelle de fenetre and Hirondelle de cheminee respectively – an eminently practical if I suspect, not entirely accurate division). And I learnt that anguille means eel – possibly a useful fact for the next time I feel the urge to order the “I wonder what that is?†object on the menu.
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