Au Secours!

Our Metro Sentier neighborhood in the 2nd arrondissement not only claims the fabulous rue Montorgeuil as its centerpiece, it is also the heart of the garment and fabric district in Paris. On the way to my Club Med gym, in the narrow, winding streets that angle off the big rue Réaumur, I pass shop after shop displaying the biggest array of "tissu" I've ever seen.

Bolts and bolts of cloth stand like glittering soldiers behind windows.

Most of these boutiques are for the wholesale trade only, and most are small, but they crowd each other, cheek by jowl, offering splashes of bright colors on a grey day.




Stepping out of our building the other afternoon, -- on my way to the Romanov Exhibition at the Pinacotèque Museum -- I was brought up short by the sound of sirens and the sight of several trucks from the famed Parisian sapeurs-pompiers, right across the street!

In France, 79% of these highly trained firemen (men and women) are volunteers . In Paris, though, and certain other large metropolitan areas, they are part of the professional military. The term "pompiers" comes from the handpumps used to put out fires before the industrial revolution; "sapeurs" is the French word for sapper, or soldier, and dates back to the Napoleonic era.

Turning the corner, I saw at once why they were there. One of those small wholesale fabric shops on rue Cléry was on fire!

With their dashing silver helmets, the sapeurs-pompiers sprang immediately into action, with me trotting alongside, camera in hand!

Grey/black smoke billowed out through the doorway of the shop and into the street, choking the air.

As this young sapeur hurried to catch up with his comrades...

...others in the brigade readied all the equipment before entering the burning building. Policemen stood at either end of the cordoned-off area, politely but firmly forbidding anyone but the firemen to enter and ordering all the other shops to close their doors and shutters. 

These young sapeurs had been among the first to arrive. They look like 15 year-old teenagers! As replacements continued to come up the street, they took a well deserved water break.





Some 30 minutes later, the fire seemed to be under control, so I retraced my steps down the rue Cléry, and made my way over to the Pinacotèque Museum in the Place Madeleine. Here, I spent a happy, though very crowded, couple of hours in the company of the Romanov art collection from the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg. Covering the history of their collecting over 214 years of tsarist rule, it begins with Peter the Great's secret journeys, in disguise, to France and England where he fell in love with western art, and continues with Catherine the Great, Alexander 1st all the way to the Russian Revolution and the ill-fated Nicholas II.

There was much to enjoy. Before the guard stopped me ("pas de photos, Madame") I managed to snap a couple of shots with my trusty iPhone! Here's the 18th century French artist Hubert Robert's Ancient Ruins Serving as a Public Bath....

...and this exquisite painting by the most famous French woman painter in the 18th/19th century, Marie-Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun. Titled Portrait des filles de Paul 1er, it captures both the innocence of childhood still apparent in the younger girl on the right, with the emerging sophistication of her older sister on the left -- note the earrings. Their father reigned over Russia for just five brief years, before being assassinated in 1801.

Standing in front of this Rembrandt, Portrait d'homme barbu, coiffé d'un beret, one could only stare in awe and bow before the master.










 After a nice coffee on the Place Madeleine, I took the bus home and found, to my amazement, that at 5 pm there was still a considerable presence of sapeurs-pompiers, although the operation seemed to be in its final clean-up phase.

The next day, the shops opened up their shutters and doors again.

Bright colors once more livened up the street.

Except, that is, for the unfortunate proprietors of the Elite Boutique, who must now begin the arduous process of repair and dealing with the insurance companies. Bonne chance!

À bientôt!