Word: les
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Emile Zola described Les Halles as "the belly of Paris," and nobody ever coined a better phrase for the sprawling wholesale market on the Right Bank where for 800 years have flowed the meat, fowl, vegetables, dairy products, herbs, roots, fish, cheese and even flowers necessary to sustain a city of gourmets. Sadly, Paris inevitably outgrew its inefficient and costly belly; two years ago, most operations were moved to a shiny new complex at Rungis near Orly Airport. That move left the problem of what to do with a dozen huge cast-iron-and-glass pavilions that made...
...pavilions, along with adjacent shops and warehouses; all together, 40 valuable acres between the Louvre and the ancient, aristocratic Marais district are scheduled for "renewal." In other days, politicians working so late and so earnestly would have restored themselves at one of the inestimable restaurants on the edge of Les Halles with onion soup and a glass of wine...
More Than a Market. In the earlier battle of Les Halles, leading up to the 1969 démarche to Rungis, disagreement centered on a social tradition. Les Halles, after all, had become far more than a market. From midnight to dawn it was the heart of Paris as well as the belly, as farmers trundled in with their bounty, chefs and grocers arrived to buy it, and prostitutes and pickpockets merged for different kinds of commerce. Such restaurants as Au Pied de Cochon, Le Pere Tranquille and Au Chien Qui Fume lured socialites in white ties as well...
...very difficult writer. Even Mayor René Compère, 67, a pert little man who takes visitors on a lecture tour around the town, has yet to crack the gigantic set of Proust's works that is prominently displayed in his office. Compère argues that les Proustiens, as the literary-minded tourists are known, are not even good for business. Says the mayor: 'They come from some place, eat a madeleine, see the Pré Catalan...
...route to an ice cream parlor in Juan-les-Pins on the French Riviera one day last summer, a doctor's wife named Josette Varinet, 30, discovered that she and her two children were taking the wrong route. Mme. Varinet began backing her Peugeot out of the one-way street when suddenly a big black car drove in, and its owner began assailing her with a wordy sermon on the failings of female drivers. To that Josette replied: "Je vous emmerde," an excremental expletive...