I Prefer Paris

Proud of My Family’s Accomplishments

My family consists of two older brothers, Ed and Joe, and my sister Sonia (I am the youngest/the baby of the family) plus one niece, two nephews, and two great nieces and nephews. 

My two brothers and my niece have recently had some big events in their lives, and I am proud to share their accomplishments. 

My brother Joe Nahem, is a hugely successful interior designer, and his work has been featured in the top shelter publications such as Architectural Digest, the New York Times, and Elle Décor. His firm, Fox Nahem Design has been on the AD/Architectural Digest list of the 100 top designers numerous times. A beautiful coffee table book of his interiors Fox-Nahem: The Design Vision of Joe Nahem was published by Abrams in 2017. 

Joe’s latest big accomplishment has been designing the Malibu home of actor Robert Downey Jr., which was recently published in Purist Magazine. 

CLICK HERE to read the article and look at the photos. 

My other brother, Edward Tyler Nahem, is an international art dealer based in New York City, and his gallery, Edward Tyler Nahem Fine Art, is located at 37 West 57^th St. His stable of mostly American, contemporary artists reads like a Who’s Who of the most celebrated American artists, which includes John Chamberlain, Andy Warhol, Helen Frankenthaler, Willem de Kooning, Joan Mitchell, Roy Lichtenstein, Frank Stella, Ed Ruscha, and Robert Rauschenberg. 

Ed is also a prolific film and theater producer. He was a producer of the Tony Award winning Broadway musical Fela, which was also a hit in London at the Royal National Theatre and he was a producer of the award-winning documentary, I Bring What I Love, about the Senegalese singer and social activist Youssouf Ndour. 

Ed’s latest project is the film Monster, which will premiere on Netflix, this Friday, May 7. The film stars Academy Award winner Jennifer Hudson and Jeffrey Wright and is a story about a talented teen implicated in a robbery-turned-murder who fights for his innocence and integrity against a criminal justice system that’s already judged him. Ed was the lead producer of the film along with Tanya Lee (wife of Spike Lee) and Nikki Silver. 

My niece Sarah Kayle, who lives in Scarsdale, New York, volunteers for Westchester Jewish Community Services. Last month, Sarah was given a special honor at the annual gala. Sarah, who has been a board member of WJCS since 2015, has worked tirelessly, giving her time and her spirit to the Art Explorers club in the WJCS after-school enrichment program, Program Services Chair, as well as a member of many WJCS committees. 

https://www.wjcs.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/WJCS_Journal_2021_FINAL_SPREADS.pdf

Please checkout some of my recent articles for Travel Awaits.

8 Things To Know Before Your First Trip To Paris-

https://www.travelawaits.com/2657546/things-to-know-before-first-trip-to-paris/

6 Top French Beach Resorts  https://www.travelawaits.com/2563609/beach-resorts-france/

Incredible Reasons To Fall In Love With Lille, France

https://www.travelawaits.com/2562922/best-things-to-do-lille-france/

9 Ways To Avoid Looking Like A Tourist In France

https://www.travelawaits.com/2563339/avoid-looking-like-a-tourist-in-france/

 

 

 

 

Eye Prefer Paris Book of the Month, May 2021: Book Giveaway- Paris, City of Dreams

CORRECTION: Last Friday I posted that June 19 is when Americans will be able to visit France again, it's actually June 9. My apologies.

My friend gifted me this wonderful and fascinating book, Paris, City of Dreams: Napoleon III, Baron Haussmann, and the Creation of Paris, and I am passing it on to you. 

Acclaimed historian Mary McAuliffe vividly recaptures the Paris of Napoleon III, Claude Monet, and Victor Hugo as Georges Haussmann tore down and rebuilt Paris into the beautiful City of Light we know today.

Paris, City of Dreams traces the transformation of the City of Light during Napoleon III’s Second Empire into the beloved city of today. Together, Napoleon III and his right-hand man, Georges Haussmann, completely rebuilt Paris in less than two decades—a breathtaking achievement made possible not only by the emperor’s vision and Haussmann’s determination but by the regime’s unrelenting authoritarianism, augmented by the booming economy that Napoleon fostered.

Yet a number of Parisians refused to comply with the restrictions that censorship and entrenched institutional taste imposed. Mary McAuliffe follows the lives of artists such as Edouard Manet, Berthe Morisot, and Claude Monet, as well as writers such as Emile Zola, Gustave Flaubert, and the poet Charles Baudelaire, while from exile, Victor Hugo continued to fire literary broadsides at the emperor he detested.

McAuliffe brings to life a pivotal era encompassing not only the physical restructuring of Paris but also the innovative forms of banking and money-lending that financed industrialization as well as the city’s transformation. This in turn created new wealth and lavish excess, even while producing extreme poverty. More deeply, change was occurring in the way people looked at and understood the world around them, given the new ease of transportation and communication, the popularization of photography, and the emergence of what would soon be known as Impressionism in art and Naturalism and Realism in literature—artistic yearnings that would flower in the Belle Epoque.

Napoleon III, whose reign abruptly ended after he led France into a devastating war against Germany, has been forgotten. But the Paris that he created has endured, brought to vivid life through McAuliffe’s rich illustrations and evocative narrative.

The publisher of Paris, City of Dreams has generously agreed to give away a copy of to an Eye Prefer Paris reader in the continental USA.

Be the third person to make a comment about the book in my comments section and win your copy of the book.  Email subscribers, if you go to the bottom of this email, in small print it says “You are subscribed to email updates from I Prefer Paris”. Click on I Prefer Paris, and on the bottom of the post you will see COMMENT in small letters. Click on that to make a comment.

CLICK HERE to purchase Paris, City of Dreams: Napoleon III, Baron Haussmann, and the Creation of Paris

 In other book news, here’s an announcement for an upcoming book event. 

FRENCH ARTISTS IN FICTION: FOUR LIVES, FOUR AUTHORS

FREE ZOOM EVENT  MAY 8, 2021,  11 A.M. CENTRAL STANDARD TIME

WITH SERVING HOUSE AUTHOR 

LINDA LAPPIN,  LOVING MODIGLIANI: THE AFTERLIFE OF JEANNE HEBUTERNE

& Lilianne Milgrom, author of L’Origine

Drema Drudge, author of Victorine

Joe Byrd, author of  Monet & Oscar

ORGANIZED BY FRANCE BOOK TOURS

SIGN UP HERE:

https://francebooktours.com/2021/04/05/may-8-free-webinar-french-artists-in-fiction-four-lives-four-authors/

BOOKS AVAILABLE https://bookshop.org/lists/recommended-reads-french-art-in-fiction

INGRAMS, and Amazon. 

All four authors have generously agreed to give away an e-copy of their book, so the second, fourth, sixth, and eight person who makes a comment, will receive a copy of one of the books. 

Email subscribers, if you go to the bottom of this email, in small print it says “You are subscribed to email updates from I Prefer Paris”. Click on I Prefer Paris, and on the bottom of the post you will see COMMENT in small letters. Click on that to make a comment. 

Please join my friend Rosemary Flannery for her live Angels of Paris tour for France.fr, Wednesday, May 5, 10am EST (east coast time), 9am Midwest time, 7am, West coast time, and 4pm Paris time. CLICK HERE to sign-up. 

 

GREAT NEWS! Starting June 9, Vaccinated U.S. Citizens Can Travel to France

The best news I’ve heard since March 2020: The French government just announced it will let Vaccinated U.S. Citizens to visit France starting on June 9th. 

YAHOO! HALLELUJAH! WHOPPE! YAY!

I look forward to seeing many of you in the coming months, so book your flights, pack a suitcase, and BOOK one or more Eye Prefer Paris Tours. 

https://eyepreferparistours.com/

Here are some Key Dates regarding France coming out of lockdown. 

May 19^th  Restaurant terraces and museums will reopen

June 9^th  Curfew will be at 11pm (currently 7pm)

June 9^th  Restaurants will reopen max of 6 people per table

June 30^th End of 11pm curfew

Note: The Government has said that the ending of restrictions restaurants/ museum etc will be based on the number of Covid cases not significantly increasing. If they do then local restrictions may again come into place.

I want to thank everyone for watching my live Lovely Luxembourg Gardens Tour yesterday and also for your generous tips to my PayPal account. I'm sorry I couldn't thank all of you individually, but know I really appreciate it. CLICK HERE to watch the video and CLICK HERE if you would like to leave a tip in my PayPal account (you don’t have to have a PayPal account), which I would greatly appreciate, as I do these tours free of charge for France.fr  Enjoy! 

Instagram Photos-April 2021

First, I want to thank everyone for watching my live Lovely Luxembourg Gardens Tour yesterday and also for your generous tips to my PayPal account. I'm sorry I couldn't thank all of you individually, but know I really appreciate it. CLICK HERE to watch the video and CLICK HERE if you would like to leave a tip in my PayPal account (you don’t have to have a PayPal account), which I would greatly appreciate, as I do these tours free of charge for France.fr  Enjoy! 

Paris in the spring has been glorious this April and I got took lots of great photos to show it off. Do you have some favorites here? 

If you still haven’t followed me on Instagram yet, here are my handles. 

@eyepreferparis     

@parisian_doors  

@literal_streetart 

Gorgeous tulips at Luxembourg Gardens

Marais door

Marais cobblestone

Eiffel Tower

Marais door

Notre Dame

Seine River

Shadow art

Fresh strawberries

Tree shadow

April in Paris Tuileries

Pompidou Centre

French Banking Horror Stories

If you speak to almost any U.S. expat living in France, they will invariably have a horror story about dealing with French banks and their draconian banking policies and practices. In fact, I’ve been with some groups of expats, and when banking comes up in the conversation, each person tries to outdo the other with their most outrageous banking story. I, of course, have mine which I will share in a minute. The reason why I am writing this post is because just when I thought I heard the most ridiculous banking story ever, I learned of a new one that jumps to the top of my list. Before I get to the story my friend experienced, I’ll tell you mine to give you some context before my friend’s doozie. 

When I arrived in Paris to live in 2005, I opened up a bank account at Societe Generale, and it was fairly simple. I received a checkbook, a debit card, and a packet with all the pertinent information, just look I did back in New York. 

The first month my rent was due, I wanted to make sure I paid it on time on the first of the month, to show my landlord I was a good tenant. I decided to take cash out of my U.S. bank account instead of doing a wire transfer, because it was easier and there was no fee. I gathered and counted out the cash and put the euros all facing the same way, made out a deposit slip, and then I practiced in the mirror, how to say  “I want to make a deposit” in French.  

I patiently waited on line, and when I handed the teller my deposit, saying confidently in French I would like to make a deposit, she looked at me and replied and said “I’m sorry, but we don’t accept cash deposits on Monday”. Befuddled and bewildered, I asked her to repeat herself and she said the same thing again. I thought perhaps it was a joke and I looked around me to see if there was a secret camera with Alan Funt telling me I was on Candid Camera but after a few moments, I realized she was telling me the truth, which I couldn’t comprehend. I also thought could you imagine if I went to my Chase Bank in New York, and said they said the same thing, and I laughed out loud. I never questioned why they didn’t accept cash on Mondays because I was afraid of what the explanation was. I returned the next day and made my deposit without problem. 

The following month I learned my lesson and went to the bank on Tuesday to make my deposit, but at a different branch. I proceeded the same way as I did the month before and went to the teller, and  she told me “ I’m sorry, but we can’t accept a deposit this large, you have to go to your own branch.”  Again, I looked for Alan Funt and his hidden film crew, but to no avail, they weren't there. 

I could tell you other banking stories, but I don’t want to keep you in suspense any longer about my friend’s story. 

My friend, who has been living here for over 30 years, received her stimulus check last month and went to deposit it at her branch of Societe Generale, which I forgot to mention before is the third largest bank in France. She hands the teller the check and he/she tells her-WAIT FOR IT! - that they can’t cash the check because it was signed by President Trump, and since he is no longer president, the check is invalid, and she needs to send it  back to the U. S. and have President Biden sign it. No joke, this is a true story and April Fools is long over. 

It seems as though the Societe Generale headquarters is located in Hooterville from the Green Acres television show, and Mr. Haney dictates the bank's policies. 

If you have any French banking horror stories, feel free to share them in the comments section. Let’s see if you can top the one I just told you and if it does, I will post it on here. 

Save The Date: April 28- Lovely Luxembourg Gardens Live Facebook Tour

Please join me for a Luxembourg Gardens tour for www.france.fr on Wednesday, April 28, 10am EST (east coast time), 9am Midwest time, 7am, West coast time, and 4pm Paris time.

CLICK HERE to reserve your place