Pink Martini, Top Models, Slovenia, Gisele, Freebox and Cynthia McKinney

The band Pink Martini was in town to play a special performance with the Orchestre de l'Ile de France. M and I went to see the performance at the Salle Pleyel not far from the Arc de Triomphe in the 8th. Great show like always with them and we were invited to go backstage afterwards by band member Timothy, who I'd come to know a few years back after one of their previous Paris performances that I photographed.

Photography highlight of the week was the France Top Model Competition at the Espace Pierre Cardin near the American Embassy and Concorde. It was the finals of a country-wide competition to find a new fresh face with the winner being awarded a modeling agency contract. Here's the winner:

I've been feeling lately like doing another exploration trip, where I travel somewhere alone with my camera and just spend a few days looking and shooting. I spent some hours researching and decided on where I'm going ... Slovenia. I didn't know much about the country, only that it's beautiful and inexpensive. The Tourism Board there has agreed to take care of my expenses there in exchange for them using my images so I'm quite happy about that. I'll be staying in the capital of Ljubljana for 3 nights and then exploring the countryside and Adriatic coast. I head out for 1 week starting April 9.

Spent a nice afternoon with Gisele, my journal-translating long-time friend, at her apartment in the 15th. She is a researcher/historian and her most important tool - her typewriter - was broken so I picked up a new one for her and took it over there. We spent a while figuring out how to change the ribbon (it had been approximately 25 years for me!) and then chatted about life over special Easter cookies.

My Freebox service has finally been activated. After being without a fixed telephone line for over 3 weeks, having my service turned on was disproportionately exciting. It's a pretty spectacular deal - for 30 euros a month, you get high-speed, wireless internet, free unlimited local and international calling and about 300 TV channels. Not sure how they do it but so far so good.

Attended a Democrats Abroad meeting where six-term former congresswoman from Georgia Cynthia McKinney presented a film called "American Blackout", a documentary laying out how to steal an election (in state and national elections), how black voters where disenfranchised and how flawed our system of voting is. It's quite informative and disturbing. I found the 2-minute opening rap poetry amazing. You can watch the film here:



And now, the photos of the week:

The fountains of the Hotel de Ville were green during a recent water exhibition



Some prankster placed hearts over the red traffic light near the Bastille



Note the classic French non-reaction of the people passing by



A needed break during the Paris half-marathon