Yesterday evening I went to Galeries Lafayette, which exceptionellement was open till nine p.m. during the runup to Christmas. It was the first time I'd been back there in a while, and surprisingly not nearly as jam-packed as I expected-- the crise?
All the announcements are now made in Chinese as well as English, Japanese and Russian. The store was full of foreigners, including lots and lots of Chinese. And the stores have Chinese-speaking salespeople now too. I heard a Vuitton saleswoman, who looked like a Chinese-Frenchwoman, say to a young Chinese man, "I don't speak Engleesh." And he answered charmingly, "Mon français n'est pas très bon non plus."
Outside the grands magasins (Printemps and Galeries Lafayette stand side by side, each with several buildings), the Christmas windows were attracting a big crowd of children. There is a little platform for them to stand to see the windows so that adults' heads don't block the view. What struck me was how resolutely secular the windows were. Not a trace of the religious holiday, and scarcely of the pagan one-- instead, the featured character was a Halloweenish ghoul. But to be fair, the crowd was pas très catholique-- lots of veiled women, Japanese tourists and gay Americans!
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