The Reddit Debacle

Yesterday KQED Forum had a segment on the whole Reddit saga(*). I have recently become a Reddit user (more like a Reddit lurker really) and have seen it all unfold over the last couple of months, with lots of feelings and opinions on the subject. I found myself driving down 101 nodding and shaking my head in turns. Gesticulating sometimes. Occasionally I had to turn off the radio to collect my thoughts and clear my head. I couldn't get the topic out of my head all day, so I just had to jot down my thoughts...

If you are wondering "what Reddit saga?" here's a brief recap. Otherwise feel free to skip below.

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The Reddit Saga

Ellen Pao used to work at Kleiner Perkins. She later sued them claiming she had been discriminated against because of her gender. After that she joined Reddit and became interim CEO when the old CEO resigned. During her tenure Reddit banned five communities (sub-reddits) for bad behavior. This led to a massive backlash from the Reddit "community" who felt that this erstwhile bastion of free speech was being turned into a vanilla politically correct zone. It was rumored that these changes were being done to attract advertisers who wouldn't want to be associated with the more objectionable content on Reddit. (Keep in mind that /rapingwomen and /burningkids are both real community names on that site). There was also a strong suspicion that the feminazi CEO was bringing her political agenda to the website. A few weeks later, a well known Reddit employee was terminated. Her primary role involved interacting with some moderators of Reddit communities and these moderators were upset that they hadn't been warned of this change and their work was disrupted. Other users and moderators saw Victoria's firing as another sign of Reddit turning evil. A full scale revolt followed, several communities went off line. Although no details of the firing were available, the user community assumed that Ellen Pao was behind it. She was reviled on the various forums, a petition circulated calling for her resignation.

A couple of days later, she did resign. One of Reddit's founders returned as CEO. Information then started to dribble out that Ellen Pao was not responsible for Victoria's firing, it was the chairman of the board (another founder). Also there were claims that far from pushing for censorship on Reddit, Ms Pao had been fighting the board on this topic because she knew how much backlash censorship would cause. 

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First, the issue at stake is not free speech (and I'm not just saying that because a private company has no responsibility to be a 1st amendment haven). The Reddit community is ostensibly up in arms about free speech but what they are really upset about is commercialization. They are not so worried about losing free speech, they are worried that free speech is being sacrificed for monetary gain. The problem Reddit faces is the same one that most sites face when they inevitably start talking monetization - user trust. This is the message Reddit needs to hear loud and clear : the users are concerned that the quality of their experience will suffer as Reddit starts to make money off of their content. And the users are losing trust in the Reddit management. For that reason a change of CEO was necessary. But not sufficient. The new CEO has made a good start by promising regular first hand conversations with the community. He has also been very upfront about the changes they are planning to make. This is essential. Everyone knows something will have to be done - Reddit needs to make money and you can't run ads on r/rapingwomen. I mean, other than ads for the next Cosby show. Many sites have succeeded at becoming popular but failed at monetizing that popularity. Whether Reddit will succeed depends on whether they can find the middle ground between pleasing their users and making money off their users. The majority of their users does not care about the majority of drama unfolding there, but the much vaunted vocal minority is harder to please. They are suspicious, paranoid people. Usually smart too. They need an open, sincere dialog. They need to be told The Plan. All of it. And they need to feel they can get behind that plan. Otherwise they will leave. And when they leave the others will follow.

Second - and I have to say this as a woman in Silicon Valley - the Ellen Pao lawsuit never for a second made me ponder sexism in the valley. But Ellen Pao's CEO stint at Reddit convinced me that sexism in tech is alive and well. The Reddit community skews young and male and tech savvy. The vocal part of the community especially so. And many of these users hated Ms Pao for daring (daring!) to bring a lawsuit about gender discrimination in the workplace. Because in their naive little sheltered minds the only discrimination that exists in the US today is reverse gender discrimination. So from the beginning she was reviled on the different forums. At every opportunity. A bitch. A cunt. Chairman Pao (lets toss in a little racism, why not). And the ultimate Reddit insult - an SJW (Social Justice Warrior). And every Reddit misstep, real or fancied, laid at her door. Of course that is going to happen to some extent with any CEO but it happened with unsettling ferocity to Ms Pao. Reddit is always quick to jump to conclusions but with Ellen it was more like trampolining to conclusions. Now some people point out that the latest round of controversy was over the firing of a female employee - proof that the outrage is completely free of gender connotations. That's not how sexism works though. The vitriol directed towards Ellen Pao is directed towards a woman leader, as well as a woman "troublemaker" (aka feminazi aka SJW aka someone who slept with her colleague and then sued her company). 

And to be clear - this isn't any kind of defense of Ms Pao. I couldn't say whether her lawsuit had any merit; she got her day in court and lost. She is just human like us all and likely has plenty of flaws. But somehow I doubt she is the vicious she-demon that Reddit would make her out to be.  

[As I wrote this I found myself talking about two "vocal minorities". One is the content creators, the trendsetters. The other is the loud anti-feminists. Are they the same? It is hard to tell. Someone could easily be in both categories unfortunately; there are plenty of very smart and thoughtful but naive tech men who think the feminazis are taking over the world. That's a topic for another day.]

Belated thoughts for Independence Day

"So, why did you become a US citizen?" I asked in a challenging tone. 

The guy I was interrogating was in his 40s and had lived in America for something like 20 years. I was fresh off the boat and manifestly scornful of "Indians" who had "betrayed" their country by renouncing Indian citizenship for US. Like any self respecting 22 year old, I had lots of opinions and no doubts. 

You can guess how this story ends ... 

Ten days ago I stood in a room full of like minded people and raising my right hand swore to "support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic". Once again, I had no doubts.

When I came to the U.S I was quote-unquote patriotic; the jingoistic, nationalistic, my-country-is-better-than-yours kind. Don't hold this against me, that's the kind of patriotism society promotes. It appeals to the most basic human instinct of tribalism. It makes people feel good and demands remarkably little from their intellect or even their daily life. Cheer for the home team and chant your country's name on appropriate occasions. (And it produces the type of populace all governments want - the kind that rallies behind questionable projects with emotional slogans and impassioned them-versus-us speeches). Fortunately this brand of patriotism doesn't hold up well against the reality check of stepping outside the bubble. When you do step out you discover that everyone thinks they are the best.

It was quite enlightening to see the US's own version of jingoistic nationalism and compare it to the kind I had grown up on. Here was a whole new creation mythology, as similar as it was different - with Washington substituted for Gandhi and Lincoln standing in for Nehru. Here were confident assertions of exceptionalism and destiny that didn't sound so very unlike the claim that "कुछ है की हस्ती मिटती नही हमारी, सदियोन रहा है दुश्मन दौर-ए-जहान हमारा ". Don't get me wrong, these were all great men. But one does realise how fruitless it is to get into a pissing match about whose country is greater. It is human beings that are great or small and groups of human beings that rise above the petty selfishness of their world to answer the call of their times. Nations are not some receptacles of fate, they are simply convenient containers for people; solving problems of scalability, not destiny. We organize into nations for many good reasons but ultimately they are reasons of convenience. We have a deep need to identify with a national identity but bear in mind this need comes from an instinct for survival honed over thousands of years of tribal living. Don't pretend it is any more profound than that. The truly great aren't obsessed with proving their country's superiority, they are concerned with improving their lot and the lot of their neighbours.

To summarize - Getting all huffy if a foreigner points out obvious faults in your government because you feel obligated to defend your country, right or wrong: immature and pointless. Working to improve the condition of the people around you because they are your people: important and meaningful. Cheering when your national team wins the world cup: only human and what the hell, everyone deserves a reason to celebrate.

So where did all these realisations leave me? I no longer felt bound to a country simply because I was born there, or even because I had had a fairly good life there. Birth is not destiny. I felt free to choose. And choice meant answering the simple question "where is your home"? Where the heart is, naturally. And my heart, surprisingly, was in America. Through the challenging Bush years and the somewhat disappointing Obama years I came to the conclusion that there was nowhere else I'd rather be than here. This kind of decision is hard to articulate because it sounds like an implicit criticism of the rest of the world. But it isn't, not any more than choosing a mate. It means recognizing what your personal values are and knowing what speaks to your soul. It was here I first discovered my strong belief in individual freedom and individual choice. In non-judgmentalism and non-conformance. And a deep enduring faith in the power of rational, free thought and the relentless pursuit of objectivity. And it is here, at my home, that I hope to pass these values down to my son.

But all the same, when I took the oath of allegiance I didn't say the part about "renouncing fidelity to any foreign state". Or maybe I did say it. Doesn't matter because words cannot erase feelings. And renouncing fidelity to India when becoming a US citizen would be like renouncing one's maiden family on getting married. Life doesn't work like that, and I guess I'll always be a two state person just like I'll always have two families.

Also, not everything has to change - whether I celebrate Independence Day on August 15th or July 4th, either way I get to slag off the Brits!

The Corsican Monster

While on vacation last week, I was reading War and Peace by Tolstoy. When I was traveling a couple of months ago, I re-read Vanity Fair by Thackeray. And last year I read The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas.

Three stories from three different European countries. All set in the same time period but written a generation later. Very different story lines, but they have one historical figure in common - Napoleon. He is the War in War and Peace. His role is much more circumspect in the other two novels; he does not appear directly but his actions form the backdrop of their drama. 

I had studied about Napoleon in history class and knew of his exploits, of course, but they didn't form much of an impression on me. When I think of world conquerors, Alexander is the one that comes to mind. And Hitler is the evil conqueror de jour. Napoleon, on the other hand, is the punchline about height and  over-compensation.

How eye opening then to come across these near contemporary accounts and feel the earth shattering effect he had on the Europe of his time; the admiration and hatred he simultaneously inspired. These are not dry historical facts or laundry lists of battles and armies. They are accounts of the fictional emotions of fictional characters. Somehow that makes them more compelling: they are incidental to the main story, mentioned in passing, each author taking for granted that his reader needs no convincing of Napoleon's impact.

In Tolstoy's Russia there are many who worship Napoleon and relish his martial glory as he conquers country after country. Then struggle to make excuses for why their hero after all turns his army on their own nation. But he is driven out of their country, his myth of invincibility shattered, and soon after his enemies finally defeat and exile him. Then in Vanity Fair and Monte Cristo you get a glimpse of the terror he still commands; first the fear that he will escape from exile, then the panic when he actually does. As soon as he lands in France, the French people rise to his support, Louis XVIII flees his capital and the nations of Europe march on him together, all their differences forgotten in their common fear of the Corsican Monster.

All this fuss about one man. A very different era when one man could be such a hero and such a villain all by himself....

Sidebar : Tolstoy has a refreshingly modern attitude to both war and patriotism. War and Peace should be about a thousand pages shorter than it is, but there are some real gems in there.

Dining in the dark

Apparently it is a thing. Sounds gimmicky but what is the point of making money if you can't spend some of it on an intriguing gimmick. So we headed over to Opaque in San Francisco Saturday night to try it out.

You walk in to a narrow entry way where the hostess receives you and hands out menus to choose your food. You choose from a couple of options in a prix fixe menu, pick your drinks and then are ready to enter the restaurant proper. The hostess asks you to turn off your cell phones (I put mine on vibrate and stuffed it in my purse. And held my purse tight between my legs the whole time so I would feel the vibration if it went off. I may have a slight problem), take off any watches and otherwise eliminate all sources of light. Then she hands you off to your server, who is legally blind - like all the wait staff. The group forms a little train behind the server, each holding the person in front of them. (Pro-tip : There's a lot of touching - deliberate and accidental - over the course of this evening. Best to go with people you know fairly well!). The server is the engine of this train and guides you into the restaurant proper. You go through a darkened passageway, past a blackout curtain and you are finally in the pitch dark. I cannot overstate the blackness of this dark. My pupils spent the whole evening dilating but could not distinguish the slightest shape. The server guided us each to our seats and we began the meal. When we were lining up to enter the darkened passageway, I felt a moment of utter panic. But once we were seated it passed. I felt around to get a mental picture of the table's layout and position of my fellow diners. The server described the serving strategy : she'd bring the plates to one side of the table and the two people at the end would pass them down to the others. It worked quite well; too well in my opinion. Once we were seated it felt disappointingly like a normal meal. Sure we jabbed our forks all over our plates but there really was not much difficulty. I had a water glass and a drink on either side of my plate; not only did I drink from both easily, they were not even slightly in the way when passing dishes back and forth or reaching to try the food in my neighbour's plate. Should not have been surprising considering the ease with which I walk around my bedroom in the dark. We are better than we think at limited navigation through known territory.

The food came in one course at a time, was duly passed down the line of diners. Much giggling ensued during the first couple of courses as we tried to eat what we could not see. I hear that the remaining senses are enhanced when one is lost, but it probably takes longer than a couple of hours. None of us felt our sense of taste or smell enhanced by the blindness. Quite the reverse, I lost a lot of the flavour of the food by not being able to see it. I also found myself shoveling the food down my throat in an unseemly hurry due to some trace remains of anxiety. I had to force myself to slow down and savour the food. That helped some, but again I realised how much I take sight for granted during an eating experience. For instance, I always combine things on my plate for optimal taste - a piece of cheese with every bite of salad. Or a delectable crouton saved till the end as a final treat for my taste buds. It was quite frustrating not being able to do that.

The food was quite good but not extraordinary. Given the logistical nightmare of running this place, the price ($100 per person for food) is probably justified. But at the end of the day, I can't honestly say the experience was worth the cost.

Vain musings

Is there anything so poignant as the loss of something one never possessed?

There it was, hovering by your head. You could reach out and grab it easily, or so you told yourself. Any time you wanted. It was practically yours and one day you would just pluck it out of the air. But you never did reach out, except that one time when you made a tentative, hesitant movement and then quickly turned it into a different gesture - nah, I was just brushing my hair. And there it bobbed silently, like a golden snitch. It is mine, practically so. Slowly it moved a little farther away, each day. And you didn't notice. Or wouldn't listen to the part of you that did. You kept insisting it was right there and all you had to do was take it. Really. Further and further away it went. And you went on saying that you possessed it - in all but name, really. Yet it kept moving away, kept getting harder to ignore the drift. And the farther it went, the more dearly you clung to the claim that it was nearby. Really. Not because you could no longer reach out for it, but because you didn't want to admit that you never would have.

Not really.

Team Fanny!

If you neither know nor care about Fanny Price, you can stop reading now...

(Ok ok, here's a quick recap : Fanny Price is the heroine of Jane Austen's book Mansfield Park. Fanny and Edmund are cousins, Fanny's in love with Edmund. Enter Mary & Henry - a delightful brother and sister pair who completely outclass Fanny & Edmund in likability. Mary pursues Edmund, Henry pursues Fanny but the boring couple ends up together and the exciting brother & sister are disgraced.)

Broad mindedness is a virtue very much in fashion today. Yet nothing is so amusing as the narrow mindedness of the fashionably broad minded.

Fanny Price is a quiet, intelligent girl with strong morals, what one would call a "good" girl. But unfortunately good girls are no longer the thing. Heroines today are feisty, out spoken, slightly unscrupulous and (adorably) self involved. And for all our pretensions to liberality, we aren't really accepting of different-ness. Only of the one specific kind currently sanctioned by popular culture. Quirky, rebellious, bitchy girls are cool but demure, shy girls are unacceptable even though nowadays they are in reality more "different" than the other kind.

Criticisms of Fanny fall into two categories; the first is that "Mary should be heroine". I honestly don't understand this train of thought. If Jane Austen had wanted Fanny to sparkle in contrast to her rival, she would have made Mary less appealing. If she had wanted a saucy heroine with sparkling eyes, she would have written Pride & Prejudice. Fanny is Fanny and Mary is the vamp for a reason. Each of Jane Austen's novels are about a human failing, and by the end of each book the failing human learns a lesson. Emma is about vanity, Pride & Prejudice is about - well, you can guess. Mansfield Park is about seduction. Mary and Henry come to Mansfield and seduce (metaphorically) everyone including the reader. Detractors criticize the book for having two such delightful characters as its villains, but seducers are always delightful - to start with. By the end of the book their evil side is revealed (well, as evil as any Jane Austen character could be). Mary can't put aside her greed even for the sake of Edmund's love. Henry, for vain, selfish pleasure, seduces a married woman he isn't really interested in.

Mary and Henry are a metaphor for 'Society' with a capital S. You know; the one Oscar Wilde said is only criticized by those who can't get into it. It is dazzling and brilliant, it is delightful and exciting, it is beautiful people in skimpy clothes and colourful cocktails and shiny lights and loud music and lots of laughter. It brings excitement and pleasure. What it doesn't bring is happiness. Just like Mary and Henry. Edmund and Fanny are the "countryside" to Mary & Henry's "London" - less glitzy, less glamorous but of real, lasting sterling worth.

Mary and Henry are also a cautionary tale. They do have a shot at real happiness. Beneath the superficiality they have substrata of kindness, love and what Jane Austen calls "moral taste". These qualities surface when they retreat from Society to the more sedate but wholesome company of Edmund and Fanny. And almost overcome their weaknesses. Almost. But they go back to Society and get sucked into its depths of shallowness. And lose that one chance of real happiness they had accidentally stumbled upon.

If this were Hollywood, the same lessons would be learnt but in a different manner. Mary would give up all ambition of a rich husband and be satisfied with Edmund. Henry would reform, give up his playboy lifestyle and marry Fanny. And all the Mansfield Park haters would be satisfied. Personally I think Jane Austen wrote a better story line, certainly less saccharine and probably more realistic. How many playboys have really reformed and settled down because they met the 'right girl'? And if they do, why should their past unfaithfulness be so conveniently forgiven? And how many women, brought up in luxury with expensive things, have turned on a dime and settled into hardworking, frugal, happy homebodies? Jane Austen's books may be called romance novels but she was far too perceptive to have romantic misconceptions about human nature.

So where is Fanny in all this? The second criticism is that she has no positive traits, that she is washed out, negative, passive and yet somehow annoyingly flawless and always right. There is some justification here: Austen's books always follow the same pattern - blunder, lesson, happiness. Usually it is the heroine who commits the blunder. At Mansfield Park it is the other residents who misjudge Mary & Henry while Fanny is never deceived. The book does give a credible reason for this - Fanny is the mousy quiet person who sits in a corner observing everything and participating little. So much easier to avoid deception when you have an outside perspective rather than being the one the deception is aimed at. But yes, it is not completely unfair to claim that Fanny is "always right". But flawless? Only a completely non-shy person could see no flaw in her excessive timidity. True it doesn't lead her into any single tragic event but it is like a giant boulder on her fragile shoulders, wearing her down all the time. And make no mistake about it, the author is fully aware of this burden. Jane Austen knows her Fanny as well as she does her Emma or Marianne, and paints her with a gentler but equally perceptive touch. Witness a time when Fanny pauses before joining her uncle in the living room : "she paused for what she knew would never come, a courage that the outside of no door had ever given her". As for positive traits - her quiet determination to do the right thing in the face of all opposition is very much that. A silent hero, if you will, one who doesn't claim the center of attention but quietly, persistently follows the path she believes in.

Of course, nothing I say can make Fanny more entertaining than she actually is, and every time I read the book I root for Fanny and Henry getting together and leaving Edmund to Mary. But the book is brave enough to not just hand me the easy ending I want. You know, just like real life. If Fanny is boring, she is neither less good nor less real for that. And the author's sharp tongue amply compensates for Fanny's bland one, the book itself is a classic gem of satirical wisdom.

Re-read it with an open mind and you will find such a difference between your expectation and your experience as "time is for ever producing between the plans and decisions of mortals, for their own instruction and their neighbours' entertainment".

A trip to France

David and I went to France in July. We spent a week in Paris and then traveled to the Loire valley to do some chateaux watching.

Full picture album (without annoying narration) :

https://picasaweb.google.com/116423174638525205555/Paris?authuser=0&feat=directlink and

https://picasaweb.google.com/116423174638525205555/LoireValley?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Paris

We got to Paris on July 11 from Cayman Islands, where we had been attending a friend's wedding. We stayed at a nice, cozy little place called the Familia Hotel in the Latin quarter. It is a nice neighbourhood to walk around in, with some cool ethnic restaurants for when this poor vegetarian got tired of eating some combination of bread, cheese and chocolate. It is also walking distance to the Pantheon and Notre Dame. Which is where we strolled down to that same evening...

From Paris

The Seine river runs through Paris, and has two small islands in it. Notre Dame is on one of the islands - Ile de la Cite. (But the other island has a famous ice cream shop, so it's a tie)

The cathedral is massive and sufficiently grand with beautifully intricate carving and flying buttresses. (I'm vague on the concept of flying buttresses but David was excited about them and took lots of pictures) Its interior succeeds in creating that indefinable atmosphere unique to great places of worship - the kind that makes even the most atheistic person come over all spiritual. Unfortunately in addition to being an incredibly popular tourist destination it is still an active place of worship. You can't help feeling sorry for the priests trying to preach in spite of the throngs of tourists wandering through the church taking pictures.

The next day we went down to the Eiffel Tower. To be honest I expected it to be ugly but it looks quite classy. Up close the metal is a cool brownish color that gives it a sepia tone. Of course this was easily the most crowded place I've ever visited and there were lots of annoying souvenir dealers selling little Eiffel Towers.

From Paris

We spent the next few days exploring the normal tourist destinations, eating a lot and walking a lot. We took a boat trip down the Seine which was very enjoyable, especially on that hot summer afternoon. We went to the Arc de Triomphe and walked down the Champs Elysees. The Montmartre district is a cute, quaint neighbourhood to wander around in - David's father recommended it to us. It is on a hill and at the top of the hill is the Sacre Coeur Basilica. The Louvre is a beautiful building but completely overwhelming as a museum. For one thing it took us more than an hour to buy tickets (you really really should purchase those online). Once in, we took one look at the map and decided that all we could hope for was to glimpse some of the highlights. The most disappointing moment was the Mona Lisa - I sincerely recommend that no one even try to view this painting. All you can see is a sea of people holding up cameras, craning to take pictures over everyone else's heads. And you are forcefully reminded that you too are that most ridiculed of characters - a tourist. Oh well. If you only have a few hours to give the Louvre, its best to stick with the exterior.

From Paris

July 14th was Bastille Day. We were told there would be fireworks at the Eiffel Tower, so we headed down there that evening. Half of Paris was there but we cleverly managed to maneuver our way to a great viewing position, just a few hundred feet away from the tower. Now we just had to wait for darkness to fall. This was a long wait, summer days are really long in Paris and even at 1opm there is some daylight. Eventually around 11 it got dark enough, there were sounds of activity and then the fireworks started... off to our left, over the river, not the tower at all! Fortunately we still got to see them, although the view was not nearly as good. Returning to the hotel was a challenge, with such massive crowds we had to walk a long way to reach a subway station that wasn't suffocatingly crowded.

Around our 5th day the weather changed. It had been beautifully sunny and warm, even in the evening. But now the rain started and it didn't quit for the rest of our trip. Unfortunately neither of us had expected rain so there was some scrambling for appropriate gear. I bought a hideous sweatshirt with PARIS scrawled across the front in big bold letters. After that, David was no longer allowed to take pictures of me.

Versailles

My cousin Darshan lives in Germany and came down to Paris to spend the weekend with us. Which was great because we hadn't seen each other in about 10 years. Together the three of us went to Versailles, which is about a 90 minute train ride from Paris. It was raining when we got there and I hadn't yet acquired the PARIS sweatshirt. Darshan was the only one of us prepared for this weather. So of course I simply stole his jacket. Having learnt from our Louvre experience, I had been very careful to buy tickets in advance this time. I was gloating about this all the way to Versailles but on getting there we discovered that there was a long line just to enter the palace. We stood shivering and wet in the courtyard for another hour while the line slowly snaked forward. Versailles may be a grand palace but my main impression of it was of a stuffy, incredibly crowded place. Only a few of the chambers are open for viewing and everybody gets into a single line and is herded from one room to another. I was too demoralized to even get my camera out as long as we were indoors. After lunch, however, the rain stopped and we ventured into the famous gardens (separate charge).

From Paris

The next day we spent the morning wandering around town and then David & I headed off to Blois in the Loire Valley and Darshan went back to Germany.

The Catacombs

But before I get to Blois, I must tell you about the Catacombs.

Our guide book had a small paragraph on the "catacombs" of Paris which it suggested were worth visiting. The cemeteries in Paris had become over crowded in the 18th century and so many of the bodies had been dug up and reburied in a part of the catacombs - underground passageways. It wasn't clear what there would be to see down there: some graves, maybe a couple of skeletons tossed in a corner. But it sounded like a change from all the history and culture we were feasting on, so I decided to give it a shot. David and I wandered down there one morning only to discover it was Bastille Day and the catacombs were closed. The next day we decided to give it another shot but were out of luck again. The catacombs were open, but there was some glitch. Due to a "technical problem", half the place was closed off and so they could allow only a small number of people down at a time. The wait was a couple of hours, it was recommended we come back another day. Then on Sunday we went there again with Darshan. Third time lucky. Not so much. Yet again there was a long line outside the entrance. Yet again, a helpful official came by with a placard that explained half the place was closed - this time because of "safety concerns". The placard went on helpfully to emphasize that the entrance fee was not reduced. An anticipated 2 hour wait. We left again - as my mother would say "the catacombs weren't in our destiny".

But by now the catacombs began to feel like the most attractive place in Paris and I couldn't rest easy without going there. It turned out that we returned to Paris the day before our flight home and we had half a day to kill. We made a beeline for the catacombs, waited patiently in another long line (this time the placard advertised 'security reasons' for the reduced capacity), got rained on but finally made it in! This was possibly the weirdest place I've been to. As I said before, we didn't know what to expect. A somewhat creepy experience, a couple of skeletons lying in a corner. But we weren't prepared for this :

From Paris

The walls were lined with skulls and bones. No, the walls were skulls and bones - plastered into place - all along the passageway. In places they were arranged in bizarre decorative formations. How anyone could think this was an appropriate way to treat their ancestor's bodies is beyond me! It was creepy and deeply disturbing, I can't believe this is a tourist attraction and I am so glad we did get to see it.

Loire Valley

Anyway, so on to the Loire. The Loire valley gets its name from a river that runs through it. For some reason the valley is filled with chateaux and the chateaux is what we wanted to see. Our first stop was in the town of Blois, which turned out to be an absolutely adorable medieval town fulfilling all my old Europe fantasies of narrow alleyways, cobblestones and cute buildings. Its also a popular base for touring the nearby chateaux.

From Loire Valley

We hadn't rented a car, so our travel was limited by public transportation. There is a bus that goes to nearby chateaux and we took it to Chambord and Cheverny.

Chambord has a combination fort and hunting lodge feel with its keep, towers and large halls. It also has the most extensive grounds in France. It has an interesting double helix staircase in the center of the building. Two entwined sets of spiral stairs climbing to the top without ever meeting. It was a pleasure to wander at will through this castle after the restrictive, crowded tour of Versailles. I would have taken far more pictures here but I got separated from David and spent most of my time looking for him. He spent this time wandering around unperturbed, taking pictures...

From Loire Valley

After Chambord we went to Cheverny. This is a more modest chateau - I don't believe any kings ever owned it, only lowly noblemen. It is well known for (of all things) its kennel full of hounds.

From Loire Valley

The next day we took a train to Chenenceau, which is the most popular of the Loire chateaux. It has a unique location, built right on the banks of a river with a long hall that spans the river.

From Loire Valley

We were told that during the second world war, one bank of the river was in occupied France and the other in Free France. So resistance fighters helped people escape by bringing them in through the front door and out across the long hall. To be honest this sounds like a made up story to me. But I heard it several times and even Wikipedia says so, so it must be true! (By the way we saw several references to the "Resistance" in the Loire towns: roads, squares and even a Resistance museum right next to our hotel. We would have visited it but the museum hours had been explicitly designed to discourage visitors.) This was the most crowded of the Loire chateaux we saw, even though some tourists must have been kept away by the pouring rain. Fortunately the place is large enough that it was still a lot of fun wandering through the various rooms. We got to see the kitchen and pantry which was an opportunity to glimpse the behind-the-scenes life at a castle. Overall, in spite of the rain, it was a very enjoyable trip. Also the food at the adjoining restaurant was surprisingly good.

Oh, and the chateau was designed and owned by multiple women so its called the women's chateau. Which sounds a little soppy but maybe explains why it is so elegant looking.

From Loire Valley

(Several places had scaffolding due to ongoing construction work. And the scaffolding was always covered with fabric that was painted to look like the building. Not fooling anyone obviously, but much less of an eyesore. Quite a cute idea).

That brings us to the last couple of days of our trip. I'd been intrigued by a hotel called the Chateau de Verrieres in Saumur. Excited at the idea of staying at a real chateau and spurred on by the Trip Advisor reviews, I booked us into this hotel for the last couple of nights. It was a lovely place but disappointing from my point of view. The experience was that of staying at a luxury bed and breakfast, rather than a historic building. The chateau is very large for a home but small for a chateau! Still, the place is charming and the big bedroom and giant bathroom was a welcome change after the tiny "European" hotels we had stayed in so far.

From Loire Valley

And just like that, our trip was over. We went back to Paris on Friday, finally finally got to experience the Catacombs, stayed at an airport hotel and took the morning flight back to California.

A really fun trip in which I learned some rather random things. For instance that France (presumably all of Europe) has embraced 24 hr time with a vengeance. And that our US credit cards don't work in the Paris metro because they have no chip. Also three weeks is too long to stay away from work and I get impatient to return. And how much I like where I live, because I'm homesick even when I am at the most beautiful places in the world.

(More pictures at :

https://picasaweb.google.com/116423174638525205555/Paris?authuser=0&feat=directlink and

https://picasaweb.google.com/116423174638525205555/LoireValley?authuser=0&feat=directlink)