The first time is always the sweetest.
When I saw Paris for the first time, I was filled with a sense of surreal wonderment. Maybe because I couldn’t believe that I was actually there. I felt like I was the luckiest girl on earth! It was 1999. I was single and ready to fall in love. The City of Lights offered all kinds of possibilities. It didn’t matter whether I was alone or with a lover (or was in fact with a production team, shooting a documentary). Paris opened up all my senses and just like that, I fell absolutely in love with her. Armed with my very basic Nikon FM10 (you can’t get any more basic than that) and a dozen Kodak Gold film rolls, I tried to capture her beauty in the ordinary, everyday things. But it was a stroll through a Sunday market one morning that allowed me to capture the delicious, the colorful and the sublime. Resurrected from the dredges of my photo albums, here are some images taken on that fine Sunday morning that would explain why I was so smitten with Paris and why I will never, ever, tire of going back.
“Every flower is a soul blossoming in nature.”
-Gerard de Nerval, French poet
“Only peril can bring the French together. One can’t impose unity out of the blue on a country that has 265 different kinds of cheese.”
– Charles de Gaulle
“Once we hit forty, women only have about four taste buds left: one for vodka, one for wine, one for cheese, and one for chocolate.”
-Gina Barreca, American author
“A world without tomatoes is like a string quartet without violins.”
– Laurie Colwin, American author
“Impartiality is an acquired taste, like olives. You have to be habituated to it.”
-Simon Hirsch Rifkind
“Where there is no wine there is no love.”
-Euripides, Greek tradegian
An artist has no home in Europe except in Paris.
-Friedrich Nietzsche
“If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.”
-Ernest Hemingway
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Great travel photos. I should shoot more like this when I travel! 🙂
Hey Gladys. Thanks! My motto is to ‘just point and shoot’. !:) Happy travels!
Oh gosh, I remember the first time I went to Paris… it also felt surreal!
Hi Gay. Mismo! It was so unreal, as if I was in a dream the whole time haha
hi, very lovely photos from your nikon fm10 🙂 i would love to shoot using my nikon fm2 too but its too bulky with the zoom lens 🙁
i will be traveling to paris for the first time this coming sept 1 and i am very very excited :)) which market is this?
btw, ive started travel blogging too. i will link you up 🙂
Hi Yvonne! Wow! Inggit! This market is at the Rue President Wilson. But not sure anymore if they still set up there since these pics were taken 15 years ago haha. I have to say iba talaga ang quality ng film photography ‘no? They’re really quite beautiful as they are, no need for editing at all. Enjoy Paris. YOU WILL LOVE IT! Will link up with you, too. Happy travels!
Hi Yvonne! Wanted to comment on your website but there’s no comment form. You also don’t have a contact page.:(
hi, just read your reply. sayang i was not able to read it before my trip 😀 is this the camera na nawala? oh no! sorry to remind you though 😀
favor naman, can u check my blog again. comments section should be there 🙂
paris je t’aime. even this song sounds “philosophically” romantic. enjoy!
cool! I didn’t know you can post a video on the comments page. hahaha. ganda ng kanta.:) let’s sing a long!
and this one, too. 🙂
nice to listen to this while looking at the photos! thanks, charles!
i love the “vintage” photos feel. made paris even more beautiful, if that’s even possible. 🙂
Thanks, Paul! Looking at these pictures never fails to take me back to that day.:)
Great photos! And quotes too. I am going to Paris next week for the first time. Can’t wait.
Hi Lisa! Good luck on your trip! You will love it there. *sigh*