PUCES!

...meaning fleas! As in markets; as in flea markets, or marches aux puces.

On Sunday I visited the world-famous flea market at St. Ouen, just outside Paris' city limits. It is huge and rather intimidating, but also ridiculously interesting. The first section you go through is a sort of sketchy-looking collection of stalls, mostly populated by people trying to push knock-off items on you. Most of them are not worth inspecting, but a few had tempting nargiles (or hookahs, for all you who have not spent time in Turkey...) with good flavors.

Going farther in you get more lost, but the things get better: the clothes stalls don't just sell cheap last-season fashion, but edgier, vintage items. Other vendors displayed Tibetan prayer flags, Che t-shirts and Tupac banners. They also got less pushy.

But the real change comes when you enter the markets that are housed in the permanent buildings. Most of these are antique markets, some of the best in the world, and I saw some great stuff. Many of these stalls are actually glass cases in the buildings with humidity control. the first one I looked at sold paintings and trinkets from the end of Imperial Russia. There were prints of Nicholas II and Alexandra, copies of proclamations, toys, and decorative items.

Some stalls just had modern reproductions of tackily neo-neo-Classical furniture pieces, but I saw a fair few Louis XIV chaises, original paintings and small boxes. But by far the most interesting and amazing piece I saw was an antique harp, dating from when Lyon and Healy (the biggest harp company in the U.S. and probably the world) was just Lyon - my mother would know better, but I'd say early 1800's? It had two sets of strings that crossed each other about two thirds of the way down to the soundboard and just one pedal. As far as I could tell, everything on the was still original; the strings were limed or rusted or something, and only a few were left. The designs in the molding were barely recognizable, but the guy said it was bronze. I asked him a few questions about it, but he said - and it's very likely - that I probably knew more about it than he did. There weren't enough strings for me to give the instrument a proper test, but those that were there had sufficient pressure to make a tone when I plucked them. I'd never seen a harp with a double set of strings, so that was very exciting.

Other stalls were interesting, too, and I think I'll go back and look around at some of the vintage clothes. I only had about two hours there because I was trying to make a concert, but I will let you know when I've explored more thoroughly.