What You Can’t Do in Paris & Other Inexplicable French Things...

After Arles we stayed in Paris for two nights. We’ve already seen many of the famous sights and museums in the City of Light, so we decided to take it easy during our single day here. We walked around, drinking in the beautiful architecture...and the funny wordless signs that seem to be everywhere. Some were easy to understand, others were puzzling.

"DO" & "DON'T" signs at the entrance to a Paris park. 

And this interesting sign, which we found at the top of a down escalator in a Carrefours Supermarket. OK, I understand the two outside signs. But what is the middle one telling us to NOT do?: 

An Inexplicable French Thing...

This HUGE sign was hung above the entrance to Paris' Gare du Nord (North Train Station). A photo of a leopard walking down steps covered with cups of hot chocolate! No title, no explanation. What Jim calls "another inexplicable French thing." Poor leopard. The humiliated look on his face says "why are they making me do this?" We wonder why, too.

Jim wanted to go inside the Cathedral of Notre Dame (of Hunchback fame), so we queued up with all the other tourists to enter. On the way in we were amused by the wordless signs telling tourists what they CAN’T DO in the Cathedral. One must be silent and respectful, of course. And you can’t bring a suitcase in, or take photos with a flash. Our favorite “don’t” sign showed pictures of the kinds of hats that can’t be worn in the church. Baseball caps, knit toboggan caps, and fedoras are forbidden. Apparently ladies’ dress hats are OK, and of course the head coverings that Muslim women wear. Skull caps are surely acceptable as well as the pointed miters that bishops and popes wear. Is it OK to wear a cowboy hat in the cathedral? A straw boater? A tiara? Next time I visit the Cathedral of Notre Dame, I’m wearing my tiara.

And what happens if you are caught wearing one of the forbidden hats in the Cathedral? Jim thinks that the punishment is illustrated in the carved arch above the Cathedral’s central door. It depicts Judgement Day. Christ sits on his throne, surrounded by saints. Below him are lines of people headed to the left and right. The souls on the left, faces raised upward, are being led by an angel to heaven. The miserable souls on the right, agonizing, are being led in chains to eternal damnation. These are the trespassers who wore the forbidden hats in Paris’ Cathedral of Notre Dame...