Letter From Paris
Paris Kiosque - April 2000 - Volume 7, Number 4
Copyright (c) 2000 Harriet Welty-Rochefort - Used with permission.
April in Paris is here and and if you didn't know it from the buds on
the trees, you'd know it from the covers on the French women's magazines in
the newsstands.
Every couverture, it would seem, features a fresh young flat-bellied
blonde looking out at you challengingly. Next to her is some title
screaming that she has lost four zillion pounds in two days.
Sure.
In spite of my cynicism, I found myself staring at those magazine
covers more and more. When, one fine morning, I stepped on the scale, I
decided it was time to take action if I was ever going to look like that
pulchritudinous creature. Nothing drastic, mind you, no sweating, jogging,
push-ups or anything of a strenuous nature. No, some light eating and a
change of scenery, I was sure, would be just the ticket.
So, speaking of tickets, I bought one: to St.-Jean-de-Luz, a pretty town
of 12,000 in the southwest of France, where there is a "thalassotherapie"
institute right on the sea. If you are wondering what that big word,
"thalassotherapie", means, the translation is "seawater therapy". Also
called hydrotherapy, this technique of using sea water to cure people's ills
was discovered by Frenchman Louison Bobet, a Tour de France cyclist who was
injured and healed by the seawater of his native Brittany. He was so
impressed that he decided to promote the concept in a big way. That was in
the 1960s and now there are fifty thalassotherapy centers all over France's
coasts.
What do you do at these centers? There's a cure for almost everything.
You can spend a week focusing on your legs, or your back, or your beauty.
Young mothers can go to relax and get back in shape after having had a baby
- and bébé can go along! There's also a cure for people who seriously want
to lose weight. Many of the people though are not there for that purpose.
They are there because they want to be pampered and coddled. Some people do
go to lose weight. They also want to be pampered and coddled. I was one of
them.
My cure was the general one called "bien-étre" which translates to
"well-being". My well-being started out with breakfast in bed with the
newspaper (hey, you need a good start to the day, right?), and two
well-balanced, aesthetically pleasing light meals taken in a spacious
dining room overlooking the sea. This being France, even the light food
looked and tasted scrumptious. The menus were heavy on fish and vegetables
which were quite good but what I looked forward to were the desserts. Yes,
desserts! How about a "biscuit roulé à l'orange", a chocolate cake with an
orange filling, or a "clafoutis de fruit d'hiver", a baked fruit pie, or my
favorite, a "fondant de chocolate à l'orange", another chocolate-orange
combination. I kept wishing I could bring the chef home with me!
When not at meals,
I was immersed in green goo, or various baths such as
the "underwater shower" in which you are in a huge bathtub
with an attendant squirting a hose at your ankles, back, shoulders. Fine by
me! There was also a hammam I hung out in as much as my body would allow me
to, and a sauna and a big pool, not to mention the entire beach outside for
walking. I enjoyed four days of this unbelievable and unusual attention
to my little self. The recommended amount of time is six days and more if
one can. It sounds like a lot but when you think that the French have
five weeks of vacation, this week only represents ONE of them!
When not immersing myself in water, I strolled around in the streets of
St.-Jean-de-Luz whose claim to fame is that it was here that the Sun King
married the Spanish Infante, Maria-Theresa. Other, more prosaic, Spanish
influences are the "bodegas" or small restaurants selling "bocadillos",
tasty looking sandwiches I couldn't touch because I was being serious about
eating light food. Other things I resisted: the gateau Basque, a sweet
cake which must have been oh so good with a cup of coffee or tea, and the
tourons, an egg white and almond confection I was dying to try.
It was a good thing I resisted such temptations, though. Four days
later, I weighed five pounds less. As I boarded the train for Paris, I
decided that next spring I would disregard those covers on women's
magazines. Instead, I'll head straight back to my "thalasso" which I fully
intend to make a yearly outing.
Maybe I can give that skinny young thing on the cover of "Elle" some
competition. At least I'll have a good time trying.
You can read the complete version of Harriet's thalassotherapy trip with an
account of her many food adventures in France in her next book, which will
be published by St. Martin's Press this year.
Harriet Welty-Rochefort, a bona fide Midwesterner from
Iowa, visited Paris for the first time while in
college. She became so completely enamored of
France that she stayed. Her first book -
French Toast
- is a lighthearted look at
French manners and mores.
Harriet lives in Paris with her French husband and two Franco-American sons.
You can meet the whole family by visiting their website at
http://perso.club-internet.fr/hwelty/
If you've had some funny, startling, satisfying, or dismaying
food experiences in France you'd like to share,
you may contact Harriet directly at
hwelty@club-internet.fr.
Editor's Note:
Dear Readers, while our writers are always
delighted to hear and to receive comments, both about their columns in the The Paris Kiosque,
as well as your experiences in Paris,
they are unable to answer any requests
for travel information.
Thank you for your understanding.
