Paris: hits and misses, and a miss to miss

This blog is no longer the preserve of a Parisian, so perhaps it is too early to be too dogmatic about what to look back on with a smile and what to be glad to see the back of.

But here goes anyway:

Picture: JammyCat.

What I'll miss:

* The sheer man-made beauty of both banks of the Seine

* The Métro. Parisians complain, of course, but it almost always worked for me

* Eurostar within easy reach

* Being able to get Indian food delivered to the door (even the Parisian version is better than nothing)

* Rebecca. Who is Rebecca Schofield? Bill Taylor asked the question when I used Rebecca's computer to make an e-mail response to his photo website.
She is, or was, my assistant. As an Englishwoman living in Paris (with a rural bolt hole), and as wife, mother, go-getter and unrivalled collector of friends, she knows just about everything about living in France

* And Rebecca will miss being reminded of Robin, the young work experience visitor who wrote in his subsequent school project of her dynamism and her ability to keep her desk tidy "amidst general disorder". He also lopped 15 years off our ages

* That view. I tried my best to give the impression of being blasé, but you cannot keep a straight face for long while feigning indifference to a panorama that begins with the Louvre, takes in the Tuileries with the Musée d'Orsay, twin spires of Ste Clotilde and the Assemblée Nationale as backdrop before arriving at the Eiffel Tower via Invalides and the Champs Elysées. Breathtaking

* Keeping relatively fit by fast-walking circuits of the Tuileries

* Parisian jazz

* Lifts to Parisian badminton clubs from Ming Lam, my friend from the Auberge des Gourmets Chinese restaurant.

* Being able to walk to functions at the Elysée, Quai d'Orsay or British Embassy. In fact, being able to walk to most places in the city centre

* Easy access to live English football whether or not you secretly have one of those Sky cards at home

And what I won't:

* The price of everything from mushroom omelette and chips to an unremarkable baguette in the 1st arrondissement

* The army of beggars. Paris seems to have more than most cities and a large proportion seems genuine, distinguishing them from the shift working professionals I have seen in action from Lyons to London. If the current wave of protests in support of France's SDFs - sans domicile fixe - inspires effective, humane action, it has my blessing

* Having to count a few extra seconds as drivers whizz by after pedestrian crossing lights turn green, and even then venturing out warily

* The feeling at the height of summer that there is no escape from the clammy heat

* Clanking old lifts that spot heavy bags a kilometre off and render themselves en panne

* And yes, there has to be more. But for once, I have run out of negative thoughts.....for now.

Adieu to the rue de Rivoli

Only three weeks to go so we invited the concierge and his wife to our farewell to Paris party. They couldn't make it, though the crown princess who will one day rule as Queen Victoria came instead.

But that's being extravagant with the truth.


The lovely Princess Victoria of Sweden was indeed in our building on the rue de Rivoli, the Daily Telegraph office-cum-apartment that has been our home, shared with a procession of colleagues from London, for two-and-a-half years.

But the nearest she came to attending my shindig was when she bowled over to my wife at the bottom of the lift shaft, assuming her to be part of the Parisian Swedish Circle's welcoming party.

We'd agreed to take it in turns to make sure guests to each function were ushered to the right one.



As it happens, and despite the fact that we were able to secure the presence of not only two ambassadors but the charming and witty Petite Anglaise (leading me to speculate that this must surely outrank one Scandinavian princess), it was not too difficult to make the distinction.

None of those attending our party wore formal evening dress. And, as a mark of the leaner times upon which their hosts had fallen, our guests were mostly carrying bottles or titbits of food, or both.


  
"Il y a un petit problème," the concierge had said when I asked him to join us and our friends and colleagues for Saturday's modest soirée to mark the end of two eras - mine as a Telegraph journalist and the Telegraph's (rather longer) presence in two of Paris's most chic arrondissements, the 1st and the 8th.

The Swedes had their royal reception, the concierge added in worried tones, and the strict security measures included the stipulation No Press.

Luckily, our neighbours saw the funny side of one minor snag: the majority of our people were indeed likely to be press. In the end, the building somehow accommodated all their guests and all of ours. The sifting process at the lift worked a treat.

To the horror of one or two French friends, we'd promised only a "light buffet" and the more sensible guests dined out before arriving. But the light buffet stretched an awful long way and I fear I shall be eating the remains - cheese, crisps and charcuterie - until we leave for the Var immediately after Christmas.

Living at the office has been a far from ideal arrangement.

But when you peer out from the living room, directly opposite the Tuileries, you get as good a view as you'll find in most parts of Paris.

It runs from the Louvre to the Eiffel Tower and takes in all the landmarks in between, and we have been fortunate - despite those benign invasions of our privacy from London - to experience it.

Successive Telegraph correspondents, dating from before the Second World War, have had similar luck, being based in a series of imposing offices in the 1st and 8th arrondissements. Soon, for us, it is to be adieu to the rue de Rivoli, au revoir to Paris.

Among regrets, one sticks out. Why didn't I put more pressure on the mayor of the 14th arrondissement to order the demolition of the Tour Montparnasse, the one ghastly blot on the landscape as seen from our room with a view*.

* Captured here, in photos two and three, by one Bill Taylor, who may have a flawed outlook on penal matters but knows a bit about photography. The first is mine and the last, a family snap taken by me on Tour de France finale day, shows how thin you'd need to be to dine on the balcony.