Paris… Paris is the River Seine… a flowing mirror… an opaque reflection of magic… Paris is tango lessons along the river bank of couples forehead to forehead, locked at the shoulders… Paris is click clack stilettos of these dancing women as they drift into a moonlight dream and melt into the nocturnal waters of the river. Paris is a silver haired stout Romanian wearing a hat and an old tweed jacket playing chords from Edith Piaf’s “La Vie en Rose” on the pont Neuf… Paris is lovers embracing on the sidewalks of the bridge.

Paris is faux balconies of white lacquered French windows dressed in heavy beige drapery concealing the secrets of lives beyond… Paris is beautiful women with deep-set solemn eyes… eyes that tell stories of how difficult it is to be that beautiful… Paris is well-groomed handsome men dressed in knotted scarves sitting at cafes along the Boulevard St. Germain. Paris is a reminiscent painting of the great French intellectuals of older times … Sartre… Camus… at those very same cafes. Paris is the sound of chapel bells coming to life from Hugo’s “The Hunch Back of Notre Dame”.

Paris is chocolateries… Paris is indulging one’s eyes in window displays of crystallized marron glaces in winter and pastel-colored macaroons in spring. Paris is minimalist statuettes posing as mannequins of quintessential boutiques dressed in sublime yet understated pieces that are to become the world’s upcoming fashion trends… All pieces in grayscale except for a splash of color from an occasional interference of that must-have accessory.

Paris is pitter patter raindrops. Paris is also rain showers that leave you unexpectedly but pleasantly drenched. Paris is gray heavy skies carrying the promise of life and orange beams of an envious sun wanting to be a part of the city’s grand panorama as well. Paris is glistening cobblestone streets after the rain.

Paris is the conquering scent of a crusty country baguette from a local artisan boulangerie… so delectable that one not only smells it but can hear it from blocks away.

Paris is upscale dog grooming salons for those who want to give their best friends that extra gesture of love.

And yes Paris is a homeless gentleman who sleeps peacefully on a stack of mismatching color-faded duvets over a steaming sewage grid that keeps him warm on those chilly nights. If you allow the landscape beyond his “bed” to blend into a pixelated blur, you begin to realize that this is “home”.

Paris is the Musee du Louvre. Paris is Mona Lisa’s gaze from beyond a glass menagerie longing to be set free.

Paris is the amusing circus of the metro… Hop-on-hop-off acts. Sights and smells of people from everywhere oddly forced to melange into an awkward underground space.

Eighteen years later and all this is still Paris today… Except… Paris today is also automatic cashiers at the Bonmarche relieving one of the so-called burden of exchanging pleasantries at “human” cash counters. Paris today is locked eyes on screens of tablets on buses that have replaced pages and pages of conventional books.

Paris today is a newspaper article in “Le Figaro” featuring the story a fifteen year old girl who was banned from school in France for wearing a long black skirt that was deemed to be “too religious for a secular society”. Paris is simultaneously a rebuttal twitter hashtag… “I wear my skirt as I please”… Wait a second, I could have sworn I saw that very same black satin skirt in the window of that trendy neighborhood boutique on the opposite side of the road? Didn’t’ you?

Paris today is the Grand Mosque in the 5th arrondisement. Paris is its Moorish style courtyard with blue mosaic tiles covered in polyethylene sheets because of its freshly painted walls… A courtyard of trees with large green leaves that make it look like a mini oasis. The caretaker of the mosque comes towards me and smiles. Did you know, he says, that this very mosque was a refuge for Jews fleeing from the persecutions of Nazi Germany? No I didn’t actually.

Today, I see two women enter the mosque. I follow them as they descend towards the women’s prayer room in the basement. I realize I am no longer smelling the dizzying paint from above but instead I find myself trying to block out the foul smelling restroom on my right from getting to my head. They enter the women’s prayer room… a hexagon shaped room covered from end to end with an old rug that used to be cream colored I think but has turned into a sickly green from years and years of neglect. The rug smells too. I watch them as they silently pray the afternoon prayer.

I wait for them to walk out of the room and I ask rhetorically “You are Parisans right?”. The older one replies with a nonchalant “Yes” as she fixes the safety pin of her head scarf. She raises her head and smiles and asks me where I am from. I tell her that I am from a small island off the eastern coast of Saudi Arabia and she says “Wow. Le Mecque” meaning “Makkah”. I tell her “Yes quite close to Makkah”. I feel her heart sink. “And in your island there are mosques everywhere?” she says with a child-like twinkle in her eyes. “Yes quite a lot of mosques” I reply. “Sometimes two on the same street”. She says with a sigh “I love the sight of minarets. You know we don’t have many in Paris.” I nod and bid them farewell. They decide that this conversation has turned us into friends and they each give me a tight hug me before I leave the mosque. They tell me their names and I say “Pleasure meeting you. My name is Salama”… Paris today is these two women… Amina and her twenty-something daughter, Kenza.

I need to hurry up now. Only forty-eight hours in insatiable Paris and I still have so much to see, so much to taste, so much to take in… My pace is no longer that of an explorer’s stroll. I must run across the Seine to make it to Isle St. Louis before the sun sets. I want to see it in daylight eighteen years later. Once I get there, I will walk towards Berthillion and and ask for two scoops of hazlenut ice cream with my forced French accent just like I used to do eighteen years ago….”Bonjour Monsieur. Deux boules de glaces aux noisettes s’il vous plait”. Mmmm…Two scoops of hazelnut ice-cream. My favorite.

I stop and look back and see the shrunken top of the Grand mosque’s minaret. Smaller and smaller it gets. I need to hurry up. No time to waste. I stop once again and look back. This time, the minaret is no where in sight. Amina was right.