{"id":949,"date":"2013-04-28T13:39:13","date_gmt":"2013-04-28T03:39:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sugarpopblue.com.au\/blog\/?p=949"},"modified":"2016-09-08T13:33:35","modified_gmt":"2016-09-08T03:33:35","slug":"26-my-paris-a-date-with-oscar-wilde-and-the-notre-dame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sugarpopblue.com.au\/blog\/26-my-paris-a-date-with-oscar-wilde-and-the-notre-dame\/","title":{"rendered":"27. A Tour of Pere Lachaise Cemetary"},"content":{"rendered":"

The sky is a brilliant blue today in the Marais.<\/p>\n

The sun peeks through the light cloud cover; bright enough to put a skip in my step but not quite strong enough to melt away the chill in the air. The perfect weather for a romantic stroll through Cimeti\u00e8re du P\u00e8re-Lachaise<\/a> a.k.a. Pere Lachaise Cemetery – arguably the most visited cemetery in the world.<\/p>\n

We jump on the metro and disembark at Gambetta<\/em> for the quickest route to our date with Oscar. It’s the farthest out of Paris’ city centre that we’ve travelled so far, but the map makes it look much further than it actually is. The trip only takes us fifteen minutes or so from our apartment, near Hotel de Ville<\/em>.<\/p>\n

On the short walk to the cemetery entrance, we pass a strategically-placed flower shop, and stop to buy some roses for our fallen friends.<\/p>\n

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\nThrough the gates at the North-Eastern “Porte Gambetta”, we are confronted by a suburb of headstones. (Thankfully there is kiosk with fold-out maps<\/a> near the entrance, without which we’d have been completely lost – this is no small-town Sunnydale cemetery<\/a>!)<\/p>\n

The sky is littered with crosses, each one distinct in some way or another. From wrought-iron beasts to stained-glass beauties, we are dazzled by the variety and abundance of them;<\/p>\n

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We follow the grey paved road around the outskirts of the cemetery, passing graphic memorials to victims of torture and genocide from each of the Nazi concentration camps;<\/p>\n

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It is our second encounter<\/a> with the Holocaust this trip, and the experience is none-the-easier. The skeletal effigies are striking with their widened eyes and mouths as if frozen mid-scream; their pain and suffering forever immortalised in stone… lest we forget. It is saddening (an under-statement!) to think of the cruelty they endured, as we stand and bow our heads in silence for them.<\/p>\n

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We walk on, admiring the elaborately gothic crypts that line each path, as well the plaques and monuments to loved ones;<\/p>\n

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 <\/a>Eventually, we find our way to Oscar<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Tall and proud he stands still, adorned by the lipstick embraces of countless fans;<\/p>\n

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The plastic barrier around his tomb is so tattooed by snippets of his poetry that it is now fenced off and unreachable by tourists. It doesn’t stop me though, as I reach over the basket of love-notes and throw my flower at his feet, the only rose to reach him.<\/p>\n

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\nOne of my earliest muses, his way with words<\/a> shaped my love for literature half my life ago. I’ve spent the last fifteen years in the shadow of such great writers<\/a>, striving to be their equals. And so it was magnificently humbling to be able to stand at the final resting place of one of my mentors, with a simple offering, and a simple word of “thanks”.<\/p>\n

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\nThe little sparrow – Edith Piaf<\/a> – is next on our list. Her demure grave is as small and unassuming as she was in her last days. Easy to miss (if it weren’t for the crowd surrounding the grave), her name is emblazoned on the side of the stone along with her family’s.<\/p>\n

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Her emotionally-charged voice crooned it’s way into my soul around the same time that I discovered Oscar; the sorrow and joys of her life translated directly into song. <\/p>\n