Stroll the avenues taking in landmark architecture and pausing to make acquaintances along the way in Sasek's caricature of the city, This is Paris.

Bakery cases holding macarons arrange the cookie sandwiches into a rainbow of rows in Easter basket hues. Perfumed in flavors like violet, spice bread, and chocolate,they are served in the likes of Paris's Ladurée where they were conceived in the 1930's.

Aboard the TGV, french-speaking Belgium is less than an hour and a half away from Paris. Reputed for the confection of chocolate and beer, and its wealth of Art Nouveau architecture, why not steal a weekend away in Brussels?

Following the blow of World War I, Paris underwent a period of rebirth. Women celebrated newfound liberty in both the way they carried and costumed themselves. These fashions born from the 20's, now on exhibit at the Musée Galliera, are timeless. Infuse your style with some of their extravagance.

Take a peek into the shop windows on the Grandes Avenues decorated for Christmas. Everything is awash in creams and golds.

Take to the streets. Raise your signs and voices in a chorus of contempt. The habitually flaunted right to strike falls second only to tennis as the French national pastime. During a grève, those motivated to work must forage passage as metro grills close and trains are annulled.

The Fleche d'Or is a rare club that offers a diverse scheduling of music, several shows booked into an evening, all free to those willing to line up. I arrived early for a serenade from songbird Alela Diane on the dawn of the release of her album in Europe.

A choicely placed last hurrah of summer, this years Rock en Seine Festival was a well-organized, eclectic assortment of music loosely grouped into the genre of rock. Sets by M.I.A., the Shins, the Hives, Emilie Simon, Arcade Fire, and CSS, were topped like icing on a cake by Bjork’s performance.

France's biannual sales motivate shoppers into a consumer frenzy, not on account of groundbreaking prices, though they do relieve some of the sticker shock I experience in regarding price tags. No stranger to the Parisian boutiques, I usually greet the storm on the first day of the soldes.

France’s emerging avant-garde artists of 1960 sought to renew artistic forms. Choosing abstraction as a vehicle they focused on the human body and everyday objects. Under the roof of the Grand Palais, remnants of New Realism have been amassed as evidence to the artistry behind their production.