One of the great things about spending 2 whole weeks in Paris is that it gives us time to do a bit more exploring outside of the center of the city. We'd always been fascinated by cemeteries and had already visited Pere Lachaise twice on previous trips. On that subject, did you know that the oldest pet cemetery in Europe (it's often claimed to be the oldest in the world) Cimetière des Chiens, established in 1899, is located in the suburbs of Paris, right across the Seine from the 10th Arrondissement in Asnières-sur-Seine? I took a look at this web page, saw a familiar name, and convinced the Missus it would worth a morning visit.
So, there we were catching the metro after our morning croissant and coffee, ending up at the Mairie de Clichy metro station and then taking the 20 minute walk, crossing the Seine, and ending up at these gates.
Talk about a rather grand entrance! We arrived at just past the opening time of 10am, paid our €3.50 entrance fee and walked on in.
Right at the entrance is a statue of the famous rescue dog Barry (who is actually in the Natural History Museum of Bern).
The inscription on the plaque reads:
"He saved the lives of forty people. He was killed by the forty-first"
Though according to several sources Barry was retired to Bern, Switzerland to live out the rest of his years.
Lest you think it's just pooches interred here…..
There's even a cat mausoleum in the cemetery.
Some of the graves date back to when the cemetery was established. This one goes back to 1900!
This one is for the two pooches of a Princess.
And this one is for the one and only Rin Tin Tin….yes that Rin Tin Tin.
Still, it was the other tombstones that caught our attention. There were several folks in the cemetery tending graves of their beloved.
You can tell they were loved.
They give so much to us……..
I know we still talk about Sammy and Frankie everyday.
Sometimes when we travel, we're rushing from place to place, from event to event. Having some time to just stroll and think about how lucky we are and how blessed we are does one good and puts things into perspective.
Cimetière des Chiens et Autres Animaux Domestiques
4 Pont de Clichy
92600 Asnières-sur-Seine, France
We crossed the Seine and headed on back to out apartment. After a short break, we decided to head on out to do some "lèche-vitrine" ("window licking") the French term for window shopping. This took us down to the area around Rue de Rivoli. When it came time for lunch; the Missus, knowing we had dinner reservations at a Brasserie was craving some Asian food. I had an interesting place on my "list" named Chez Ajia, run by a husband and wife team, she is the chef and hails from Taiwan and her husband who is French runs the front of house.
We arrived just past 1pm and easily found a table. We found out that the nice gentleman taking our order is one of the owners; he was really friendly, spoke perfect English, and turned out to be quite entertaining; more on that later. The restaurant is what I would call "coffeehouse – cozy". What was interesting is that you are given a device with three buttons on it, like we have at many Korean restaurants here; to call for service or your check. The menu was full of basic Taiwanese "standards".
The Missus is always up for eggs, so we started with a basic Basil Omelette (10€).
This was like something you'd make at home, it could have used more salty – savory tones, the eggs were adequately fluffy.
We ordered the "Loh Bih" (16€) which had some of favorite side dishes.
The eggs were very tasty and the bean curd skin knots were nicely marinated. The pig ears were not seasoned enough and the smoked tofu and seaweed tasted like it came out of a package from 99 Ranch Market.
Meanwhile, the owner, I believe his name is Geoffrey came on over and started chatting with us. And frankly, this was the most memorable part of the meal. He asked us where we were from and we said San Diego…he then asked us where in San Diego and we said "Bay Park". He knew exactly where it was! You see, he spent a year in college at SDSU! And then for some reason we mentioned Hacienda Heights and Rowland Heights. And he said he spent almost year nearby when going to the University. He asked us where about and we mentioned being near Colima Road at HK Plaza. He then said something that made us totally crack up – "so, you could smell the chou doufu then….." Yes, I guess the "scent of Shau Mei" extends all the way to Paris!
The last item of the meal was our favorite, the Guo Bao (11€).
The bao was on the gummy side; but the pork belly was nicely balanced in flavor, just enough sweet to even out the soy sauce, the meat was very tender with a nice savory porkiness to it.
It was a good way to end an interesting meal.
Yes, our first two meals back in Paris was Sichuan and now Taiwanese. Heck, we were spending two weeks here, why not eat like we live here, right?
Chez Ajia
4 Rue du Roi de Sicile
75004 Paris, France
Thanks for stopping by!
The Laundry" hangs over a bowl with a smoky-mildly spicy chili oil, with a large dollop of garlic paste in the middle. We quickly noticed that fat was dripping off the slices of pork belly enhancing the concoction.
This was an interesting Liang Cai (cold dishes) trio; the Duck Tongue in a chili oil was interesting. Usually, when we've had duck tongue, there's a hard inedible piece of bone in the center making eating it somewhat ponderous. The center of the tongue in this dish was cartilaginous, reminding us of 
And just wandered around. I ended up buying more Tarbais beans in the shop/deli above….yep, 35€ a kilo and I bought another half kilo.
The pig tongue was as expected, fairly chewy and very porky. Quite typical.
We quickly noticed that on this visit, the dumpling wrappers were very soft, lacking in the slight "pull" that we enjoy in jiaozi wrappers. The filling of the shrimp, pork, and leek was very moist and actually had a good amount of "soup" in them…very nicely flavored, though a bit short in the shrimp department.
But man, that filling was so gamy, moist, juice just poured out of it when I took a bite.
We did notice that the dish has changed since our last visit. The shrimp shells and the shrimp seems to have some coating; like the tofu skin, the portion size is smaller. The shrimp is not quite as delicate as it used to be. But the flavor is still there and the shells and tail are a pleasure to eat.
Soon enough the large plate of bun, herbs, and veggies. And of course the Missus enjoys the Banh Trang Me dipping it into the mam nem. As for the Mam Nem, we noticed that it's not quite as potent as it used to be.
As you can see, the Missus was all about the tamago on this day. This bowl had a lot of "stuffs"; scallion, spinach, bean sprouts, cabbage. The best item in the entire bowl was the menma which had a wonderful texture and the earthy-soy sauce tones were on point. The two slices of "chashu", I use the quotation marks because the two thin slices were not pork belly, it was lean and tough. 
