Above is the dedication page to the 253 men of the 409th Infantry Regiment who died in action in the European Theater of Operations.
The first chapter of the journal tells about the formation of the regiment and the basic training that came after for the 13,000 men assigned to it when the regiment achieved full strength. They began their basic training at Camp Claiborne, Louisiana. Subsequent training involved construction of a mock village to train for infiltration and close combat. Throughout the summer they trained on maneuvers in combination with other units. Post maneuver training began in November of 1943 and continued until the regiment moved out of camp in October, 1944 to head to the port of New York for their voyage overseas.
If anyone is interested in the very detailed account of those maneuvers and training events, let me know and I will happily send you a copy from the journal. It is very specific and complicated and I can't tell you that I really would be competent to summarize it all.
Chapter 1b A Road trip is born
While I'm certainly not saying that 4 days in Paris is in any way equivalent to 21 months of basic training, there are similarities. Madonna and I have pounded ourselves into shape for what's to come by logging 5 - 8 miles a day on the trusty pedometer and by climbing stairs in Métro stations, hotels, railways stations with pounds of luggage in tow. To improve our mental acuteness, we have racked our brains trying to get online in hotels (the "Wee-Fee" is not always easy to access) not to mention printing out tickets at RR stations where subtle word differences throw us off track. We've even had some munitions experiences at a local store while shopping for Opinel knives, and finding instead that they really made their money selling guns, ammo, and something that looked like grenades. Did they know we were out of place? To cap it all off, we got to watch the bomb squad (ok - heard them) explode a suspicious package at the Barbès Métro station. (Yes, it's true Blondeel family - on the way home from dinner chez vous). Luckily the package was not a bomb, just some forgetful person's package. Interesting to see that Parisians are as blasé as New Yorkers, looking at their watches as if to say"Hurry up and sweep up the mess. I gotta get home."
In case you think Paris was all suffering (hardly that!), we managed to enjoy ourselves thoroughly. We allowed ourselves a full day to recuperate from the rather grueling Alitalia flight - just walking around our hotel neighborhood with the beautiful Canal St. Martin, and naps. We ate North African food - the best cous-cous I've EVER had. Beautifully seasoned. Then walking back to the hotel we ran into this:
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| Porte St. Denis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porte_Saint-Denis |
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| Same in daylight |
They also had a special exhibit on the Métro system. We quickly tired of the lo-o-ong discussion of electrical systems and wen to play with the kid-friendly exhibits. We designed the following subway car-of-the-future.
And here is a model of a familiar and beloved lady:
In French she is called "Liberté éclairant le Monde" (Liberty lighting the world). She was designed by the French sculptor Frédéric Bartholdi http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frédéric_Auguste_Bartholdi and her inner structure in New York City was engineered by Gustave Eiffel. A complete statue of her is on the place outside the museum.
There are two copies of Lady Liberty in Paris as well as a life-sized copy of the flame at Pont d'Alma, near where Princess Di was killed. It was used as a memorial place when Diana was killed.
I just love all these reminders of our shared franco-american history, and mixing of our cultures and languages - in both directions.
Bravo for your first foray into blogging! Your voice is already apparent! =) Shopping for Opinels - imagine that! Sounds like you have already had a number of adventures and I will look forward to hearing more of them!
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