Au Square Alex Biscarre

In the Saint Georges district of Paris, last Saturday afternoon, it was hot and sunny and I found this:

I don't know how "square" got there - I've never come across it in French before.

It wasn't what I would call a square, though: I walked through the gate into a delightful garden.

Nobody was speaking: everyone was just sitting, enjoying the gardens and the sunshine. It was remarkably quiet, with all of Paris so near. The only voice to be heard was a mother singing French nursery rhymes to her toddler.

On the other side was this imposing building:

Apparently it's the Hotel Thiers, which was destroyed by the Communards in 1871, then rebuilt, and now a library.

But I was just as interested in this, up high on the other side:

And suddenly I was imagining myself in another life: living in that apartment, waking up every day with a view of the gardens below.

Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, seemed very far away.