STROLLING IN MY SPARE TIME...

When I'm trying to pick up a language there are certain words that people use again and again that I don't yet know and eventually have to look up. On a trip to Forte dei Marmi one Easter with some Florentine aristocrats those words were meraviglioso (marvellous) and spaventoso (I can't remember exactly but it means frightful or horrendous, something like that.)

Here in Paris the words I kept seeing and hearing were flanerie and loisir. Flanerie apparently means strolling, and loisir means spare time. If you could ever capture the essence of a city in two words...