Africa in Paris

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Africa in Paris

Take the metro to Château-Rouge (not on Monday) and step outside. For the price of a subway ticket you are transported in the heart of Africa. You'll find everything - African princesses who have become stars on French TV, thieves, drug dealers, artists, French middle class families who live here and fight for their turf or who just come to Château-Rouge to do their groceries or buy colorful fabric.
The heart of the neighborhood is the rue Demean. Every day, the most amazing market takes place there. Sunday is the busiest day. Here, fruit look like vegetables, bananas are huge and vegetables look like nothing you know. You'll also see fish you cannot find anywhere else like the sompate and the machoiron from Sénégal, or small sharks. If you take the rue des Poissonniers, you'll find grocers from the West Indies and Africa, not fish mongers. Ask and you will be told how to prepare the macabo from Cameroon. You don't need to want to buy anything to go to Château-Rouge. Go there just for the sounds and the colors and the atmosphere. It is a very different Paris.

Our addresses

Tout Kin. (meaning: all Kinshasa): You'll find all the products from Congo, but not only. 63, rue Doudeauville. 75018. Tel: 01 42 52 42 30

Au Marché de la Côte d'Ivoire. This store sells things coming straight from Ivory Coast: dried fish, manioc leaves. You can also try the "bissap", a pink drink made with hibiscus flowers. 66, rue Doudeauville. Tel: 01 42 51 67 65.

Kabaco. This little store is full of medicinal plants and objects from Sénégal, Mali and Burkina-Faso. You'll find wonderful earrings, fabric dyed with the black mud from marshes, little shells. 36, rue Polonceau. Tel: 06 86 24 27 31. Metro: Barbes-Rochechouart or Château-Rouge.

Le Porokhane. The owners will greet you as if you were family. The food is good and you'll be serenaded by the music from the peule people. Try the "thieboudiene", a red rice with stuffed fish. Open until 2am. 3, rue Moret. 75011. Tel: 01 40 21 86 74.

Chez Aida. Very good Senegalese restaurant. People come here for the mafe (meat cooked in a sauce made with peanuts and tomatoes), and the tie-bou-dien, the Senegalese national dish (rice with fish). 48, rue Polonceau. Daily except Wed. Tel: 01 42 58 26 20. Metro: Barbes or Château-Rouge.

African Art

Musée Dapper. This private museum dedicated to the pre-colonial art of Africa has just reopened. It closed its doors for two years for renovation. Now it has a theater, a bookstore, a café. The museum also is making space for the living arts - dance, theater, music. The opening exhibition is called "Art dÕAfrique" and presents 130 exceptional pieces. 50, ave Victor Hugo. 75016. Tel: 01 45 00 01 50. Daily 11am-7pm. Metro: Victor Hugo.

Musée des Arts d'Afrique et d'Océanie. This extraordinary museum was built for the colonial fair of 1913. The concrete building is a blend of Art deco and neo Greek architecture. Inside, an extraordinary mural (1,300 square meters), lauds the French colonial experience (this is 1913, after all). In 2004, the museum will move to the new museum being built near the Eiffel tower. The collections are very rich. Also, the MAAO, as it is known, is in the Bois de Vincennes, in an area of Paris seldom visited. 293, ave Daumesnil. 75012. Tel: 01 44 74 84 80. Daily except Tues. Metro: Porte Dorée.

Louvre. After decades of battles, African and Asian-Pacific arts have finally found a home in the Louvre to join the Mona Lisa and the Venus of Milo. Finally, the art which represents 80% of the world is recognized. The new wing of the Louvre has been a huge success. It is near capacity each day. Musée du Louvre. Pavillon des Sessions. Permanent exhibition. Tel: 01 40 20 51 51. www.louvre.fr

CSAO. The Compagnie du Sénégal et de l'Afrique de l'Ouest, presents in a vast space hundreds of objects from artists and artisans from Western Africa. It is a really wonderful place where you'll find extravagant attaché cases made with tin recycled from advertising, jewels and fabric. 3, rue Elzevir. 75003. Tel: 01 44 54 55 88. Mon.-Sat. 11am-7:30pm. Sun. 2pm-7:30pm. Metro: Saint-Paul.

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