Months of Lockdown Raise a Pressing Question: Where to Pee in Paris?
Voice of America
PARIS - Paris begins reopening next week, bringing relief to residents missing its long-shuttered shops, museums, theaters and cafes that make France’s iconic capital so special. Not to mention something more basic—easily accessible toilets.
Cecile Briand ducks into a small cement building, tucked inside a northern Paris square. The toilet she’s inspecting is a bit dirty, but no nasty surprises—nothing a little tissue can’t fix. Number one advice walking this city: always bring toilet paper. Briand is a writer and artist. Also possibly this capital’s best resource on restrooms. Her guidebook Ou Faire Pipi a Paris? — or Where to Pee in Paris — is now in its second edition. She earned her expertise firsthand— spending hours on the streets researching a separate Lonely Planet guide on Paris walks. Discovering its hidden and not-so-hidden toilets, she says, is another way of discovering the city.Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. Fire rages following an Israeli strike on an area designated for displaced Palestinians, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, in this still picture taken from a video, May 26, 2024. Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. A member of the bomb squad of the Israeli police collects debris after a rocket fired by Palestinian militants struck in the Israeli city of Herzliya on May 26, 2024.