Chinese Chickens

A trip to the Chinese restaurant brings three pleasures apart from the food: the hot white flannels to clean your fingers and face at the end of the meal, the peace when the children run away to look at the goldfish at the far end of the restaurant while we drink our short coffees, and these little Chinese chickens made of glass, offered to the children in a little decordated box as a parting gift.

I could go on about the Chinese diaspora in Paris, the millions of Chinese living in France, the boom in Chinese business, the annual Chinese festivals that have become a feature of the Paris calender, but I won't. Somehow, these little chickens say it all.