Paul Dallison writes Declassified, a weekly satirical column.
Spare a thought for Louis Sarkozy, the son of former French president and legal issues enthusiast Nicolas Sarkozy. He has a difficult life.
Sarkozy the Younger was featured this week in the How to Spend It section of the Financial Times (which no one will ever convince me is not a parody) and gave a guide to the delights of Washington. It’s still so relevant. Here are some of the best excerpts (incidentally, Louis’ mother, Cécilia Attias, tweeted the story and later deleted the tweet for reasons unknown, but probably involving the word cringe)…
In the FT article, Sarkozy Junior says he and his wife Natali Husić “were in Washington with no place to live when we discovered the Fairmont Hotel. We negotiated a price and stayed for seven months, a fascinating experience.
We chose one night at the Fairmont (a random Monday in May) and the cheapest room was $492 (€458) plus taxes and fees. So a seven month hotel stay (let’s say 212 days) without negotiation, the price would be $104,300 plus taxes and fees.
But hotel life and using the gym at the prestigious Georgetown University is hungry work. So we’re heading to Boulangerie Christophe. You may have heard of this particular bakery because its boss once gave French President Emmanuel Macron a baguette (which is the definition of the British expression “coals in Newcastle” or in French, carry water to the river).
Now, at this point, you’re wondering “what is Louis Sarkozy actually doing?” He’s an author, of course. And good news, he wrote a book on Napoleon (released May 30).
Sadly, Sarkozy declared: “I hated Ridley Scott’s disappointing film, a disaster! To take my mind off things, I reserved a table at the Michelin-starred restaurant Seven Reasons.
The food here is delicious (the chef’s tasting menu costs $160, and an additional $140 for wine pairings) — be careful, there is a special menu called Surprise but you know what you’re getting, so it’s not not a surprise at all.
The young Sarkozy is also passionate about cooking.
“As an experimental cook and meat enthusiast, I frequently source ingredients: ground bison, elk and venison,” he wrote.
Don’t all bison live on the ground? Please tell me there are no flying bison!
It’s not all about eating and writing masterpieces. There is also shopping, even if “it’s not one of my passions”.
“I recently acquired a 19th-century candlestick from Kensington Antique Row,” he said, although Kensington Antique Row itself is a modern brick building.
Staying on the shopping theme: “I also couldn’t resist the ring I recently bought for Natali at Bulgari DC.” FFS.
And finally, there is Sarkozy Jr.’s view on architecture.
“I often worry these days that we’re building too many parking lot-type buildings,” he says. It’s just a point.
But then he follows it up with this truly horrifying sentence: “If I could buy any building in Washington, it would be the Library of Congress; I would close it to the public and install a pool table and whiskey bar in place of the research offices.
Politico
