"My hobbies" Personal Page by GUYON

The first PC I bought was to registrate the 30.000 persons of the genealogy of my wife and me : ancestors, uncles, aunts, cousins and their relatives.
As all the Parisians, our families came from Province or from other countries.
My ancestors were living nearby Lyon (the eldest I found was a comtemporary of Joan of Arc).
In the village inhabited by my family there were plenty of RAY. So my ancester was identified by the name of his farm : LE GUYON (the location still exists). I perpetuate the use of this nickname.
I am not a noble man but, as a lot of Frenchmen, I have some noble persons in my Genealogical Tree. As 9 French on 10, I am certainly a relative of Charle the Great.
My wife's ancestors came from Britany and Vendee. One of her ancestors (a Swissman) was with John Paul Jones during the Bonhomme Richard battle (see my Annapolis page).

On the picture, my grand grand grand father Jacques who came from Lyon to Paris around 1842. He was involved in the Revolution of 1848 and was an active support of la Commune (an other Parisian revolution in 1871). For this reason, he was imprisoned during 5 years. He is photographed during the siege of Paris by the Prussian troups in 1870. He wore his uniform of National Guard.

My cellar

Three hundred bottles of wine are waiting in our cellar.
Each Saturday I take up 1 or 2 bottles for the week end.
To be appreciated, a wine needs to be drunk quietly and with moderation.
We are 4 to drink these 1 or 2 bottles.
I am a chauvinist and I like exclusively French wines and more precisely Bourgogne, then Bordeaux, then Beaujolais but I confess to have also a weakness for Loire Wines and Cotes du Rhone.

Nanterre (1907)

I am a vintage post cards collector.
My specialization is very narrow : I am limited at the city of Nanterre at the beginning of the 20° Century. But I refuse the pictures of firemen (famous because of a song) and "Rosieres" (virtuous young ladies who received a yearly prize in Nanterre during a local festival) .
I have 200 different post cards.

Double face

I am an amateur photographer.
Previously, I made by myself the black and white pictures in my bathroom or in my cellar.
Unfortunatly, a fire destroyed in 1989 all the equipments and I changed for the colour.

Le Grand Rex

Once a week, and sometime twice, we go to the cinema in Paris or in our area.
We like American movie because it is generally well "built", with good actors, a sturdy story, technically made. There are in France plenty of very good actors who give their voice to their American colleagues. They bring really something more. S Stalone has an husky voice. Tony Curtis has the witty voice of Michel Roux. And S. Bullock has a bewitched voice.
We like : Stalone, B. Willis, Schwartzy, R. Williams, M. Freeman, L di Caprio, Meg Ryan, Sandra Bullock, S Weaver
We like French films too. Especially, when they tell "a day to day story" ("films tranche de vie"). The humour of some actors and actresses is very delightful.
We like : D Auteuil, Ph. Noiret, M. Serrault, Michel Bouquet (he can be filmed very closely because he knows how to make his eyes expressive), Emmanuelle Beart, C Deneuve, Claude Jade.
On my advice, the American cinema has often talent and the French one is time to time brilliant (see in "Manon des Sources" at the end of the film the dialog in the graveyard between Yves Montant - Le Papé - and his blind mate : it is a part of anthology).

T rex en promenade

The humankind is on the earth for some 100.000 years and the dinosaurs were the kings of the planet during 120 millions years.
They were not out-of-date animals. On the contrary, they were very well adpated and a catastrophic event (meteor, vulcanos, climate change, together or not) chucked them out the earth.
We visited (too quickly) the Dinosaur park, the natural history museums of New York, Washington and London to see the dinosaurs exibits. The British Museum seems the best one because of its pedagogy but the NHM of NY has a large and interesting collection.
The museum of Paris (at the Jardin des Plantes) is too dusty.

Rue Mouffetard by Pelourhino

Each Sunday morning, we go to Paris for a visit or for shopping.
It is the adequate time to drive in Paris : there is a low traffic and we can park without concern.
I bring a camera with me and a note book too.
I do that for years and I have not seen everything, I often discover a new street, an unknown house or a shop recently established.
Sometimes, I make the tour with a VT member with whom I was in touch to show him (her) some attractions of the capital.