Where to go in Paris. Free Paris – where to go and what to do

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"Who wants to become a millionaire?"

Questions and answers:

Yuri Stoyanov and Igor Zolotovitsky

Fireproof amount: 200,000 rubles.

Questions:

1. What fate befell the mansion in the fairy tale of the same name?

2. What does the chorus of the song in Svetlana Druzhinina’s film encourage the midshipmen to do?

3. What button is not found on the remote control of a modern elevator?

4. Which expression means the same as “to walk”?

5. What is stroganina made from?

6. At what mode of operation of the washing machine is centrifugal force especially important?

7. Which phrase from the movie “Aladdin’s Magic Lamp” became the title of the album of the group “AuktYon”?

8. Where do the sailors of a sailing ship take their places at the command “Whistle all up!”?

9. Which of the four portraits in the foyer of the Taganka Theater was added by Lyubimov at the insistence of the district party committee?

10. Which state’s flag is not tricolor?

11. Who can rightfully be called a hereditary sculptor?

12. What is the name of the model of the human body - a visual aid for future doctors?

13. What was inside the first Easter egg made by Carl Faberge?

Correct answers:

1. fell apart

2. keep your nose up

3. “Let’s go!”

4. on your own two feet

5. salmon

7. “Everything is calm in Baghdad”

8. on the upper deck

9. Konstantin Stanislavsky

10. Albania

11. Alexandra Rukavishnikova

12. phantom

13. golden chicken

The players did not answer question 13, but took the winnings in the amount of 400,000 rubles.

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Svetlana Zeynalova and Timur Solovyov

Fireproof amount: 200,000 rubles.

Questions:

2. According to the catchphrase, where does the road paved with good intentions lead?

3. What is used to sift flour?

4. How to correctly continue Pushkin’s line: “He forced himself to be respected...”?

5. What appeared for the first time in the history of the Confederations Cup this year?

6. In which city is the unfinished Church of the Holy Family located?

7. How does the line of the popular song end: “The leaves were falling, and the snowstorm was chalk...”?

8. What kind of creative work did Arkady Velurov do in the film “Pokrovsky Gate”?

9, the site reports. What is believed to be added by the Crassula plant?

10. What did Parisians see in 1983 thanks to Pierre Cardin?

11. Who killed the huge serpent Python?

12. What title did the 50 Swiss franc note receive at the end of 2016?

13. What do adherents of the cargo cult in Melanesia construct from natural materials?

Correct answers:

1. profile

4. I couldn’t think of a better idea.

5. video replays for judges

6. in Barcelona

7. Where have you been?

8. sang verses

10. play “Juno and Avos”

11. Apollo

13. runways

The players were unable to answer question 13 correctly, but left with a fireproof amount.

Keep in mind that you need to come here early in the morning, as already in the afternoon there will be a very long line at the cash register. Notre Dame is again an excellent vantage point for the city.

Address: Parvis Notre-Dame - Pl. Jean-Paul II

Price- entry is free. An additional fee is required only for climbing the bell tower - €15, for persons under 26 years old - free of charge.

Opening hours: Mon-Fri 08:00-18:45; Sat, Sun – 8:00-19:15

8. Versailles

Since the Palace of Versailles is located outside of Paris, it is worth setting aside a full day to explore it. The residence of King Louis XIV is living history. You can plunge into it by visiting the palace itself and strolling through the surrounding gardens. And if you get hungry, there is a wonderful Angelina bakery inside, although the prices here are not low.

Entry fee – €18

Opening hours of the palace complex depends on the season. For example, during the high season from April 1 to October 31, the palace is open from 9:00 to 18:30, the park from 7:00 to 20:30, and the Trianon palaces from 12:00 to 18:30. The low season lasts from November 1 to March 31: during this period, opening hours remain the same, but the complex closes to the public an hour earlier - at 17:30. The park is open from 8:00 to 18:00.

In 1973, my dad happened to become the son-in-law of the first deputy chairman of the KGB of the USSR. My mother was the only and dearly beloved daughter of Semyon Kuzmich Tsvigun. Dad was a graduate of the Faculty of Economics of MGIMO, the son of the creator of Exportles, Vlas Nikiforovich Nichkov, and worked in international scientific and technical cooperation.

From left to right: my grandmother, Rosa Tsvigun, my mother, Violetta, my grandfather, S.K. Tsvigun, my father is Vladislav Nichkov, my paternal grandmother is Lyubov Nichkova. Moscow, August 4, 1973

In 1980, he and his mother went on a long business trip to Paris, where my father began working in the group of the State Committee for Science and Technology, and a year later I joined them to go to the first grade of the embassy school.

My parents: V.V. Nichkov and V.S. Tsvigun, Paris, early 80s.

The spy scandal erupted three years later when France expelled 47 Soviet diplomats from the country in April 1983. The French press immediately dubbed them the “Club of Forty-Seven.” In the entire history of diplomatic relations, only one case exceeded this expulsion in scope: in 1971, the British authorities simultaneously “threw out” 105 Soviet diplomats from their country.

The main person involved in the new espionage scandal turned out to be career KGB colonel Vladimir Vetrov, also known as agent Farewell, who transmitted information in the early 80s. many top-secret documents to the French intelligence services. However, this story goes far beyond the framework of USSR-France relations. Here is just one fact that speaks of the true scale of what happened: then US President Ronald Reagan made the following entry in his diary in those spring days of 1983: “This is one of the biggest spy cases of the entire 20th century.”

It was this quote from Ronald Reagan that became the epigraph to the feature film “Farewell,” which was released on a large scale in France in 2009. But all this will happen later, and then, in 1983, everything was very tense.

“In connection with the events here, there was a lot of hype in the press that everyone in the embassy was “spies”, that some of them left the country, and even more remained (...) In Marseille (in the south of France) some schizos at night 2:00 the building (ours) of the Consulate and Aeroflot was shelled. There were no casualties, but the guys were caught. I am writing so that you know from me as it is, and not from others with exaggeration. We were given instructions to go out into the city, move around as before, work and live as before, so that they do not think that we are afraid of them, only in families (at least 2 families).

It was 1983. My grandfather, who could have calmed down and informed my grandmother about everything, died a year before. Therefore, my mother tried to convey all the events to her grandmother in as much detail as possible.

(...) It’s bad in the newspapers that they published all the numbers (codes) of Soviet cars, so now I don’t want to go out again. The newspaper also published all the diplomats by name, who worked for whom and what institution they came from. About so many, even those who have nothing in common with K.B. [for the purpose of secrecy, my vigilant mother omitted one letter “G” in her letters when she wrote the abbreviation KGB - approx. author] wrote that he is an agent of the service. They wrote about Vlad that there were two of them from the State Committee for Science and Technology (he and Borya Narutdinov, who was sent home), that ours is not an agent, and Borya is a secret service agent.

My father was not included in the list of 47 (spy “fame” overtook him a little over a year later). During the time spent in France before the expulsion of our diplomats, he managed to send the first French cosmonaut Jean-Loup Chrétien into space and, in general, his activities apparently did not arouse suspicion among the local intelligence services.

From left to right: Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Dzhanibekov, the first French cosmonaut Jean-Loup Chretien (unfortunately, almost hid behind Dzhanibekov), French cosmonaut (Chretien's understudy) Patrick Baudry (in the center, with an order on his chest), my father, Vladislav Nichkov, Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of the USSR to France Stepan Vasilyevich Chervonenko.

From a letter from my mother Violetta Tsvigun to my grandmother, Rosa Mikhailovna Tsvigun, April 13, 1983:

People like Vladik (not very long on the list) they told everyone on TV that their secret service was systematically monitoring us. This means that over the course of 3 years, we became convinced that Vlad did not pry into other people’s affairs in his work, and in fact, we are not going to pry into other people’s affairs in the future. To each his own.

On the day our comrades were sent home, a telex from the French arrived in the name of Vlad in the science and technology group: “Shame on the French government. With friendly greetings...” (the richest company). And many French businessmen called, stuttered, tried to sadly probe whether Vlad was on these lists, they say, they tried to schedule business visits. And when he answered that we would call in a week and decide, there was joy in his voice. There are French people who are far from politics or against such gestures; they are interested in business, cooperation in various fields, and much more in work; the determining and positive link is personal human sympathy.

A fragment of a letter from my mother, Violetta Tsvigun, from Paris to Moscow to my grandmother, R.M. Tsvigun, April 13, 1983.

Due to the tightening of measures for issuing visas and other controls on the part of Paris, Moscow was unable to send a new resident to France for a long time. Months passed and the situation did not change. At first, the French counterintelligence officers were happy, but then they began to be overcome by doubts: what if, after all, “the mouse slipped through?” Or, seeing that the embassy was under siege, did Moscow decide to appoint one of the people in the embassy as a resident?

The DST (French counterintelligence) again took out the lists and began to re-analyze the biographies of the remaining employees of the Soviet embassy. In their opinion, my father, Vladislav Nichkov, was best suited for the role of the new resident. Despite the fact that during several years of work in France he never came under suspicion from the French intelligence services, his biography clearly let him down. Firstly, he was born in the USA, where his father worked. And although Vlas Nikiforovich Nichkov, my grandfather on my father’s side, was not a spy, DST apparently did not have accurate information on this matter. But a much more compelling argument was that Nichkov was the son-in-law of Semyon Tsvigun, whom they called the second man in the KGB (KGB #2). And it doesn’t matter that Tsvigun had already died by that time. The portrait of the head of the group for scientific and technical cooperation, Vladislav Vlasovich Nichkov, still loomed, if not sinister, then extremely suitable for demonization.

From left to right: my grandmother, R.M. Tsvigun, my grandfather - S.K. Tsvigun, my parents - Vladislav Nichkov and Violetta Tsvigun in a romantic kiss on their wedding day. Moscow, August 4, 1973

The decision was made and the French newspapers came out with photographs of my dad in profile and full face, accompanied by cinematic headlines: “Parisians, remember this face!” The embassy mobilized. Father and mother, and therefore automatically me, were strictly forbidden to leave the walls of the embassy for three weeks. I looked at my dad’s photo in the newspaper and listened to my parents explain the situation to me. She was bad for me. The fact is that at that time I was very interested in the Disney cartoon about the chipmunks Chip and Dale. And I really wanted such a toy chipmunk. And he was promised to me, and now everything was falling apart before my eyes. No going into the city - no trip to your favorite toy store! My 10-year-old heart was torn between “I want a chipmunk!” and “What if dad really is a secret spy?”

I, Violetta Nichkova, a primary school student at the USSR Embassy in France, Paris, early 80s.

Official protest from the Soviet Embassy, ​​published in the French newspaper Le Monde, February 1985.

Time passed. DST was silent. The father was not expelled, as would be logical to assume. Apparently, other than analyzing family ties, the French were unable to find evidence of involvement in the KGB. The situation was stalemate: no one apologized, but no one drove him out of the country. Dad’s French colleagues unanimously supported him, it was touching. No one, according to his recollections, stopped contacts, despite the “revelatory” publications in the press, the business circles of France calmly proceeded from their own interests, and the interest in scientific and technical cooperation with the Soviet Union in the mid-80s was great!

My father worked quietly in Paris for another three years, and we returned to Moscow as planned at the end of his business trip in 1988. The French side never apologized, but by not expelling the failed resident Vladislav Nichkov from their country, they by default admitted their mistake . But they never bought me a chipmunk. During my forced confinement at the embassy, ​​my interest in chipmunks faded. But I began to pay more attention to dad: somewhere in the depths of my soul, a doubt persisted for a long time - what if the French were not mistaken, and he is still a real, deeply secret intelligence officer?

In 1993, the famous journalist Bernard Lecomte’s book “Bunker” was published in France. 20 years of Soviet-French relations,” in which he, among other things, described this interesting episode. The Parisians called our embassy a bunker, in many ways similar to a real fortress. Our intelligence services recognize this book as one of the best books about our politics and intelligence in France, paying tribute to the knowledge and, at the same time, the accuracy and talent of the author. For me, Lecomte has become one of my favorite journalists who can write simply and with irony about complex topics in international relations. I was engrossed in “Bunker” and even wrote one of my term papers based on this book at the Faculty of International Journalism at MGIMO.

Bernard Lecomte, "Bunker. Twenty years of Franco-Soviet relations"

Years later, already working as a correspondent and producer of the “International Panorama” program with Alexander Gurnov on the RTR channel (now “Russia-1”), I decided to find Lecomte and invite him to be an expert on one of the topics of our program. To be honest, even though Leconte was ideally suited to the role of our expert at that time, I, first of all, wanted to get to know him personally, taking advantage of his official position. I found his email and wrote him a letter, mentioning who I am, in addition to my work on TV, and how much I love his book “The Bunker”.

Leconte responded with keen interest, agreed to the teleconference, and at the end succinctly asked: “Do you agree with what I wrote on page 243?” The question was posed bluntly. The choice had to be made finally and irrevocably. On this page, Lecomte wrote that Vladislav Nichkov, who was called in the media a resident of Soviet intelligence, in fact never had anything to do with the KGB, although he was the son-in-law of Tsvigun, who for many years held the post of first deputy chairman of the all-powerful Andropov. There was nothing to do, and I answered “yes.” With gratitude for your objectivity and awareness.

For many years, Leconte and I have been planning to meet for a cup of coffee in Paris one day. He continues to write books, becoming, in addition to an expert in Russian-French relations, also one of the leading experts on the secrets of the Vatican. But that's a completely different story...

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Many words have already been said and written, it was painted by hundreds of artists and thousands of poets sang, a city unlike any other city in the world, the capital of lovers and the city of arts, high fashion is born here and important political affairs are accomplished.

Paris is different, deceptive and unpredictable. Paris is different for everyone.
But there are places in Paris that you should definitely visit when first exploring the city.

Until the end of the 17th century, wealthy Parisians were buried in church cemeteries. And at the beginning of the 18th century, on the slopes of a hill in the Belleville quarter, a city cemetery was opened on the site where the house of Father Lachaise, confessor of Louis XIV “the Sun King,” once stood. This is where the name of the cemetery came from - Père Lachaise. At first, Parisians did not want to bury their deceased relatives away from the city and in a simple quarter, but in order to raise the “prestige” of the Père Lachaise cemetery, the remains of famous people were moved here, for example, Heloise and Abelard, Moliere and La Fontaine.
Now Père Lachaise is the largest of twenty cemeteries in Paris (40 hectares), where many famous people, scientific and cultural figures, military and political figures are buried, including Edith Piaf, Oscar Wilde, Georges Bizet, Marcel Proust, Balzac, Camille Pizarro , Moliere, Eugene Delacroix, Sarah Bernhardt, Isadora Duncan, Simone Signoret, Frederic Chopin, Yves Montand, Jim Morrison and others.