Fish Blog Post 2 by Laura

It was interesting going to the Liberation Fish Market and seeing all the varieties  of fish that people eat in France.  Growing up in the Midwest,  the only fish our family ate  were freshwater fish like catfish, bass and trout.  As I recall, trout was  the infrequent  delicacy for our family. I did not acquire a taste for crustaceans and open water fish till I was an adult when I moved to the coastal state of Oregon.  Even now, my taste for  those fish is limited.

But at the fish market, I saw octopus, cuttlefish, squid, abalone, oysters, shrimp, eel, salmon, daurade, flounder,  bonita.... the list goes on and the fish  were completely intact.   At home,  if I went to my friendly Albertson's,  I would see some of these fish but  they would have already been prepared with the heads cutoff and the bodies gutted.  At the Fish Market,  I could actually see on an intact left-eyed flounder and recognize it based on Dr. Cheroske's explanation of to determine if the flatfish was  right-eyed or left-eyed.  

The vendor had displayed the flounder in an interesting way,  alternating the top and the bottom of these flat fish into a checkerboard like pattern.   At first I thought it was 2 different species- one darkish grey the other almost white, until I realized the "white" was just the bottom of the flounder that never sees the sun. 

Later that day we did the fish dissection where we cut a side window into our fish and tried to identify various organs. The dissection process was less than ideal and rather humorous as we were  using rounded scissors meant for a youth's hand with no really cutting ability. Everyone persevered. Once opened up you could see the intestines, gonads, heart and kidneys,  although due to the cutting ability of the scissor, not completely intact as "brute force" had to be applied in some areas of the fish.

The day before we toured Villa Massena.  On display was a Lego version of the Nice Jetée Promenade t I am including.  Built in 1891,  it  was gorgeous.  I wondered why we had not seen this beautiful structure along the promenade? Then sadly  I read that it was destroyed during the German Occupation.