Tahiti - Papeete like the locals

Unless you come in by boat (and even then, I suspect), everyone starts their Tahiti vacation in Papeete, flying into the Faa'a airport. Papeete, pronounced pa-pay-EH-tay, is the capital of Tahiti and the biggest city around. According to our taxi driver, it has 200,000 residents, an impressive number for an island just 28 miles across and over 3,000 nautical miles away from any big land mass (that would be Australia). We explored Papeete yesterday as both tourist and a husband in need of new tennis shoes. This lead us to Carrefour Le Plaza, the elegant mall across from our hotel, frequented by Pappeetean locals. Here Steven viewed and rejected tennis shoes at the local sports store, got a phone sim card from Vini, a French phone company, and I wandered the isles of Carrefour, the French hypermarche, which has absolutely everything a person needs - underwear, electronics, pareos (sarongs), croissants, etc. And because this was also in the mall, we stopped at Brioche Doree for coffee, quiches and croissants. Here I tried my high school French while ordering. The cashier put me out of my misery by replying in English.

Fortified with our petit dejeuner, we headed off for the 30 minute walk to downtown Papeete, our final goal the Papeete Market, the largest "farmer's market" in French Polynesia. On the way we encountered napping dogs and crowing roosters, both free to move about the island. We also walked through the Paofai Gardens, a shady stretch of park along the Pacific, filled with locals and their kids. Here we encountered this monument to the 1984 Autonomie. According to Wikipedia, "in 1977, French Polynesia was granted partial internal autonomy from France; in 1984, the autonomy was extended. French Polynesia became a full overseas collectivity of France in 2003." I am not clear what a "collectivity" is; sounds like "colony" to me, but I will study this further. In any event, we did make it to downtown Papeete and bought some comfy Skechers for Steven. Next up, Papeete like a tourist.