Paris! And the following week...

    Friday was a day to sleep in, clean, do laundry, and pack for Paris! I had an extremely good time eating dinner with a few other students here, and the conversation lasted well into the night. It was actually kind of funny, because as soon as dinner was finished, the girls started to clean and talk about music and share pictures, while the three of us guys started talking politics, culture, and economics...

    Saturday morning we boarded the bus to escape to Paris at 8am.  I packed light (which was difficult for me of course), ate some strawberry apple sauce, and talked about authentic Mexican food (which we are ALL craving, it's serious) and culture for a good portion of the bus ride. Three hours of driving through flat countryside that kind of resembled Texas & Oklahoma (with much prettier trees, of course), and then we were greeted by La Défense. It was a very beautiful and welcoming site, entering the city limits to the sight of the taller buildings. However exciting it was to see La Défense, it certainly couldn't compare to seeing La Tour Eiffel. I think it must have been comical to our program director Benoit to listen to us 'Ooh!' and 'Aah!' at every tourist attraction, and I know that the French students were laughing at us. But on your first visit to Paris, 'the city of light,' and the most romantic city in the world, I think it's okay to enjoy being a tourist (at least the first time). =]

    The bus dropped us off at Place de la Concorde (where the guillotine was located during the revolution, and also where the Obélisque de Louxor stands), and from there, we walked through the Jardin des Tuileries (and all of its peddlers trying to pawn off mini Eiffel Tower keychains and random fedora hats) to our meeting place at the Musée du Louvre (with its cool looking glass pyramids). From there, we were given a two hour break to grab a bite to eat and see some sights. My group walked up Avenue de l'Opéra and sat down to eat at a small Parisian chain café called Brioche Derée. The mixed fruit tart that I had as my dessert tasted like the most amazing Starburst flavor you can imagine, but then again, maybe it was just the fact that I was on cloud nine from eating at a café in Paris...

    After everyone finished their food and coffee, we quite literally across the street to the Opera House (L'Opéra Garnier or Opéra national de Paris). Words can't describe the beauty of the place. I had never seen such an ornate building in all my life (until the Louvre, that is.. but I'll get there). One of my professors had said that only in Paris could there be so much gold and it not look completely gaudy... She was definitely right. The building was covered in the most meticulous decoration. This, again, is another situation in which I just have to let the pictures speak for themselves. Anyway, walking inside the building and finding ourselves at the base of the lobby was spectacular. I couldn't believe the amount of marble in the place. I kid you not when I say that modernity hasn't tampered with the building as a whole, walking through the corridors you could imagine it just as it would have been when it was completed in the late 19th century. There were high, painted ceilings, elaborate tile mosaics, hard wood floors, gold detailing all along the walls, and mirrors every third wall or so to make the place look even larger than it was. 

    I think by the time I left L'Opéra it finally started to sink in that I was in Paris. Walking back to the Louvre, I stopped into a small candy store and it was fantastic! There were free samples of chocolate or strawberry filled cookies, chocolate or caramel bricks, etc. etc. etc. At that point though, I was only in the mood for free samples (I was still very full from lunch). 

   Back at the Louvre, the group had to go through a minor metal detector checkpoint, and then we took the escalator down to the underground lobby beneath the glass pyramids of the plaza. The underground lobby was huge, and it was connected to the three main galleries: Richelieu, Sully, and Denon. I knew that I had to see The Mona Lisa, The Winged Victory, the crowning of Napoleon's wife and other works by Jacques-Luis David, Napoleon III apartments, Venus de Milo or Aphrodite, as well as the medieval mote that once supported a castle where the Louvre stands. I paired off with Ashton, a girl in my program, and we raced through the museum to find all of the important pieces, stopping frequently to take in the ornate ceilings (which are masterpieces in themselves). Seriously, throughout much of the museum I found myself looking up as much as I was looking at the artwork. The massive building its self is a work of art. We also had fun making our own commentary about the works...

    "Oh this is just the world's largest tea kettle.. um, well, my grandmother actually donated this from her collection a few years ago, so... that's what that is..."

    Immediately after this picture was taken, a security guard appeared out of nowhere... "MADAME!!!!!!!!!!!!" and then us: "Oh, uh oops.. uh sorry, desolée!" and then we ran away. Well we didn't quite run, because that wasn't allowed either.

   Shortly after, as I was walking and talking about how badly I was craving a frito-pie, I missed the first step in a long stairwell that led to the basement and nearly died.

    "So these are just waxed figures of Beyoncé's Dreamgirls... They're actually on loan right now from Madame Tussauds... Actually, the one of the left is Beyoncé herself..."

    "And these are just some tapestries that I made one day when I was bored after a trip to Hobby Lobby... No big deal."


    In all seriousness though, the coolest thing that I saw in the museum was Marie Antoinette's last letter to her sister before her death (when she and her husband Louis XVI were beheaded in the revolution). It was an amazing thing to read, we had to translate it from it's original French. Wow. On the contrary, I thought that the Mona Lisa was very over-rated. Honestly, you get a better view of it in pictures on the internet. I would like to say that at both the Opera House and the Louvre, it was very tempting to jump certain velvet ropes and see restricted areas! I didn't, because I didn't feel like being removed from the Louvre... but it there were many places where it would have been really cool, Napoleon III's apartments, for example.

    Later in the afternoon, we exited the Louvre through the large glass pyramid in the plaza and walked back through the Jardin des Tuileries to Place de la Concorde. There I bought my first French crêpe! Jambon et Fromage. It was delicious! I love crêpes! When the bus arrived, we got on and rode to our hotel a few blocks north of the opera house across the street from Gare Saint-Lazare. I had just enough time to dump by bag in my room and change into a dress shirt before I had to get back on the bus to go to dinner.

    The plan for dinner had been to eat at a nice restaurant called Monte Carlo... I guess our reservation fell through or something, because we ended up at the French equivalent of Golden Corral... Only at Golden Corral, you get to pick what you eat, and at this buffet, we were served in courses. It was kind of funny to see all of us dressed up for a traditional French meal, and then sitting in a buffet eating roast beef... The service was terrible, and since it was pre-paid, if we wanted soda we had to pay out of pocket. It was all okay though, because we had amazing fresh fruit tarts for dessert, and also we were a block away from L'Arc de Triomphe, and we got to see the Champs-Elysées.

   After dinner, we all rode the Metro back to our hotel (for free because the swipe machine was broken and stuck open). Now, people say all sorts of things about the Parisian Metro system, but from my experience, it was much easier and less crowded than the New York City system. I mean, they both smell like human excrement, they both have rats, they both can get sketchy at night, they are both cesspools for germs and homeless folk, but the Metro is just more conveniently placed and less crowded. It made navigating the city much faster and it was so much cheaper than taking a cab (I'll elaborate on the cab situation later). Anyway, we got back to the hotel and the girls changed out of their heels. We all  then bought bottles of champagne, beer, Desperado, etc. and headed out to the Eiffel Tower to hang out at the park underneath.

    Walking up on the tower was just plain overwhelming. It seems so much taller in person, and it was so bright all lit up! We found a spot in the grass beside the tower and started drinking, talking, dancing to music, and taking pictures. The tower did several beautiful light shows while we were there. It was a little sketchy to be drinking out in the park with peddlers all around offering us cigarettes, snacks, and bottles of everything for a cheap price, and from different areas of the park wafted the smell of marijuana.

    Really, the whole time I kept asking myself it it was actually happening. I mean, most of this trip has just seemed like a dream anyway, and having a kick-back in front of the Eiffel Tower like it was no big deal wasn't really something I ever thought I would do at twenty one. Anyway, needless to say it was pretty epoch, and definitely one of those moments that made me feel "infinite," like in my favorite book, The Perks of Being a Wallflower.

 








  
     The Metro apparently closes down at random times, we heard that it closed at 1am, so a few of us left the Eiffel Tower at around 12:30. When we reached the station it was already closed, so we decided to walk until we could hail a cab. The funny thing about Paris, is that apparently, you are not supposed to hail cabs on the street. You can try, and you might find one that will take you, but in general you are supposed to call them or go to a cab stand. So we ended up walking an hour and a half back to the hotel. I didn't mind the long walk, in fact, I actually kind of enjoyed it! I got an amazing picture of the Eiffel Tower all dark and the moon shining brightly beside it.

   The next morning, our group had a boat tour to go to at around 10am. It was fantastic. Apparently, one of the best ways to see Paris is by boat on the river Seine. We boarded, and listened through the ear piece in English to the narrated tour of what exactly we were seeing. Thankfully, the majority of the major historical landmarks can be seen from the river, and I'll never forget the amazing sights that I saw one after another out the side of the boat. We passed the Eiffel Tower of course, the pedestrian bridge that can be seen in the new movie Inception, numerous historical bridges (one even made with stones from the Bastille), Place de la Concorde, the Louvre, the Musée d'Orsey (where all of the impressionist art is), Invalides (where Napoleon is buried), two pedestrian bridges (where couples buy pad-locks and etch their names into them and lock them onto the bridge forever. very romantic), Notre-Dame de Paris, etc.

   After the river tour of Paris, I took the Metro to the Latin Quarter and at on Rue de la Huchette. There were many Greek restaurants (with excellent looking seafood shown in the windows), but we chose to eat at a restaurant that served French cuisine. It turned out to be such a good idea! Here, you order from either the menu or the carte. I prefer to order from the menu, because it seems like a much better deal. For example: a guy in our group got only spaghetti for 12euro, but I got a three course meal for 13euro, which included many options for the three courses. I chose onion soup, poulet champinons (chicken with mushrooms), and a delicious fruit tart. As savory as the onion soup was, one of my friends had the mussels and I was VERY jealous. I tried them, and the seafood here is on another level!

    An hour and a half later, we walked just a block across the bridge to the Ile de la Cité, to Notre Dame. I had a brief conversation with a chinese tourist after he and his wife took a photo next to me about his experience with American business. He knew of San Antonio, and his English was much, much better than his French (because at first, I spoke French to him). There were a lot of French scouts outside of the cathedral and they all welcomed each and every tourist passing through.

    Once inside, it was really a hallowed place. The ceilings were unbelievably tall and the stained glass windows were immense and gorgeous. I ended up in the prayer area towards the front of the building and donated the two euros for a candle. I'm not exactly religious, but who would pass up the opportunity to light a prayer candle in Notre Dame de Paris? I'll send that message out into the cosmic void with warm thoughts and admiration for the effort that it took to construct the building over two centuries. It was quite interesting to tour the cathedral while taking a class of the "history and evolution of global processes," which is mainly a world history class with an emphasis on European history, particularly France.

    Regretfully, we didn't have time to climb to the top of the cathedral, so we ran back to the RER (a subway train line), and raced to Invalides. We were on a serious time crunch and had only 40 minutes to make it to the museum and back to Place de la Concorde to make our bus back to Angers. We ran to the museum, saw Napoleon's tomb, ran back to the train station, and rode back to Place de la Concorde. We made it just in time (thanks to our literally running through Invalides).

    The drive out of Paris is a vulgar bitch. I'm just saying. We were stopped for probably an hour and a half in traffic, and what was a three hour drive into Paris turned into a five hour drive back.

    Monday, I went through the routine of business class (after waking up late because my alarm didn't go off). Then in French, I hadn't finished my homework and had a very hard time with the day's lesson. But all was made right again when later that evening I cooked the Tex-Mex that I had been craving for so long! Guacamole, burritos, and chips and salsa!! YUM! It was the perfect meal to take my mind off of the long day! It did make me a bit homesick though.

    Tuesday, I sat through my European history classes in the morning, and then had a cheese tasting in my culture class. It was everything you would expect a classy French cheese tasting to be. We tasted the cheese from the fromagerie from the weakest to the strongest (the weakest being mimolette, the French equivalent of cheddar, and the strongest being moldy blue cheese). From there, with a full stomach, I went to the English language library to volunteer at a game night. It was okay. I actually thought my table was pretty boring because the native English speakers (one Britt and two from Indiana) dominated the entire game. But there was pizza and coca (Coca-Cola), and everything was just fine.

    Today, I woke early to go out to the market for the first time. I walked across town past the gare (train station), to Rue de Lafayette where the market was. I bought a kilo of green beans, a melon, bananas, a crêpe, and a pastry for under ten euros (remarkable), and then headed to school for yet another French class. This time I was prepared though!

    Afterwords, I had my first McDonald's experience in France. Of all the places in this damned country that I would expect some good old American air conditioning, McDonald's didn't have it!?!?! I ordered the Big Mac (on white, because here you can choose between white or wheat), and I ordered the regular frites (fries), instead of the special fries which were potato wedges, really. It tasted just like home. MMMM. I'm still enjoying it even now, hours later. They only give like two ketchup packets and one packet that says it's a dipping sauce for the fries, but it tasted more like tarter sauce to me. On the whole it was a great day to eat some good old fashioned American McDonalds. Even though there were some small cultural differences (like the names of the food, the different foods offered like the I Love New York Crisper, and the fact that they serve beer at McD's here), it was still a touch of home. MMM.

    Tonight, I once again volunteered. We have a program called Jam Club, which is actually at a lounge called the Jam Club. It is an English speaking social club for the French to practice their English with students. It was okay, I had a beer and we played Taboo and Charades. Nothing to special, and only a few French people actually showed up. Later though, back at our residence we had yet another Wine Wednesday, which was yet again, a smashing success. People from the CDEF Notre Dame (the American University) program showed up this time to socialize with us. It was very fun, and as I type this, I still have a small buzz. Now I'm in bed for the night, snacking on chips and salsa, and also some crème caramel... I'm still loving France, and even though at times I do miss my own culture (and 24 hour fast food), I am so thankful that I'm experiencing France. I will truly miss it when I'm back home.

    I will be wine tasting tomorrow, and then going out to my first boîte de nuit (night club). Then Saturday I'll be in Versailles visiting the palace of Louis XIV!! More to come later!
  
Loving France,
Kev

PS: I think this whole public urination thing is starting to rub off on the other boys, as several of them peed off of the balcony tonight at Wine Wednesday. Also, the French are very shy and conservative when it comes to talking about gossip or sex. Shopping at a French market is very inexpensive and exhilirating. And I am enjoying this new found taste for French wine and fashion. And SO many people stink of BO on the street, definitely a reinforced stereotype.