Day Three in Paris

The next morning was another where we over slept. The problem this time though was different than the morning before. Paris is actually in the next time zone over so they are an hour ahead of England. What happened was my mother and I had just been keeping that information in our head and not bothering to change our phones so when her alarm went off at nine it was already ten. This didn’t occur to us till we were halfway out the door when we glanced down at the clock and realized it wasn’t ten but eleven.

This didn’t put to big of a hitch in our plan seeing as today was our wandering day but you still want all the time you can get, four days really isn’t enough time to spend in Paris.

We began to make our way to Notre Dame and a café that was just on the other side of it. Walking past Notre Dame in this beautiful park with the colossal church on the right and the river on the left lined with the beautiful French architecture buildings was breath taking.  The weather wasn’t too brisk so taking our time walking through this park was lovely. Just like the Eiffel Tower I couldn’t stop myself from taking photo after photo. The gothic architecture was just so photogenic.

On our way to the café we had to cross this little bridge were three men in overalls were performing. One was singing with a cone, the type that they used to project there voices before microphones were too popular, a man on the piano and other man playing the base. And what were they singing you might ask? Route 66 and they sounded pretty American. Not being able to suppress a smile I stood there and listened to them sing while my mom got more and more impatient. She was hungry and the café we were going to was only about 50 feet away.

Eventually she drag me away and we went into the café. Being in France for three days no I have come to two conclusions. The first is everyone in France speaks English and they all speak it relatively well. The second is even though they speak English they wait for you to try and speak French to them first otherwise they will just start speaking rapidly in French until you give them a confused look and a “Pardon?” I have a feeling this serves as great amusement for them.

At the café we ordered two café creams and this time instead of just getting a plain croissant like what my mother got I ordered a chocolate croissant, fantastic as always, I have yet to have any bad hood in Paris.

Next was back to Notre Dame, this time to go inside. Since it was Sunday when we walked in they were in the middle of mass and not just any mass communion. Now I am not catholic but being in Notre Dame during mass is something to talk about. My mother on the other hand, although she is not catholic, is fairly religious and was really excited to be in such a famous church for such a moving experience.

Leaving Notre Dame was another photo experience snapping away at the front making sure to get all the little details crafted into the frame we then walked on to my aunt’s favourite church Saint Chelet. I can see why it is here favourite, it’s this little chapel and it isn’t like most of the churches in England. It was colourful and the walls were covered with stain glass so light peaking through carried this magical feel about it.

On Sundays in Paris there is this little market area and during the week it is filled with flowers but on Sundays the flowers are taken away and replaced with birds. Bright little parakeets and cockatiels lined up for about two blocks and we could hear there chirping about a block away. Rounding the corner to see all these birds was lovely. I love birds, I think they are beautiful, their colours, their chirps and songs, I found myself tempted to just pick one out and by a white wire cage and just take one home with me. Voicing this plan to my mother she just laughed and said, “I don’t think British customs would be to please if you brought a bird back with you. I mean you could probably keep it hidden in your room but I don’t think you would make on the train.” Yeah, she was probably right.

Our next plan was to go hit up the shopping district but once we got there we realized that since it was Sunday nothing would be open. My face fell, I love seeing the sights but I really wanted to do some shopping in Paris. My mother seeing my disappointment assured me that the next day, Monday, we would make time after visiting the Louvre to do a bit of shopping. Oh well, that would have to do.

Next I wanted to head back over to the Eiffel Tower and then to the Arc de Triumph to get pictures of both during the day. Again, I am not sure I got enough photos of either.

To my happiness the Arc de Triumph was close by to the major high end-shopping street in Paris. I mean you could see Carte from the Arc and even though it was Sunday everything was open! I was in heaven shops everywhere I was walking in and out of everything. Now most of the shops were far too expensive for me but we came to an H&M and I just barrelled in. I have never seen one bigger and all I wanted to do was just buy everything. Since that was slightly impractical I picked out a coat that was 50%. Feeling proud of my purchase I walked out thinking, I now have a coat from Paris. I was pretty happy.

Leaving H&M we looked at the time and realized it was almost eleven, time to go back and get some sleep, we were determined to wake up early the next morning.   

Day Two, well sort of day one in Paris.

Waking up at 9:30, the time we had hopped to leave the flat, my mother and I realized we were both to tired to not get a little bit of a late start.

Stretching and attempting to massage out the crick in my neck that had only been made worse due to sleeping on the couch.

Miraculously, we were out of the flat by 10:30 and we went off to a café slightly down the road for breakfast, well mostly coffee. But once we got to the café we each ordered a croissant, which was the best croissant that I have ever had. I am pretty sure that it had just come out of the oven because the middle was warm and gooey and the top was flaky and buttery and just wonderfully magnificent.

Feeling full and excited to for the first full day in Paris to begin and off we went.

The Musée d'Orsay was  our first stop, set up in an old train station it was filled to the brim with mostly impressionist and post impressionist art. I was in heaven. There was a Van Gogph exhibition, Renoir, Degas, and tons of Monet and Manet, and then the crown jewel (or at least in my opinion) Edouard Manet’s Luncheon in the Grass. Luncheon in the Grass is my favourite painting and the marvel of being able to see it in person was just positively breath taking.

Even though it is my favourite painting I did not know that it was housed at the Musee d’Orsay. I did not even know it was going to be there, displayed proudly and boldly on it’s own wall when I turned the corner to enter the impressionist wing.

The prints that I had seen all my life did no justice to the real painting. I mean for one I had no idea how big it actually was until I saw it. And the colours, they were just so much more vibrant that any replica I had every seen.

I could just go on and on. The beauty and the satirical elements that it possesses standing tall and proud just took my breath away.

I could have sat in front of it for hours.

Even thought I think the Musee d’Orsay is the only museum that I honestly could have spent days in (most museums I get tired by about hour two and am ready to move on the see the rest of the city I’m in) both my mother and I were hungry and decided to go to the café.

Very artsy, beautiful, the café had all of this metal and orange wire design filling the room.

The menu was, overwhelming. I wasn’t starving and neither was my mother and due to our experience with dinner the night before we knew nothing we were going to get would be by any means small.

After some debate over how we should tackle our just slightly rumbling tummies we decided that my mother would order a Café Cream (espresso with frothy milk) and I would order the Croque Monsieur which was these two slices of tomato bread with a thin slice of ham and cheese in the middle topped with hot gruyere which just sat in a lump on top melting ever so slightly just as if it was butter.

Even though it wasn’t very big it was rich and after only just half I felt stuffed and as if I would or could ever eat again.

Wandering about the museum a little my mother realised that she had forget the tickets for the Eiffel tower back at the flat. So we had to go make our way back but not before we found a good pastries at a cute little shop to have over tea right before we left for the Eiffel Tower that night.

Our tickets for the Eiffel Tower were at eight but we wanted to leave plenty of time to get there on the metro and then take photos of it from the ground so we left around seven.

Getting seeing it for the first time was breath taking, the lights running up it and just the sheer magnitude was widely impressive. All I did was take pictures of it. Honestly, I would walk a few feet figure out that now this was the better angle, take about five shots and then walk a little and do the same thing all over again. I think that it is highly probable that I just do not have enough photos of the Eiffel Tower (see below to understand the full magnitude of my sarcasm here).

Even though we already had tickets there was still a short line we had to wait in before we could go up and while we were waiting, my eyes wandering aimlessly and my head mindlessly following my eyes I noticed three French military men walking in what appeared to be a loose formation carrying very, and I mean very, large guns. It made sense why they were there, protect the monument for terrorist attacks, but it still didn’t change the fact that they were terrifying and how thankful I was that my passport was just in my bag (in scary situations my mind wanders to the worst possible scenario and in that scenario my passport came in handy).

Finally they walked past and honestly the funny thing was nobody else seemed bothered by them or much less seemed to notice them at all were as me and mother were fascinated and a little bit scared of them and therefore neither one of us could stop talking about them.

The trip to the top wasn’t that spectacular due to the fact that way to many people were packed in this little glass elevator and I was unlucky enough to be pushed to the centre. Slightly upsetting but oh well, I got a good view from the sommett. The city was beautiful, all lit up at night and I could see for miles and if it wasn’t about three degrees up there I could have stayed for hours but once a half hour had passed and I was shaking and my toes were going numb it was time to go.

The trip down was better, I was able to shove my way to the window and I then had my nose pressed to the glass the entire way down. If I had my way I would ride up and down that elevator, with no other annoying tourists of course.

Part of me wanted to stay out all night, just wander the streets and see Paris for Paris but my body was screaming NO, and yawns kept interrupting my sentences. It was time to go to bed, plus I needed to get up bright and early for my adventures the next day. 

View from the Musée d'Orsay

Pantheon directly to the left of our flat

Little French Avenue 

Flower Stand

These aren't even half of the photos I have of the Eiffel Tower.

Departing for Paris

Departing for Paris

Waking up at seven in the morning is only okay if you are doing it to get on a plane, train, or automobile. For me it was a bus to a train, then the tube to a train and then a train to a train to the flat. Where was I going you might ask? The city of love, Paris.

The train ride really wasn’t bad. I mostly just looked out the window and worked on and off until the train finally pulled out of the black tunnel under the sea to resurface on the French countryside.

Since my mother had come to visit from the States she was able to ask my cousins if we could use their flat in Paris. Seeing as the dad only uses the flat during the week due to his job in Paris (his family actually lives in Lyon which is about a two hour train ride so the flat is more so he doesn’t have to spend his entire pay check on just getting to the office). So to get there we had to take the metro from the train station.

The Parisian metro is hell. Don’t get on it. Get robbed blind and call a cab.

Well you could probably handle it if you didn’t have luggage.

First off, the ticket counter, yeah wouldn’t take either my mother’s or my cards, debit or credit, because the whole of Europe decided it would be fun to change the way you use credit cards which I still don’t understand but it essentially has to do with a chip and a pin number and the fact that you don’t swipe a bar code.

I think Europe just wants to be difficult.

So, since the machine decided it only wanted to take cash I went on a hunt to find an ATM, which was a lot harder than it should have been and I probably looked like a chicken with it’s head cut off frantically walking around the station looking for anything that could be a cash machine.

Finally, some cash was found. Nope, the machine only wants coins and of course ATMS only want to give you 20s. Feeling a little flustered I handed the bill over to my mother and this time it was her turn to go off and break the bill while I stayed with the luggage. While sitting on my mom’s big, red, bulky, plastic suitcase I noticed out of the corner of my eye that this man was staring at me. Do all I can to pretend like I don’t notice him he eventually comes up to me with a smile on his face and says something to me in French, which I don’t pick up at all. He could tell right away from the reaction on my face that I didn’t speak a word of French. He asks me a few question and then says, “Facebook?” I replied with a smile and a nod accepting the piece of paper accompanied by a red pen that he handed me and proceeded to write down a fake name.

I’m not going to lie, that did flatter me a bit.

Since the ticket machine finally decided to accept the money it was given (it should really learn not to be greedy) it was off to the metro or RER.

You know the term packed in like sardines? Well that only began to cover what it was like on this metro. Everyone was literally standing on top of each other trying to fit in this coach and the fact that both me and mother had suitcases, which both were not that bulky mind you made that experience ten time worse. Bright side however, we only had to ride it for four stops and when we did finally have to exit everyone in the coach helped me lift my suitcase over the crowd because there was no way I was going to make it off, I could barely wedge my body through the packed in people.

As it turned out my cousins flat is in a really nice area about a block away from the Pantheon and you can see the Eiffel tower over the buildings down the street.

Paris.

Dropping our stuff off in the flat my mother and I both realized that we need a break before we went out and began to wander the streets. It was about 4:30 so our plan was to leave at about six, walk around a little, look at the restaurants for a place to eat dinner and then sit in a café with a cup of coffee till we were ready to eat.

Basically we did just that.

We had dinner at this place with things really long name and of course you only pronounced have the letters. The food was fantastic, amazing, I don’t think I eat that much food in a week when I’m at school.

They do this thing in a lot of places called a fixed price, which means for 33 euros you get an appetizer, a main course, and a desert.

I had sausages of Lyon for my appetizer, which were these sausages, potatoes cooked to perfection, and a salad all drizzled with this I think mustard based sauce. Probably one of the best meals I have ever had and it was big enough to be an entre too.

Next was my main course and I chose lamb for that which came with these heavenly potatoes cooked with milk and topped with cheese that was still bubbling when the waiter brought it to the table.

Finally it was desert time and I had ordered this nougat ice cream sitting in a pool of warm raspberry sauce.

Best meal of my life and looking back on what I wrote I wouldn’t even know how to begin to find the words that would possibly start to give even the littlest amount of justification to how truly amazing it was.

Oh, just throwing it out there, I’m surprised they didn’t have to roll me out of the restaurant.

Walking or more waddling back to the flat I realized that the pure beauty of that meal was only just the beginning to the wonders I would experience in Paris. 

Pitt Rivers

Normally when I am told that I have to get up early to go to a museum I am never very pleased. First off about getting up early  (look I am only just in sentence two and I am already complaining about my sleep patterns.)and secondly because nine times out of ten museums can be really, incredibly, boring. I mean you go with school, the keep you there entirely to long and make you do ridiculous amounts of worksheets so the entire time you are to busy trying to find the Norwegian dinosaur and who dug it then actually enjoying the museum. No, Saturday wasn’t like that, I was actually excited to venture to this museum.

Cassie, for her anthropology class, had to go and visit the Pitt Rivers museum. So, she tried to rope as many people as she could to go see it with her. Now she didn’t have to do anything once she got there she just had to look around and see all there was to see. If we really all stayed in there to see all there was see I think we could have been there for a year. Exaggeration? Eh, not quite. This place wasn’t very big, really just two rooms and three stories but it was packed. Everything about the world was in there and it was all just kind of shoved together making it really hard not to have any awkward encounters with people who you would try to walk by.

All in all the museum was really fascinating and the three hours I spent three didn’t feel at all like three hours, well at least till the end. As we were leaving the museum my contact started to bother me and then a few seconds later, plop, out it came. Luckily I come semi-prepared meaning I had a case with some contact solution in it ready to go, but not fully prepared, I did not have my glasses with me so the fun times of walking around with one contact in, only being able to see out of one eye came rolling in.

It would have been fine if we had just gone straight to the flat but we weren’t. Earlier in the day we had made plans to get food at some point and since it was now about five o’clock and everyone’s tummies were rumbling we chose to walk over to the turf tavern for some fish and chips. Part of me wanted to go back, I was cold, couldn’t really see and I had a slight headache starting to form, but I was also hungry and everyone was excited about The Turf so I didn’t say anything and just started going with everyone else to the pub.

Due to Oxford University graduation that day the place was packed and on this cold and getting colder night it was natural that all the tables inside were taken and the only ones left were outside. Granted these tables were under a heater but I tend to keep my coat on even when I am inside and the heater really didn’t make too much off a difference. The good thing was the food was really good and we left right on time so that when we got to the bus stop the U1 was only 5 minutes away and our time waiting in the cold was greatly diminished.

By the time we go on the bus my head was killing me, it was of course because I had been walking around only able to see clearly out of one eye and the other one was desperately trying to catch up so when it was suggested that we go to a fair down the road for Guy Fawkes Day I quickly declined, I was already cold enough. My response was met with some “Aw are you sure?” to which I replied, “Yeah, I just have way to much to do.”

Back in my flat I just plopped down on my bed, watch an episode of Fringe (I have just recently become addicted to this show, honestly it is just absolutely fantastic) and then forced my self up to begin working on my Art essay and my essay critiques. The night was concluded with some work done but mostly with me having migrated into the kitchen when I had heard that everyone was back from the fair. I sat and chatted, my headache having disappeared about an hour ago, my glasses sitting on my nose; to my embarrassment, my day ended the way it always seems to, with a smile on my face and good conversation amongst friends.