3 posts tagged “paris”

I've been bad about updating since my first day in Paris. Rather than bore you with my inane ramblings, I'll do this list style.

Places I've been:
Eglise Saint Severin
Reims - Cathedral Notre Dame
Jardin du Luxemborg
Napoleon's tomb
Pere Lachoise
Shakespeare & Co
Forum Les Halles
Gare de L'Est

Now a bit of observation. Myths I would like to go on record to debunk:
No, the streets are not covered in shit
The French are not mean people, though they do dislike Americans. I totally understand all their reasons why.
Not all metro stations smell of piss (though some do)

Myths that do exist:
There are not many overweight people. Not everyone is a waif, but they certainly don't follow the obesity trend.
Yes, many people smoke.
It does seem to be a burden to have so many tourists, so they aren't necessarily awesome towards them. But after witnessing the swarm, I can also understand why.
Surly waiters, but see above reason.
They do love their comic books (ah le B.D.!)
They do tend to be fashionable. If only men all over the world took the care to their appearance as they do...

So that is it, thus far. I leave Monday, so I probably won't update until I am home in Seattle and can completely digest the experience...

I'll spare the usual travel disaster stories (including soap dispensers that like to bruise thumbs in Houston, discovering that my deodorant was failing me into the 7th of 10 hours on my flight from Houston to Paris, my debit card not working at the train station, etc.)

After some hearty napping, a comically uncomfortable shower (it's built for gnomes, I swear), and psyching myself up, I decided to venture out. Psyching myself up was required because thus far no one speaks English and my French is elementary at best. It's intimidating and overwhelming to be in a city that I've spent years dreaming about only to feel totally inefficient and isolated.

However, once I ventured out the first thing I came across was a comic shop around the corner from the hotel. This I took as a good sign. I got fairly lost but managed to find a brasserie that served something other than steak tartar and beef soup and some beef mayonnaise (you'd think I'd be kidding but it appears that the French LOVE their beef). I sidestepped the restaurants that catered to the tourists (meaning English menus) and headed for the most smoky, scary place I could find. It worked - I found an authentic French eatery.

I had to had gesture and mistakingly pour some of my kir sauvignon into my water to truly prove to the fellow eaters that I am a dumb American, but I got to eat. After 24 hours of airport food I was stoked.

Afterwards I decided to wander around and somehow crossed the Seine and found myself at the foot of the Notre Dame. I'm glad I saw it in all it's lit glory rather than swarmed with tourists. Though I told myself beforehand I wouldn't be the tourist to take shots of all the predictable locations, I was moved to. I blame it on the chiming bells on my approach.

I think that my taking a photo was invitation enough for some swarmy Frenchman to approach me, tell me I was beautiful, and that we needed to have a drink. It took nice persistence, but I finally shook the strange man who tried to convince me my name in French is Sarah and that Seattle and Washington D.C. are really close to each other.

And now I will relax with my first bottle of cheap French wine bought in Paris and play some Final Fantasy III on my DS.

Oh, I don't know if I'll be able to blog again. The adapter I bought doesn't work. So long ipod, DS and laptop charging.

I've been fidgety and spacey all day and couldn't figure out why. Then it suddenly dawned on me at lunch, while flipping through a tourist guide, that today is the start of my Paris countdown. Three weeks from today Dylan and I will be en route to Paris (Freckles will be staying at the Seattle Canine Club).

We are going with no agenda, other than checking in at our modest, but hopefully cool hotel in the Latin Quarter (Minerve Hotel). We have a running wish list of things we'd like to do, but we won't stress out if we can't get to everything. I'd like to check out the market on Rue Mouffetard, the Notre Dame, Pont Neuf bridge, and Montmatre. Dylan wants to go to Musee Rodin. Other than that we just want to sit at cafes and eat good food and enjoy the sights. I'm sure our 6 days/5 nights will go too fast, but I'm glad we have to opportunity to go, thanks to low airfare and visiting during a lull in the tourist season.

Since I've already started reincorporating cheese into my diet in preperation of the French cuisine, the only thing left for to us to do before leaving for Paris is to brush up on French through downloaded audio lessons and flip through a gigantic, intimidating beast of a book called The Big Blue Book of French Verbs.

Oh, we have to LOTS of film to buy too. Anyone have suggestions for traveling with film?