So last weekend, I visited the fabulous city of Paris with my best friend Katie, where we met up with our other best friend Vanessa. (Yes I'm very popular...my other best friend Alyssa is in New York.) I got to Paris around 8pm Friday night, when I pulled up to Paris Gare de Nord (sp?) in my fancy Eurostar train. I then followed Vanessa's AMAZING directions (seriously, no sarcasm) to her apartment. I took a metro 20 stops, a tram, and then walked. And I made it without getting lost. I am AWESOME at Paris.
I sat outside her building puffing on my inhaler since I still had bronchitus, but when I saw Kate and Vanessa walking towards me I got real excited and started running. After fabulous hugs and hellos, we made our way into Vanessa's flat. (Although I don't think that's what they're called there, whatever I'm in London and it's all rubbing off on me.) We then spent the night catching up and trying to find a fun place to get drinks, which did not go as planned. We walked in circles for miles looking for this one bar, and on the way we saw one thousand roller bladers. No exaggeration. We finally ended up at Auto-Passion, this race car inspired pub, where the waiter tried to tell me they were out of hot water until Vanessa explained to him in French that my throat hurt and I needed tea.
The next morning, we woke up super early so that we could see all of Paris in two days. Vanessa's roommate had made us a handy dandy list of sights, so we grabbed a pastry on the run and made our way to the Eiffel tower. It was 70 degrees and sunny! When we got to the tower though, the line to get in was hours long. Plus, it had been evacuated twice the weekend before due to terrorist threats, so I didn't want to waste time AND risk getting to the front only to get kicked out. So we decided to just take a bunch of pictures in front of it instead...Katie and I were shocked to learn that it's brown. Are we the only ones that thought it was black?
From the Eiffel tower, we walked along the river (there is no way I'm going to remember the name of everything, and if I do, the spelling will be horribly embarrassing. Just warning you now) and took some pictures on a beautiful bridge. We walked to the Arc de Triumph, and on the way ended up on Champs Elysees (pronounced Ehleezay, I think)...which is pretty much the Rodeo Drive of Paris: really expensive shopping leading up to the Arc. We held our breaths and managed to pass by the temptation, making our way into the Arc via an underground tunnel. Once we were in it, Katie and I decided it was our favorite thing of Paris. (I realize we had seen very little at that point, but we're very easily entertained.) It was so beautiful, and the weather was so nice, I just wanted to live in the middle of it. But I think they frown on that.
After the arc, we went to lunch at a cafe where I experienced first hand that French people like to take 3 hours to eat lunch and 5 hours to bring you the check. After our million hour lunch, we went to H&M. Now, I now you must be thinking 1 or 2 or both of the following: first of all Genna, you said you were able to surpass temptation to shop, you clearly lied. Second of all, why H&M? You're in PARIS! Go somewhere European so we can all be jealous of your fashionista wardrobe instead of heckling you for wearing T-shirts all the time! Well, concerned citizen, first of all, I was not able to walk by all those stores without going into at least one. I am only human. Second of all, it was because of the shiny bags. As a marketing major, you'd think I'd be aware of and therefore immune to psychological advertising tricks, but unfortunately, my brain is not that developed and certainly not that focused when it encounters something shiny. (And as it turns out, same goes for Katie and Vanessa.) The H&M store had opened the day before, and was kicking off its move to the Champs Elysees by putting purchases in stiff white bags with shiny letters on them. I wish I was kidding. I wanted that bag so bad.
After buying a cute little sweater and NOT getting the bag (I almost filed a complaint but I don't speak French), we met up with a couple of Vanessa's friends and went to get Haagan Dazs. It was the most expensive two scoops of ice cream I've ever eaten, at 5 euros. When we were done eating Haagan Dazs, Vanessa and her friends decided to trick me into going to a wine festival at the top of a mountain. Now, obviously this sounds like a fabulous idea: lots of fun on a beautiful Saturday, sitting at the top of a scenic mountain on the steps of an amazing church overlooking all of Paris, sipping wine. But no one warned me that in order to get to the top of this mountain, I had to climb 243 thousand stairs (rough estimate). Also, I found out later that there is actually a train that takes you to the top that no one felt the need to tell me about.
At the top of the mountain, (Montmarte, yes I looked it up), there were thousands of people sitting on the steps of the Sacre Coeur (sp?). Sacre Coeur is a huge, gorgeously ornate basilica, for those of you who are not cultured enough to be familiar with all my fancy french references. (I have a wikipedia tab open right now.) We stopped at a tent and got a bottle of wine and escargo, which I did not drink or eat, respectively. (I don't like wine, and the second thing is snails. So, no thanks. I don't care how much I've grown up, I'm not eating snails.) We sat on the steps and enjoyed the view, which was absolutely incredible. You can see the entire city from the top of Montmarte, and it was so amazing to look at while I basked in the pride of having climbed all those steps. We met up with some more of Vanessa's friends (she's very popular as well), walked through the basilica (which was also incredible), and then made our way back down to the streets.
Enough for one post, I'm gonna break this up like the Berlin one so you guys have some time to digest. Plus I get really nervous that I'm gonna write a ton of shit and then my computer is gonna crash. In which case I would die.
Cheers!
I MISS PARIS.
ReplyDeleteIs that Eddies sister? How ironic that Eddie visited Matt and then she visited you.
Nah, I visited Vanessa...she's studying in Paris!
ReplyDelete