Paris! (Part 3, The Finale)

This is Part 3, the final part of a 3 part series on my trip to Paris. To see Parts 1 and 2, click on the links below:

Link to Part 1

Link to Part 2


A quick side note before I begin part 3:

So I want to respond to something that was brought to my attention about Part 2 of the Paris post. A reader emailed me saying I didn't sound like I really liked Paris that much. When I went back and read my post, I saw where they could get that from. It seemed like I was criticizing all of the different things I saw, and several times said I was "underwhelmed". I think I was more critical of the Paris attractions because I have learned about them for a good portion of my life. Since 6th grade I have been taking French classes. Not only do you learn the language in these classes, but you learn about the culture and the different locations in France and other French speaking countries. We have studied pretty exhaustively the region of Paris, including the different monuments and places in Paris. So unlike Barcelona, or Rome even, I knew what I wanted to see and what I would be seeing in Paris. I also knew the background of these places. I think this was what made Paris different. It was experiencing the places that I had seen in textbooks for so long that made it really cool. Yes, I was a bit critical of some places, but I think it's because I have come to have expectations for the sites. Nothing though, can trump the real life experience of seeing these places first hand. Everything we went to was exciting and memorable.

Part 3:

So Saturday...

We woke up early to have breakfast at the hostel (or hotel we decided on yesterday didn't we?). A french baguette and chocolate pastry, with coffee and orange juice. Not bad for a free breakfast. We then headed out to the sights for the day. It was a bit cloudy and a little rainy during the day, but that didn't stop us or slow us down.

Musee D'Orsay:

I didn't take pictures in this museum, mostly because I was more interested in just taking in the art as opposed to capturing it in pictures, and I think that says something for the exhibits at the Museum. I was really impressed by the exhibits. I got to see some really cool sculptures and paintings from artists such as Monet, including some really famous pieces. We spent a good couple hours in here and it was really cool.

Catacombs:



This is something I hadn't studied in French classes before, and it was really incredible. The catacombs are old mines that were used to mine stone and rock for building. Once the mines were all used up, they were turned into a burial place. Walking down into the catacombs was creepy, but that was only the beginning. We suddenly walked into a hallway of bones. Skulls and bones, piled up, actually stacked meticulously forming floor to ceiling walls. The amount of bones was incredible. They were lined with morbid sayings in french such as "The Empire of the Dead". Walking out of the Catacombs we were asked to open our bags, to show we had not stolen any bones. Pretty chilling.

Crepes:

Coming out of the Catacombs, we were all pretty hungry. So we made our way to a Crepe place that was recommended in a tour book of Paris. Great recommendation. In France, Crepes are used not only as a a dessert, but as a sandwich/pita like bread for breakfast/lunch. I got a crepe with Eggs, Ham, and Cheese. Incredible. One of the best tasting combinations of Egg, ham and cheese (One of my favorite breakfast sandwich combos) I have had in a long time. I didn't stop there. Next was a Crepe with Nutella and Banana. A classic dessert crepe, which was just as good. Everyone was really happy with their crepes, full and re-energized, we were ready to hit the sites again.

Luxembourg Gardens:

The weather was getting a bit better, just slightly overcast, so we headed to the Luxembourg Gardens. We walked by the fountains and sat around the water for a bit. The park was really big, so we walked around the South-East area of it, and then headed back in to the Metro (our favorite place in the world) to head to do a little shopping!!!

Galeries Lafayette:

Saying this is a large mall is an understatement. At Villanova, I live near the second Largest Mall in the U.S. and I still was overwhelmed by this mall. It was basically a huge department store, with small storefronts of all different name brand designers. The mall spanned over two blocks, and had an overpass to get from the two. The amount of people in it rivaled Macy's on December 23rd this year, which is really saying something. I didn't plan on buying anything, but it was cool to see a basically one-stop-shop for everything name-brand.

Tour D'Eiffel



By now you must have been thinking we forgot about that huge structure in Paris. The one that everyone always goes to see? Well we didn't forget about it, but planned all along to go see it at night. For one, it's much prettier at night (yes I said prettier, deal with it). The second being we thought the lines might not be as bad to go up it. Okay, I made that second reason up, it was only because it's prettier at night. The line wasn't long though so there! We opted in for the elevator, not the stairs, because we had done more than enough walking and climbing of stairs over the past two days. Good decision. The elevator took us to the second level of the Eiffel tower, which is I'd guess about halfway up heightwise. The elevator to the top was closed, but you could climb the stairs to it. We opted out for that. The view from the second level was incredible. You could see the entire city lit up on what turned out to be a pretty clear night. It was pretty windy up there, and therefore cold, but we stuck it out to take pictures and just take it all in. While we were up there it did it's little light show where it sparkles for about 5 or 10 minutes. It was really cool to see that happening right in front of us. Back down the elevator we went, satisfied with the pictures we had taken and the experience in general.

Dinner:

We went from the Eiffel tower to a local Cafe a friend of Erin's had recommended. It was a good choice. Really cool atmosphere and some good food, especially dessert. I had pasta for dinner. I know, I just couldn't help myself. I wanted to try the pasta in a different country. It was still very good, and the tiramisu came in a huge ice cream dish. Very good. We sat at the cafe for a couple hours just enjoying the atmosphere and hanging out.

Sunday:

The girls of Syracuse had an early train, 10am, on Sunday to go back to London, so we got breakfast and then parted ways. Meaning they left and I went back to bed for a couple hours. I then checked out of the hotel. While checking out, I wanted to ask about a local church to go to mass. I quickly realized that the man at the counter spoke little if no english. Good thing I had finally gotten into the habit of using French. Pause for Tangent.

Speaking Francais:

Yes, I've taken French for half of my educated life. Yes I should know french very well by now. It was, to say the least, an interesting experience.

Just as is familiar to me, I am going to grade myself on different aspects of French:

French Comprehension: A-
I was able to understand a lot of the French. Most of the normal talk I understood actually, or picked up on enough verbs or key words to make out what the person was saying or asking. It came pretty easily to me, sometimes I had to think about it for a second or two, but if I had learned it in the past it came to me quickly. This made interacting with the city pretty easy, such as getting places or ordering food.

Speaking French: C
Yes I understood the French, but speaking it was a whole other problem. You see, for the past month I've been living in Italy (in case you hadn't picked up on that already) and have been learning how to speak Italian. In French classes, its much easier to learn to comprehend the language than it is to speak it. So yes we do do speaking exercises, but it is not the same as actually using the language in real conversation situations. With Italian, most of my learning comes from real conversation situations because I'm forced into using it whether I like it or not. I have to speak it to survive here. So in Paris, when someone said something to me in French, my brain would comprehend it and begin to form a response. Trouble is, the Italian is quicker in responding than the french is. So I would hear a french question, and respond to the person in Italian. I understood what they were saying, and responded correctly, just in the wrong language. If I actually thought about what I needed to say, or if I was the one initiating the conversation, I had more time to deliberately think out the french, and I did well when it was this type of situation. But in a knee-jerk reaction situation, the Italian came out. Many times it was me saying si instead of oui.

So back to asking about church. I realized this guy didn't speak any english. Fortunately I was able to remember the word for church: l'eglise. I was able to form a sentence to tell him I was looking for a church, and he was able to show me on a map. I was not expecting what I found when I got there. It was a pretty big church for being in a small side street. I walked in just as mass was starting. Mass was quite an experience. All of the mass was in French, except for the readings which they did in both French and English for the first reading, and then French and Spanish for the second reading. There was a choir of nuns who sang, and there were organ interludes inbetween everything. It lasted an hour and a half, but was a really nice mass.

After this I walked around the cobblestone streets around the hotel and found this awesome bakery. The pastries were expensive,but looked really cool (see pic). I got a chocolate Baguette which was great and a coffee. From there it was back to the train station to go to the airport for my 4:40pm flight.





Flight home to Rome:

Have I talked about the Charles De Gaulle Airport yet? It is a spectacle in itself. It is a massive airport with Three Terminals. It's not just a big eyesore though. Besides the really nice shopping and restaurants the gates are really incredible. The gate I was in looked like the Louvre, a gigantic glass pyramid over top of the gates. One of the more impressive airports I've seen (though I haven't seen many).

Flying back to Rome, we passed over the Swiss Alps. At first through the clouds you could only see the peaks of a couple mountains peeking through (get it, peaks peeking through?!). Ten minutes later the clouds opened up and I could see the entire landscape of the mountains. It was a pretty moving experience and I couldn't help but stare out the window the rest of the flight.



So that just about wraps up my trip to Paris. It was a really great weekend, it was nice to see Becky and all of the Syracuse girls there, and I'm ready for my next trip out of the country. But that will have to wait, seeing as my family is currently on their way over here, a quick change in plans with the impending storm that is headed towards the east coast. Florence this weekend with them, I'll keep everyone posted on when they arrive, check the twitter feed to the right!