Paris

---

This is the last retroactive posts to be filled; the date is not the date I wrote it, but the last date of being in Paris, since we were there fore 3 nights.

Before I go into the details of what we did in Paris, our journey there was very eventful since there was apparently a strike going on, starting the night before we were departing Interlaken (who has scheduled strikes with a begin and end date?). So there was apparently a good possibility that when we left our connecting train in Geneva, we might be there for a while since the train to Paris might be cancelled. Turns out our train happened to be just fine, so it was packed full of people who had been on cancelled trains, but we got to Paris just fine and on time.

We get into Paris on Thursday night trying to figure out where our hostel is again. Our directions are horrible, and the only thing we have to go by basically is the name of the train stop we get off on, and that once we leave the station, go around the regional commercial center (mall), we see McDonalds and then walk 300m and we should be there. That's seriously all we had. It was sketchy. We find the hotel after a while, which was actually really nice since we had our own bathroom and the hotel was high quality in general. We even got a tv, and french tv is very interesting, to put it politely.

So that first day, as a result of those train strikes, we didn't get to go anywhere because it wasn't certain if we could get back, and our hostel is not really in Paris, more like just outside the city limits (zone 3 of the public transportation map, if you know what I mean; there are 5 zones total in concentric circles out of the city center, so we weren't as far away as it gets, luckily).

2 days left: we spend Friday going to the Louvre, which is really awesome, just a really great museum, but ridiculously huge. I must say that Mona Lisa is is a very awesome painting, and it is indeed mysterious. I can't really put my finger on why though. There are some other important works in there, but they pale in comparison. After the Louvre, we went and saw the Notre-Dame Cathedral. We went inside to get out of the rain, walked around a bit, and then sat down in the sanctuary to chill while the rain let up. While sitting down, all sorts of goings-on were happening; clergy members hustling about, people handing out flyers of some sort, and people rustling and sitting down all over the place. Mass must be commencing soon. I'm not Catholic, but during the last Catholic mass I went to I saw the Pope, so might as well see what happens this time. Turns out the Notre-Dame houses Christ's Crown of Thorns, as well as 2 other relics, so they bring those out in this grand procession, and go through mass (all in French) with the Crown of Thorns in a display case up front. Afterwards, it appears people begin to line up to go see it, so we say what-the-heck and do it also. As we get close, we see that people are going all out, bowing to the floor, crying a lot, kissing it, generally worshipping it. So we just go up there, kiss it and slink away (they had some guys up there to wipe it off after each person kisses it), which we think is acceptable since we see other people not going all out for it. But going all out seemed to acceptable also since it was probably one of the most intense things I've ever done, and I had just gone canyoning. After that, the rain had let up, so we walked down the Champs-d'Eleeys (spelling is not right there) to the Arc de Triomphe (again, bad at French spelling), and stopping in Sephora for Judd and Nate to buy perfume for their girlfriends and for me to buy some cologne I didn't need and paid too much for. From there we walked to Rue Cler to get some picnic food and head to the Eifel Tower to eat in the park around it. We then go to the top and watch the sun set from up there, which is awesome. After that, we get down, and hop on the metro to the Latin Quarter to try and find somewhere interesting to hang out for the evening, and stop at Notre-Dame to get some cool pictures of the Cathedral at night). It starts getting too late, so we just head back home, which is fine because we are all tired from walking around and short of breath still from the whole Crown of Thorns incident.

Saturday, we get up later than normal (to sleep in) and head to Versailles after picking up our tickets for the Chunnel train ride the next day. We wind up getting there around 2 or so, and buy the full day pass (20 euro) to use up some of our euro bills before going to England. So we see the apartments and the royal halls and the gardens and its all very awesome mostly since its so over the top and out of control, but also mostly boring. The gardens were very beautiful, and ridiculously huge, bigger than the Louvre even, and we walk through those hoping to find Marie-Antoinette's little countryside village that she had made in the garden because she wanted to experience being a peasant woman and have her children enjoy the countryside, or something like that. The village was complete with a mill, farm, houses, small lake, everything, and it was really cool, but it just seemed too fake, too planned out and fairy-tale-ish, kind of like Neushwanstein Castle, but like in the opposite direction of regaity. We got back to Paris, checked out the Moulin Rouge (which was far more expensive than we had thought, and far more prestigious - like 150 euro for the show, black tie occaision), and went up the tallest hill in Paris (which was near the Moulin Rouge) to get a good view of the city and see a cool church (no Popes or Crown of Thorns here though). We then got on the metro to go to the Latin Quarter, and try to find a cool bar a second time. We find Le 10 Bar, which is supposed to be a little bar famous for the philosophical and political conversations of students who attend the bar, as well as their sangria, which is very very good. After that, we headed home, and said good bye to Paris (or what we would see of it above ground).

The next day we hopped on the train to go to London through the Chunnel, which went just fine, and got all unpacked in our rooms here on campus at Brunel University. We each have our own bathrooms with maid cleaning service, as well as a shared kitchen for the floor.

If you would like to contact me or Judd by phone, you can call me at 011 44 791 402 6418 (its free for me to accept incoming calls, but you will need an phone card).

From now on I will keep updating this, probably just on the stuff I do on the weekends. We plan on going to places around the UK, like Scotland and Ireland and Wales.

---