Fête Nationale - Quatorze Juillet

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It is a great day for almost sixty one million people in France. Apparently many Parisians as well as foreign nationals gather both side of Champs-Élysées to capture a glimpse of colourful military parades followed by Cavalry guards and French President's motor car. Then there were arrays of war planes invades the sky of Paris with a thundering noise. Despite all these pompierisme & bombastic style, I was not that much keen to wake up so early to go in order to secure place with a good view to see the military parade. When we arrived at 8am, the place was already full. I pushed inch by inch to get close to the iron barricades which were kept close to the edge of the main road. I only wish that I was up somewhere comfortably sleeping instead of getting squeezed both sides of my thinly body by the crowd. Much waited parade began at 9am with a loud noise of clapping and hoot. A little by little, an inch by inch the military power of French nation was exposed to us. From firemen to nurses and all other units belongs to the police, the navy, and the army were marching so lazily for hours and hours. The beginning was exciting but sooner it begins to bore us badly. We might have stayed in the crowd for two or three hours until Mr. Nicolas Sarkozy appeared his right hand-waving. That was all about this. On our way back home, we bought a couple of freshly baked croissants from well renowned Patissier J.P. Cohier. Our celebration was over as we steeped One hundred and twenty five steps up the wound up staircase.

History:- Bastille Day is the French national holiday, celebrated on 14 July each year . In France, it is called Fête Nationale ("National Celebration") in official parlance, or more commonly "quatorze juillet". It commemorates the 1790 Fête de la Fédération, held on the first anniversary of the storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789; the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille fortress-prison was seen as a symbol of the uprising of the modern nation, and of the reconciliation of all the French inside the constitutional monarchy which preceded the First Republic, during the French Revolution.

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Photos

Bastille Column
Today this column marked the place where the famous Bastille fortress-prison was located.