9/14/08 First full day in Paris-Lots of Touring

La tour de Paris es moy interestante y moy divertirse. Me gusta mucho la guide. La chica vive in Paris ahora porque la familia de la madre de ella vive in France. Quiero hablar en frances. Ahora yo miro para un libro o dicionario de ingles/frances.

Like the title says: we spent a lot of time this day touring Paris. We went on another free tour (where the tour guide only gets paid the amount you give them), this time a woman from New Zealand was the tour guide.

We started at the fountain of St. Michael where the Saint is portrayed booting the devil down into hell. After the Germans were pushed out in WWII the French have given more of a symbolical meaning to that fountain. We crossed the Thames, took a look at two incredible bridges (one were the last episode of Sex in the City was filmed, and the other had heads of drunken rulers-the king held a party and had his artist draw pictures and make sculptures out of the plastered dignitaries), saw the cathedral where Eva got married (also famous for the marriage of the protestant prince to the catholic princess- catholic mother in law had all of the protestants who were at the wedding killed by the Swiss Guard and the order that she gave out also led to a huge mob of Catholics who went and killed anyone they suspected was protestant). We saw the entrance to the Louvre. The Louvre is held in the Sun Kings old palace. He wanted to build a new one outside of the city and that is Versailles. This one has three sides and when it was used as a museum it had many entrances and exits. Since this was a pain for people to navigate around and through one architect said, "Why don't we get rid of those 5 entries and exits and instead have one central entryway and exit?" Parisians were overjoyed. When he said he'd make a pyramid in the central courtyard the Parisians said he was crazy and were outraged (they don't like new architecture with the old classic-even hate the one skyscraper that's in the middle of the city, and they initially hated the Eiffel Tower-only reason it still stands is it has a radio station on top). Obviously, he went ahead with his work. He told the people of Paris to not worry and that it would be almost like it wasn't even there. Yeah. That's kinda like the dome in St. Paul's Cathedral in London being a minor adjustment.

On this walk we also got to see the second most expensive street in the world (next to 5th avenue). On this street I could've gotten a chocolate bar for a couple hundred euros. We also got to see the most expensive hotel in Paris, this hotel was where Tom and Katie stayed before he proposed to her on top of the Eiffel Tower. To stay at that hotel you get to pay a couple hundred thousand euros to stay in the presidential suite. Katie and Tom stayed in that room.

Also have to say that the Egyptian Obelisk got an interesting job at one point. At one point they put a giant pink condom on it to celebrate safe sex. Great isn't it? Wish I could've gotten a picture of that. (found one on-line though)


We learned that the Arc de Triumph is in the center of 12 streets, and that the roundabout that's under it is one of the most dangerous in the world (and it's not covered by insurance if you get into an accident there). Another little tidbit we learned about the Arc de Triumph is that the "eternal flame" they've got blazing underneath it was put out once by a drunken Mexican who peed on it. The Mexican in question was banned from France for life and Mexico's Ambassador (?) came to Paris, relit the "eternal flame" and gave a huge speech telling their apologies. Another thing about this eternal flame is that a group of Australian men were barred from Paris for roasting sausages over it. This eternal flame was lit for the unknown dead.

All throughout the tour I talked to Louise, our tour guide. I think she liked us because she ate lunch with us when we stopped to eat. It was so nice talking to her. I actually think that she's got a gift to talk to many people. She talked to the girls who were there who were from Australia (there are a LOT of Australians touring). I didn't really want to talk to this group of girls. They reminded me distinctly of a few girls back home who aren't very nice to others. I'll tell you what set me off with them. They gave me the impression that they were incredibly shallow.

After the tour I wanted to go to the Eiffel Tower. Louise had said if we went down the road and made a right we'd find ourselves right underneath the Eiffel Tower. It didn't sound too far, but it ended up being quite a distance. I loved the walk and window shopped on the way there.

Something I truly loved though was the way EVERYONE in Paris was out walking around, soaking up the sun. When we reached the park that's right next to the Eiffel Tower it was like a fair. Everyone was out on the grass. Children were laughing and playing games, adults were snuggling on a blanket, college students were reading or playing with a frisbee. The atmosphere coupled with the sun heading down to sky and the wonderful smell of autumn in the air made me sooooo happy. I love the smell of autumn, I love the crispness of it. Also love the sounds and sights of many people out enjoying the last bit of sun. All in all, I think I enjoyed the people around the Eiffel Tower more than I enjoyed seeing it.

We didn't go up to the top of the Eiffel Tower either. By the time we'd gotten there our feet were killing us. I think that we were quite happy to look and enjoy our surroundings rather than stand in line and slaughter our feet to get up to the top and have to wait even longer to find a place to sit. Course, we did end up taking a while to find the subway after we visited the tunnel, so it still took a while to get to a place where we could sit.

Something I should mention about the subways of Paris. The smell of urine is quite common here, and if you happen to get on the subway at the end of a work-shift be careful. You're going to end up getting crammed into the train that you need to take, and you'll all be standing in front of the door "like sardines" as Ahmee put it. Luckily it didn't get that bad for us, but I did see it happen for others. Guys were literally jumping into the train to squeeze themselves in. Didn't see that in London!

Later on that night I noticed that my teachers had not emailed me back and I emailed my friends and family. I then handed the computer over to Ahmee and Poppy. I don't remember if it was this night where we all found out from Aunt Cyndi that a huge storm had come through and knocked out power and trees, or if it was the next day. Either way, the news was worrying.