This weekend (a series of words)
Jun. 23rd, 2008 10:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rubahJune 20:
Got up at 6:00-- initially thought it was 6:30, calmed down, talked to stu, read an e-mail from my dad basically saying my grandpa is about to die. Cried for a while, talked to stu, calmed down again. Took a new bus and it turned out fine. Got to the gare and the train was an hour late. Stood around for an hour, trying to figure out if the train we were standing next to was ours, decided it was, walked through, realized it wasn't, then figured out another train was coming to couple on. Train arrived, we settled in and were off. Started bleeding (predictably!)
Got to Paris and it was pretty stinky around the gare Lyon. Alternates between urine river and $500/oz perfume. Hawkers everywhere.
Went to hotel room, got tamped up, set off walking to metro, went to Sacre Coeur, intense déjà-vu of big restaurant building (george pompidou) on a cloudy day with mostly strangers. Beautiful ceiling in Sacre Coeur. God dude looking up from the edge. Bought a toothpick holder and lighter. Dunno who to give them to (well, lighter is for cory, and the toothpick thing was supposed to be for megan, but I might get her a t-shirt on OMGSALE day wednesday). Walked past the Amélie café and the Moulin Rouge. Went into l'Opéra which was closed for rehearsal.
Gallery Lafayette--reminds me of the place I hated in London. Too expensive, too shopping, etc etc etc etc I just don't dig them. Bought hp and the half blood prince and a cute black shirt I'm pretty eager to wear (when it's not hot). This also had a nice ceiling. Saw some €350 shirts, shirts that had cables on them to prevent shoplifting.
Took metro to Champs-Élysées. L'Arc de Triomphe was pretty dang inspiring. It was incredible to think of all the men who died for France for whatever reason to have their names inscribed on this huge arch in the middle of a gigantic roundabout. The first thing we saw was a tow truck pulling a car away. Got my first glimpse of the tour eiffel at this point. Walked down the entire length of the CE to the Louvre. Holy crap that was excruciating. (two miles).
Saw amazing paintings (i took pictures of my favorites except for a couple (the coronation of napoleon, and this red dress duchess looking lady). Took a gratuitous shot of the wreck of the medusa and the mona lisa to satisfy Mrs. Jones, and took a special walk to find Venus de Milo for mom but actually enjoyed seeing it. Mona lisa has her own special room now with a long line to see her, and frankly I didn't think it was worth waiting for. Got a nice green tea for relatively cheap (€2.80 compared to uh, €5 for a coke; make sure you take a water bottle or your own drinks to the Louvre, not to mention every other single place in Paris)
Metroid (haha pun?) to uh, Trocadéro where I finally took proper pictures of the eiffel tower (it was a pretty sunset atm too!), then we ate at the café trocadéro which wasn't too bad. I had thought previously that the sparkling of the tower was a long term and gaudy thing, but I found out it is neither and was glad.
Oh yeah, at the little terrace that looks out on the tower, there was this dude that like ran up to this girl and like grabbed something from her, then all these other people started trying to fight him, but he had a chain in his hands, and the gendarmes just were kinda standing there talking on their talkies (hopefully calling for backup), but it was so crazy that this guy was just like doing that in the middle of a hundred people easily. There was a black guy that started to brawl with him, but he couldn't do much because of the chain. I didn't see the end of it, but I hope that guy got his ass whipped. It made me mad and I almost wanted to go over and do it myself.
Anyways, after dinner, we wanted to try and take a batteau mouche that night so we walked down the pont and of course it was too late, so we just went and stood under the middle of the eiffel tower for a while. It was so romantic walking up there. I wished so bad that stu was there. it is just simply gorgeous.
Past the tower is the champs de mars, and that night they were having what was easily the biggest lawn party I'd ever seen going on. There were hundreds of teens and young people out drinking, smoking, smoking joints I'm sure, and it was the first time I felt really scared and really excited in Paris. I wanted to go and join them, but I was afraid also.
We made it back to the metro for an unbelievably long ride back to the hotel, and when we got back there, they were counting as we came in and shortly after, we got a call asking us how many people were in our room. Of course they weren't going to let us get away with cheating them, so the three who were going to be bunk buddies between teh rest of us had to get their own room. shamefully, I stayed in my room and had nothing to do with it because I was tired and didn't want to have to deal with difficult problems. Understandable perhaps, but entirely selfish.
I took a nice hot bath and scraped the blisters off my feet then settled in for bed.
Got up at 6:00-- initially thought it was 6:30, calmed down, talked to stu, read an e-mail from my dad basically saying my grandpa is about to die. Cried for a while, talked to stu, calmed down again. Took a new bus and it turned out fine. Got to the gare and the train was an hour late. Stood around for an hour, trying to figure out if the train we were standing next to was ours, decided it was, walked through, realized it wasn't, then figured out another train was coming to couple on. Train arrived, we settled in and were off. Started bleeding (predictably!)
Got to Paris and it was pretty stinky around the gare Lyon. Alternates between urine river and $500/oz perfume. Hawkers everywhere.
Went to hotel room, got tamped up, set off walking to metro, went to Sacre Coeur, intense déjà-vu of big restaurant building (george pompidou) on a cloudy day with mostly strangers. Beautiful ceiling in Sacre Coeur. God dude looking up from the edge. Bought a toothpick holder and lighter. Dunno who to give them to (well, lighter is for cory, and the toothpick thing was supposed to be for megan, but I might get her a t-shirt on OMGSALE day wednesday). Walked past the Amélie café and the Moulin Rouge. Went into l'Opéra which was closed for rehearsal.
Gallery Lafayette--reminds me of the place I hated in London. Too expensive, too shopping, etc etc etc etc I just don't dig them. Bought hp and the half blood prince and a cute black shirt I'm pretty eager to wear (when it's not hot). This also had a nice ceiling. Saw some €350 shirts, shirts that had cables on them to prevent shoplifting.
Took metro to Champs-Élysées. L'Arc de Triomphe was pretty dang inspiring. It was incredible to think of all the men who died for France for whatever reason to have their names inscribed on this huge arch in the middle of a gigantic roundabout. The first thing we saw was a tow truck pulling a car away. Got my first glimpse of the tour eiffel at this point. Walked down the entire length of the CE to the Louvre. Holy crap that was excruciating. (two miles).
Saw amazing paintings (i took pictures of my favorites except for a couple (the coronation of napoleon, and this red dress duchess looking lady). Took a gratuitous shot of the wreck of the medusa and the mona lisa to satisfy Mrs. Jones, and took a special walk to find Venus de Milo for mom but actually enjoyed seeing it. Mona lisa has her own special room now with a long line to see her, and frankly I didn't think it was worth waiting for. Got a nice green tea for relatively cheap (€2.80 compared to uh, €5 for a coke; make sure you take a water bottle or your own drinks to the Louvre, not to mention every other single place in Paris)
Metroid (haha pun?) to uh, Trocadéro where I finally took proper pictures of the eiffel tower (it was a pretty sunset atm too!), then we ate at the café trocadéro which wasn't too bad. I had thought previously that the sparkling of the tower was a long term and gaudy thing, but I found out it is neither and was glad.
Oh yeah, at the little terrace that looks out on the tower, there was this dude that like ran up to this girl and like grabbed something from her, then all these other people started trying to fight him, but he had a chain in his hands, and the gendarmes just were kinda standing there talking on their talkies (hopefully calling for backup), but it was so crazy that this guy was just like doing that in the middle of a hundred people easily. There was a black guy that started to brawl with him, but he couldn't do much because of the chain. I didn't see the end of it, but I hope that guy got his ass whipped. It made me mad and I almost wanted to go over and do it myself.
Anyways, after dinner, we wanted to try and take a batteau mouche that night so we walked down the pont and of course it was too late, so we just went and stood under the middle of the eiffel tower for a while. It was so romantic walking up there. I wished so bad that stu was there. it is just simply gorgeous.
Past the tower is the champs de mars, and that night they were having what was easily the biggest lawn party I'd ever seen going on. There were hundreds of teens and young people out drinking, smoking, smoking joints I'm sure, and it was the first time I felt really scared and really excited in Paris. I wanted to go and join them, but I was afraid also.
We made it back to the metro for an unbelievably long ride back to the hotel, and when we got back there, they were counting as we came in and shortly after, we got a call asking us how many people were in our room. Of course they weren't going to let us get away with cheating them, so the three who were going to be bunk buddies between teh rest of us had to get their own room. shamefully, I stayed in my room and had nothing to do with it because I was tired and didn't want to have to deal with difficult problems. Understandable perhaps, but entirely selfish.
I took a nice hot bath and scraped the blisters off my feet then settled in for bed.
