Comment ca cost? Bon nui, Bon b'rev. Comment tu tapel?

Oh my goodness, I just went to Paris, France--arguably the most beautiful city in the world! I'll give you the breakdown. Thursday I packed for a 3-day trip and I've never packed so lightly. 2 of everything, contact case, brush, make-up, the end. Oh, and an umbrella (that was important). I went with 2 of my friends, and the flight there went very smoothly, although I've never been on such a noisy plane because a group of Spanish high schoolers were being rather obnoxious. We landed at 9-ish, walked into some tents where the baggage claim was, and walked out into brisk French air. That was it. Tents. No customs...just tents. It was great. We actually landed in the Beauvais airport, an hour outside of Paris, so when we actually got into the city, figured out the metro system, and found the hostel, it was about 1am. To celebrate our first night in Paris, I got a kebap for dinner (ordering with lots of pointing and laughing) and then we walked over to the river Seine to see the Eiffel Tower from far away.

Wow, so I had my first hostel experience and gotta say, it was memorable. The front is a bar setting and through the back door is a courtyard with the rooms connecting. Apparently when my travel companions booked the hostel they went for the cheapest one, because one can only be a poor college student finding shelter in nastiness once in their life. In this particular place, if we wanted to rent sheets, they were 3.50. Other than that, we got a pillow, a blanket, and a bare mattress. We shared the room with 3 other strangers. A mother and daughter from Kazakhstan and a guy named Matias from Argentina. The room was tiny, with a sink & a shower (that had a button and when pushed, water would spurt out for about 20 seconds) and the toilets were outside, shared by all. Actually, for the most part, it wasn’t too bad. Clearly not hotel quality but for 20 euros a night and free breakfasts, I’d say it’s
sufficient.

The next morning, we got up and talked with Matias a little more in Spanish. He’s 27 and recently graduated in accounting, so now he’s traveling around Europe on his own for awhile. We invited him to walk around with us, but since he’d already seen the Louvre and everything, we just arranged to meet for dinner.
From there we set off to the Eiffel Tower and took many, many, many pictures with all 3 of our cameras. We didn’t climb it because there was such a long line but the view from below was good enough. After that we walked to the Arch of Triumph, which Napoleon apparently built. It was huge and…triumphant, but we just dimos una vuelta (stopped by) for a minute or so and went on our way. We walked town Avenue de Champs Elysees and found the Grand palace and Petit Palace, took pictures of Plaza de Concorde (with political embassies and such), and had a ghetto lunch in the Jardin du Tuileries right beside the Louvre. It was ghetto because I had a can of cold ravioli and my friends had deli salads. We then walked to the Notre Dame where the gypsies kept on accosting us asking if we spoke English so they could beg. The inside was gorgeous and there was a mass going on. I honestly thought it would be taller than it is, maybe because in the movie The Hunchback of Notre Dame there’s an entire 3 minute scene where he’s sliding down the side of the cathedral . At Notre Dame we went to the bathrooms that actually had 2 attendants, a little booth, and those bars that you have to push to walk through. I wish I had taken a picture because it was very odd.

We decided to take a little boat tour down the river Seine and, although we couldn’t understand the tour guide, it was beautiful all the same. At 6pm, we went back to the Louvre because on Fridays at that time anyone under 26 gets in free. There was a big glass triangle as the entrance and apparently we went underground to enter and then climbed back up to end up in the actual building. Unfortunately I was so tired from the day’s events that not only did I get lost for 40 minutes, but I also couldn’t concentrate and appreciate the art. The Mona Lisa was on display in a glass case, but there was an obnoxious crowd of people taking pictures instead of actually admiring it…I joined them in the picture part. The museum itself was humongous and we only covered about 10% if even that.

At 8:30 we left to meet Matias for dinner. Instead of walking one block to the metro, we took a wrong turn and walked the entire length of the gardens—about 13 blocks. We found the restaurant, called Au Refuge des Fondus, which was packed, of course, but it was sooo good.

The first course was just meat & cheese squares, and the 2nd course—mmm—was fondue. We skewered the meat ourselves in hot oil, or dipped bread or potatoes in the pot of melted cheese. It was quite amazing. To top it all off, included in the meal as a beverage is a glass of wine…but not in a glass; in a baby bottle (probably to avoid spilling, but also makes the restaurant unique). It was so cool, and our conversation in Spanish with Matias made it even better. For a dessert, we were served chocolate ice cream stuff. All in all, it was a bit pricey, but considering it was Paris and it was fondue and it was a 3 course meal, I’d say it was well worth it.

We made our way back to the hostel where we met quite a lot of guys: a bunch of Portuguese, a few French, and one American that graduated from Berkeley Music School. There were a lot of Americans staying there, but only one was there at the time. But one Portuguese guy named Liandro was telling me to visit his country, and another French guy was teaching me how to speak French, and the American was asking me about my trip. I was quite busy trying to pay attention to all 3 conversations at once. Soon after we went to bed and about 2 hours later I awoke…our new friend Matias decided to have “relations” on the bottom bunk and I was on the top. So in a hurry I hopped off the bunkbed and walked outside, not caring that I had neither my shoes nor my glasses. I joined a group of French guys that were playing poker outside for about 40 minutes, but I was blind and cold and on top of that they did not speak any English and little Spanish. Fortunately I went back to bed and slept through the night to find Matias gone in the morning to Belgium. Needless to say our impression of him went from great to horrible. Haha

The next morning I rose with head pounding. We took our time getting out but went
straight to the Opera House where we toured the inside. It wasn’t that amazing but the fact that it contained the chandelier from Phantom of the Opera made it pretty cool. From there we met the French/Algerian cousin of one of my trip-mates and we went to..uh…Le Se Cours? Or Se Bleu?...I dunno, some cathedral on the highest hill in the city. The cathedral itself was very pretty but it didn’t spark my interest too much, but the view of the city was awesome. Unfortunately all of our cameras were close to dead because of the usage from Friday, but we have some pictures of Saturday’s events. From there we ate some French crepes. Although very expensive and quite a tourist rip off, eating crepes in Paris near a world famous monument is worth it. Then we said goodbye to the relative and walked to Moulin Rouge, took a picture and went back to the hostel until the flight time. The rest of it was very uneventful.

And of course when I got back, I had the urge to speak Spanish, so although it was 12:30 at night, I dropped my stuff off at the apartment and went right back out. I ended up sitting and talking to my bartender friends after closing time while they cleaned until 7:30am (actually it was 6:30 but last night we changed to Daylight Saving Time). And that was my weekend. I learned a few phrases in French, spoke more Spanish in Paris than I did this week at school, and kept trying to say “Gracias” in France, and now I keep trying to say “Merci” in Spain. I’m just all confused.