France is fun

My weekend in Paris started Friday morning at 5a.m. because that is what time it was when I woke up to get ready to walk to the bus station. So I walked in the darkness to Piazza Italia to take a bus to the bus station (weird right) and boarded the bus for the Rome airport. Everything went well at the airport except that my flight was moved from gate to gate to gate which resulted in our landing in an altogether different terminal area in Paris, so after a few failed phone calls I finally met up with Laura and her friend Laura, confusing right?
We took the Roissy bus into the city, and got off at the Opera house which was amazing. So incredibly ornate and the gold (it couldn't possibly be real) was so shiny. We then took the metro to Laura's neighborhood to get Laura's stuff before checking into the hotel. Laura's (the one studying in France) mom got me and Laura (this entry is going to get confusing) a hotel room right next to her apartment so that we'd be near her since her host family wouldn't let the two of us stay with her. That was amzing (especially because she lived on the 7th floor). The hotel was so nice and we got a breakfast every morning... mm croissants :)
After checking in, Laura (my Laura) and I went for a long walk to the Louvre which was free to everyone under 26 years of age that night. The road we ambled along had many many cafes and shopping stores as well as many incredible sights such as the Arc de Triomphe.
That was incredible, so much bigger than any arch in Rome. We wandered around and there was some kind of flag ceremony going on so the army guys were there in their cute little hats and I took a few pictures of them standing around with flags. Then we walked toward the giant obelisk which was given by the egyptians to france-- not quite like the recreated ones that we have here in Italy. There were some pretty fountains and buildings... I found that most major attractions in Paris are right in the middle of the road- like the Arc. It was weird to see all the cars zooming past it like it was nothing special, just a tree or a traffic light.

After the Arc we kept walking and saw a few interesting buildings that Laura pointed out to me, mostly governmental, a few museums- one of which I think housed a Dale Chihuly exhibition a few years back that I saw on the DVD documentary. We finally came to a pretty large fountain and grassy area that had many pretty flowers blooming and the whole thing led up to the Louvre, which was GIGANTIC. We went in and got through for free, awesome!, and followed the signs straight to the Mona Lisa. For such a hyped up painting I was a bit disappointed. Not like I've never seen it before, that's just the thing. You see it everywhere, and then when it's finally there in front of you it's kind of like you're expecting more, a little fanfare or fireworks or something. Not to mention its behind glass, on a giant wall, and you are standing a good 10 feet away. Oh and it's about the size of a microwave, yeah she's not that big. But we wandered around some more and saw Aphrodite and went to the underground Louvre which was pretty incredible, it was all the underground area they had dug up and showed all the things they found- however it was all in french, so it was a little difficult to understand exactly what was going on.

After the Louvre we met Laura at a metro stop and walked to a Fondue restaurant where we had an inclusive meal of bread, potato, and beef fondue with cheese-- so good! The meat part was weird because they brought out a bowl of raw beef and I was not about to eat that. But then they brought out another fondue crock pot of hot oil, and you leave the meat in to cook and then dip it in the different sauces. It was really good! We also had dessert, a chocolate cake in this creme sauce, yum! After eating we headed back to the hotel since we had a long day and were planning on waking up early the next day.
On Saturday we woke up for the continental breakfast, which was so good- too bad the fresh squeezed orange juice machine was broken all weekend :( but I did have tons of croissants and kiwis! yum.
So we left and headed straight for the Eiffel Tower, which we took many pictures of and then walked across the street to take pictures of it from a square above this giant fountain. Those came out really well. There were a ton of strange girls with silvery wigs running around and trying to get into people's pictures and I decided that it looked like fun and that my friends and I should do that to the Asian tourists that come to Perugia.
After the Eiffel tower we headed to Notre Dame and went inside. Now, I absolutely love Notre Dame because I read The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Victor Hugo is absolutely amazing. Seeing the actual cathedral and climbing it to see the bells and gargoyles was a whole different amazing experience!

I love the gargoyles!

Unfortunately it started raining so it was a very wet experience but it was fun nonetheless. We also got really good panini from this little store around the corner from Notre Dame, they were puffy baguettes until he put them into hot sandwich press and then they came out all flat and tasty. A little different from Italy panini but still good! Then we walked to the Pompidou Museum of Modern Art because I really wanted to see the building which I'm glad we went to because it was awesome. But first, we passed by this building called the National Hotel (I think) which wasn't a hotel at all but a government building.. weird. And we also got Nutella crepes! mm good!

So anyway, the Pompidou museum is really strange and has all these crazy pipes and colors on the outside front and then on the back (or maybe that is the front I am not all that sure) there were stairs and escalator and elevators all on the outside of the building- because as Laura told me, the concept of the building was for everything that is supposed to be on the inside of the building to be on the outside. Which made sense but wasn't quite as fun. Oh well, the fountain next to the museum was really neat, it had fun statues and really random art pieces.
We also went into a church right next to the building because it looked pretty and it was nice. The architecture in Paris was very different than anything I'd experienced in Italy and London and I'm not sure if I liked it as much. I liked the apartments and buildings like that which always had the metal framed balconies and such, but a lot of the larger buildings were so ornate- maybe too ornate. But not ornate in such an art way, with sculpture and fresco or paint and color like in Italy but instead, gold- gold gold gold everywhere. It was different though, and I was definetely ready for a change.
Anyway, after the church and Pompidou we still had time before meeting up with Laura and her friends for dinner at this world famous falafel place, which ended up being closed because it was saturday- the sabbath, and the falafel place was located in the jewish area. All of Paris seemed divided into little areas- jewish, italian, irish, you name it. Very NYC. So, instead of having the falafel at the one place, we found another one down the road with the sign "world's best falafel"- and I don't know if it was the world's best, but it was pretty amazing.

This was the closed falafel place, as you can see, also endorsed by "Leny" Kravitz

We walked around, a bunch of them got gelato while I wandered into a pastry shop and got a coffee maccaroon (which are nothing like the maccaroons I am used to- they were SO amazing). Then we were trying to figure out what to do when we all decided to go bowling! Bowling in Paris, who knew. We went to this tiny bowling alley that had 8 lanes but it was so much fun, they had cosmic lights and funky music playing and it was smoke free. We bowled a couple of games and had a really good time. Then we headed back to the hotel since Laura had a pretty early flight the next day.
Sunday morning we woke up and said our goodbyes and then I was off to Sacre Couer all by myself. The whole weekend I had been following Laura and Laura around and not really navigating the metro since they knew it much better than I. However, I found it with no problem and I arrived around 9am before there were any tourists and it was such a nice day- which was a nice change from the rain from the day before.
So I climbed the giant hill that it was on (the funiculaire- monorail type train that ran to the top was shut down) which was really nice since it was so pretty out. Unfortunately I tripped up the stairs on the way up to which some French woman came over and tried to help me up and kept saying random french words to me until I said "thanksmerciwhatever" and ran away. Then I wandered inside and spent a good 30 minutes walking around admiring the frescoes and ceiling and sitting in the nice quiet. Upon leaving I saw the streaaaaaaaaaams of people coming and was glad to be leaving. When back at the metro station I realized that the Orsay Museum was only a few stops away and since it was the first of the month, all museums were free. So I hopped on the next metro and headed to the museum where I waited in line for a bit before going inside to see a ton of Cezanne, Manet, Van Gogh and my favorite, Monet. It was a really beautiful museum and had a great overlook of the Sacre Couer which was amusing because I was just there.

view of the Sacra Couer from the Orsay Museuminside of the Orsay

Then I had to leave to meet Laura (the other one) at the Opera house where she was going to put me on a bus to the airport. However, she was also meeting other family friends at the airport and plans changed and instead of meeting me there, she gave me all the instructions over the phone and I had no problems getting on the Roissy bus and getting to the airport. Before doing that though, I had poked my head inside the Opera house which was gorgeous, I didn't pay to go into the actual part, but there is an opera house right in Perugia where I see my movies so I figured I'd survive.

inside of the opera house

The Opera was actually under rennovation, someone is painting a fresco that is going around it on the scaffolding, as you can kind of see at the bottom

So now begins the transportation story of the decade.
Let's just do the run down shall we? Bus to airport. Wait for plane, plane arrives late. Plane takes off 30 minutes late. Plane arrives 10 minutes later than schedule, I miss train to train station. Take the next train, miss train to Perugia. Buy tickets for next train, which has a connection in Foligno. Ride train for 2 hours, get off in Foligno to discover that on the departure board the next train is not actually a train, but a bus, which I also realize from the loudspeaker voice saying "THE BUS FOR PERUGIA IS LEAVING RIGHT NOW" (in italian) and me running for the door. I got on the bus which happened to be the sketchiest bus of buses, with a little sign on it that said Perugia (and a few other cities). The bus then proceeded to stop in every single train station along the way, in Spello, Assisi, and some other ones that I didn't recognize. That took a good hour, so I finally got to the Perugia train station (note: not the actual city center) just in time to take the next bus to the center. By the time I actually arrived home it was just about midnight and I think I had taken every form of transportation possible in that day. I was tired, hungry, and ready for bed.

This is my story of Paris, and I'm sure I will continuously update it as I think of more things that happened and that should be discussed. Sicily this weekend, wish me luck with the Italian mob! Miss and love you all!