paris, baby

so on wednesday i almost missed my train to paris, it was a close one. eurostar is quite nice, i like traveling in style by train. when i arrived in paris i took the metro to the hostel we were all staying at (the 3 ducks, on the corner of commerce and entrepreneur, next to the church at the end of commerce), dropped my stuff off, then checked out the shopping on commerce street for an hour while weitzel came back to meet me at the hostel. we then did some stuff which i cant remember right now. that night the whole groupie of stanford kids and i were together and we ate at a posh and trendy resaurant (charlie birdy) which is right by our hostel, then we walked to the eiffel tower, rode the carousel in front of it, and got crepes! later that night we went to le queen - a gay club on the champs! haha it was pretty awesome i guess, it was my first club in euorpe and my first gay club ever (luckily it was 'ladies night' so we got in for free). (Note: gay men, straight women)

the next day (so thanksgiving) we shopped around commerce (weitzel was quite successful at h&m) then john, weitzel, alex and i went to grab lunch in the saint germain area (i think). we then walked along the seine to the musee d'orsay. although we passed it somehow. then we came back to it, waited in line for a bit, then finally went inside. i think the d'orsay is the coolest museum ever because it is in a train station, and i like train stations. and it holds the most amazing collection of impressionism art ever. so yep, we had a good time there. nel, one of weitzels friends who is quite cool, made reservations for thanksgiving dinner on teh champs, but due to a few disagreements within the large group and our smaller one, we ended up bailing as a whole and going to a lebanese restaurant. so needless to say, that was lame. that night we hung out the in smoke ladened air in the bar in our hostel while i tried to not think about the fact that it was thanksgiving and i had a kebab. (although, fridays dinner made up for this one)

friday we woke up, grabbed a baguette for breakfast from teh hostel (fresh french bread = sooooo good), and headed to the eiffel tower. we paid the €3.50 or whatever it was, and took the stairs up to the first and second levels. which was fun since it was raining and really windy. but i actually went up it! unlike last time i was in paris when we kinda walked by it...lame. anyways, weitzel, jordan, and i took the elevator up to the top where there was pretty much no visibility through the clouds and rain. weitzel and i took our pic at the top then booked it back inside since we were getting soaked. inside was grrreat because it smelled really bad (brushing your teeth and using deoderant isnt such a bad idea....oh well, these people are french...). we came down adn our group of 6 (john, jo, weitzel, alex, jordan, and i) went to montmartre, my favorite part of the city since its on a hill and it has personality. we walked past sacre coeur (weitzel started singing the sacred heart song which is in french, so that was a little weird to hear. she also had to memorize it for st joes, whereas i only know the fun little part since in high school they know they cant get students to actually sing that song), and then down to the main area where we had lunch which was yummy. we then took the metro to the champs to check out the arc de triumphe. weitzel, john, and i went back to the hostel for an hour to take a quick nap. we pretty much passed out and it was good. at 6 we arrived at the louvre because they had a special deal where if youre younger than 26 you can get in for *free* after 6. which was great! so we ran around the louvre checking out the winged victory and mona lisa in the denon wing, then we cruised on over to the richelieu wing because weitzel wanted to check out the vermeer paintings (of which there are 2 aparently). we also walked through the napoleon apartments which were....hmm...a little overkill? there was a bit too much gold for my taste. after leaving the louvre we were supposed to meet jo at chez clement in saint michel for dinner. however we could not get a cap. we tried for 35 minutes. it was amazing, and stressful. we then took the metro which has a stop right outside of the restaurant (?!?!) and then had a great dinner. with great wine. its nice being able to order a couple of bottles of wine and have a nice time at dinner. soon enough i will be able to do that in the states.

so yes, thats pretty much my trip in a nutshell. although i can say that most of the stereotypes towards french people (at least parisians) are true: they are generally rude, they smoke a lot (its amazing theres still anyone left), they dont like anyone who isnt french. so yes, those are my generalizations of an entire country. oh something else i noticed - the other euorpean countries have things in english around town, like on signs and stuff. in france, there is french. unless they have to have english. oh well

this trip also made me fully realize how important it has been for me to study at an enlish school (one where i go to class with brits) and travel around london, enland (like oxford, bath, and brighton), and across euorpe. ive always known taht ive wanted to study in london, even looking at colleges we looked at their study abroad programs in london. and now that im here i see how important it has been for me to live with other british students in a flat, to get to thouroughly know london (its pretty dang big), and to go to other countries (italy, spain, austria, and france. im also going to try and fit ireland in there somehow....)

anyways, its crunch time now. im coming home in 3 weeks! but that means that within that time i have to finish up all of my schoolwork, do more things around london that ive been meaning to do (there is so much to do here!) and try to go to dublin. we'll see how this all works out! home in 3 weeks! yes! and ps its officially christmas time!