Paris

My trip to Paris began early Saturday morning at 5:30 when I woke up to get in a taxi that would take us to the train station. I was traveling with 12 other Camp Adventure people and we were all very excited to be in Paris. Our train took us directly from Kaiserslautern to Paris in about 2.5 hours, the shortest trip yet (not including the day trips). Unfortunately things did not work out as smoothly as the ride...the weekend prior I had written in the date on my Eurail before deciding I wasn't going to use it. Since I had never actually used that slot/date on my pass I thought I could write over it with the date I was actually using (changing from an 05 to an 11... kind of obvious) when the conductor saw my ticket he confiscated it telling me that I had done something illegal-forged my pass and that I must pay for my mistake...how much did I have to pay for this honest mistake? $177 USD or 126 Euro...I kept arguing with him that I had the right to lose that day on my pass and write in the next column (perfectly legal) but the conductor refused and would not give my pass back until I had payed him...not the best way to start my trip off. I asked him if there was a way to get my money back and who would I talk to about it and he said I had to either talk to him about it or talk to the people at the train station...since he was obviously not going to be giving my money back I was forced to wait 'til the station to try. On arrival I stood in line for nearly an hour to talk to someone about getting my money back only to find out that the station was not authorised to make such transactions and that had I wanted the situation remedied I should have dealt with it on the train...I tried! So the woman gave me an address for their customer service office which apparently has no phone number...hmmm. I was not so pleased with my first few hours of Paris I'll just leave it at that.
We left the station to find our hostel...we got there only to find that they were out of room even though we reserved a room with them and they gave us an address of another hostel that would be able to accommodate us. So we walked to the new hostel and checked in, but they weren't ready to give us the room yet...this gave us enough time to figure out where we wanted to go and which route we were going to take to get there. Thanks to the Paris metro system we were able to hop on any metro train and get wherever we needed to go. So after dropping our bags off we went to Notre Dame, it was much prettier than I remembered it being. After that we found the Conciergerie (the palace before the revolution converted to a prison that held Marie Antoinette before her death). It was really interesting to see the prison and the beautiful architecture of the palace.
Next we took the metro up to Sacre Cour (the Sacred Heart Cathedral) and the Monte Mart area of Paris (the artist district). The Sacre Cour is the most beautiful cathedral ever! It's white on the outside with a tall dome and the inside is filled with stunning mosaic tiled pictures of biblical scenes and people. Although this was my second time being in this cathedral I still was amazed by the craftsmanship of the place and the artistry put into it. We ventured into Monte Mart to see the artists and poke around for a bit, and here's where I got in trouble again with the French. At a shop there was a sunglasses stand outside that said 2 for 10 Euro, so I was trying a pair on...I decided they were really ugly so I went to put them back...having some difficulty in getting them back in the holes I quickly shoved them in and began to walk away. As I turned to leave I heard the glasses crash to the cobblestone road with a clatter...I swung back around to look without thinking before I decided the best option would be to walk away as quickly as possible...but too late, the store clerk had seen me and the broken glasses and chased after me. He pointed at the pieces and said over and over you pay, 5 Euros you pay! I picked up the lens that had popped out and put it back in its place, and showed the man that they weren't broken at all, just needed some fixing. He didn't buy it, there was a large scratch across the other lens and the one I had just popped in I hadn't gotten in all the way...so he drug me inside and made me buy the ugly broken sunglasses for 5 Euros...yup...will I ever wear them...nope!
After that fiasco we headed down to the Arc de Triumph where unbenounst to us the French military was performing a ceremony at the tomb of the unknown soldier. Their military is not as rigorous as ours instead of about-facing and moving to a new location by marching...they side stepped into their new formation. It was really funny. After watching the french soldiers for a while we walked to the Eiffel Tower to meet up with the rest of the group. (I only stayed with 3 people for most of the trip: Jimmy, Nichole, and Katie). Once we found a few more people we went to a cafe where lo and behold...Abigale Breslin (the girl from Little Miss Sunshine) was eating dinner with her family. After much debate of whether it was actually her or not, Nichole was brave enough to ask her and to our delight it really was her. Her family was just visiting Paris for the heck of it and was very interested in what we were doing in Europe and everything. They were so nice!
After dinner we went to a grassy field past the Eiffel Tower to watch the tower light up. I didn't realize this the last time I was in Paris but at night the tower is light from 9-1 and on the hour for 5 minutes it shimmers. It was really really beautiful. It began to sprinkle a bit, which caused most of the people there to leave or get out umbrellas...not us! We stayed around 'til 12:30 before we decided that if we didn't get on a metro soon the metro would stop for the night and we'd have to walk across Paris to get back to our hostel.
In the morning we checked out of the hostel and put our bags in the luggage locker at the train station before heading to the Louvre. The Louvre is probably one of the most incredible places I've ever been to. So much beauty in one building should be a crime! The building itself is a work of art, it holds so much art, and contains so much history it's insane! My friend Nichole who has her undergraduates degree in art was almost bouncing off the walls with excitement for actually being in the Louvre. It was so much fun seeing everything with her because she was able to tell me things about the artist or the medium or what the piece meant that I would have never known and that the small plaque written in French next to the piece couldn't tell me. We saw the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo, Winged Victory, the Medusa, and many other paintings by artists whose names escape me at the moment, but were stunning each in their own way. After 3 and a half hours of looking at art, our feet and legs could handle no more so we began to work our way out of the Louvre...a task that sounds easier than it actually is. At each turn we took we ended up deeper in the museum when the signs were pointing us out. After a half hour we sucked up our pride, gave up on reading the map, and asked a museum worker to help direct us out of the building...it took us only a minute after that to figure it out...oh boy.
We thought our journey was over when we boarded the train, but of course, being that it's me, it wasn't over yet. The seats we had reserved were at a table with 2 French children sitting across from us. Their mother sat across the isle, and as soon as the train took off from the station, she layed her head down for a nap...after about a minute of sitting across from these children I found out why...these kids were the biggest wiggle worms ever! They kept clamoring over the other to either look out the window or to see down the isle, this action of course always upset the other one because it was their seat! These kids weren't given any toys to play with and were wearing dressy clothes so I'm assuming they weren't supposed to be rough-housing either. Instead they just kept hitting each other or kicking us from under the table. Nichole wore jeans with holes in the knees and the kids were fascinated by the bare knees showing through so they kept climbing under the table to touch her knees. I think final count was 25...the number of times Nichole was kicked in the shin by these little kids. Since I wasn't tired I made it my goal to try to entertain these kids...too bad I only know ballet French...so instead I made them origami animals out of the paper from my sudoku book. The little girl loved the creatures I made her, but as soon as her brother got a hold of them he would open up the paper, crumple it up and throw it in the trashcan attached to our table. But at least I held their attention for a half hour of the 2 and a half hour train ride.
I am pretty tired from all the excitement from Paris, and even though I spent way more money than I planned on spending...it was one of my favorite weekend trips so far!

Pictures from top to bottom: me and the Eiffel Tower; behind the bars in the courtyard of the Conciergerie; in front of the Sacre Cour Cathedral; the French Military at the Arc de Triumph; the Little Miss Sunshine girl!;Eric (a co-worker at Youth Programs) and myself at the Eiffel tower at night; me at the Louvre!; Me and Mona Lisa thumbs up!