Bonjour Mon Ami! Please don’t ask me what that means because I don’t know. I just heard a lot of people say it to me this weekend while we were in Paris. Speaking of which, I LOVE PARIS! Yes, I know…everyone always has bad thing to say about the French like:

Q: Why is good to be French?
A: You can surrender at the beginning of the war, and US will win it for you.

Or

Q: What do you call 100,000 Frenchmen with their hands up?
A: The army.

Or Even
Q: Why do the French Smell?
A: So blind people can hate them too!

But honestly…the French were 10 times nicer to us Americans than the English were. As for the smell thing, that is 110% true. It smelled like the sewer had overflowed each time that we got on the train…but that was just the people standing next to us. I have never smelled such bad body odor in my entire life. Really. I wanted to grab the nearest garden hose and spray them all down…but I don’t think that would have even put a dent in it. I guess it’s a good thing that they have so many beautiful tourist attractions to pull people in because their stench alone would have people running for the Swiss Alps. Other than the offensive odors, Paris was a truly amazing city to visit.

On Friday morning, we met the cab outside our building at 7am to take us to Fiumacinno International Airport in Rome. Of course, we were flying from the furthest airport to us where no train goes at 7am so we had to pay the cab driver 40 euros to get there. Luckily, we got there early and walked straight to the counter to check in and get our boarding passes. That whole process was pretty painless so we got what we needed and heading for our boarding gate with Lufthansa. Something I’ve learning is that Lufthansa Airlines are ALWAYS on time which is pretty great because they’re flying us home in May. When I get on the plane, I’m going to be counting down the minutes until I’m on American soil with free drink refills, free public restrooms and a taco salad sitting in front of me. We were scheduled to fly from Rome into Frankfurt, Germany and then connect from Germany to Charles De Gaul Airport in the center of Paris. After slamming into the ground with our landing gear (QUITE a rough landing according to 99% of the foreign passengers on the plane) we got off and heading down the tunnel. We made our connection after walking around in a German airport for a little while. I realized that I’m not as bad at Italian as I thought….because German is a million times worse! I spent my time in the airport trying to pronounce single words on signs posted around us in preparation for our visit to Munich during Spring Break. I’m in trouble. The rest of our flight that day went well and we landed in Paris around 3pm, slightly ahead of schedule. From there, we encountered our first Paris metro and our first Paris stench. It is something I will remember forever…. Amazingly enough, we found our Hostel without any trouble. It was SUCH a nice place to stay…surprising, really seeing as we were in an extremely expensive city in Europe and hostels are supposed to be dirty and disgusting. We checked in with the English speaking staff ( AMEN!), moved our stuff to our room and set out to explore Paris.
Our first stop of the day was The Louvre  With a limited amount of time before they closed, we rushed in and pushed our way through crowds of German and Asian tourists to stand in front of the Mona Lisa. Not that I want to put down the Mona Lisa or anything…but I should have had lower expectations. While it was amazing to see such a national treasure, it was really small! Everyone I have talked to felt the same…but it was still amazing none the less to be standing in front of such a work of art. Next, after pushing past more Asian tourists, we made our way to Venus De Milo. Once again, I was in awe of what I was standing 3 feet away from. Venus De Milo is an ancient Greek statue created sometime between 130 and 100 BC. Sure, her arms are missing and all but she is still one of the most recognized pieces of art in existence. After we hit all the major exhibits, we wandered around for our remaining amount of time and took pictures of art that caught our attention. We finished up at the Louvre with some pictures outside by the famous Glass Pyramids.

After dinner with other backpackers at our hostel, we decided to go to Troccadoro, the best spot to take pictures with the Eiffel Tower. Like most places on this continent, the area was crawling with those creepy sales guys that sell knock off products and run whenever the police come near. I must have been asked to buy an Eiffel tower key chain (3 for 1euro!) at least 80 times this weekend. They’re creepy but they’re persistent. I’ll give them that. We spent about 45 minutes there taking random pictures and waiting for the tower to light up. NO ONE believed me when I said that it flashed with lights….they thought I was insane. But what do you know! On the hour, the tower lit up! How about that! I guess I do know some things after all….We took lots of pictures in front of the sparkly tower and I got a video too which I’ll stick up on youtube for you to see. The Eiffel Tower is by far my favorite place in Paris  I had my French Fries in France and was extremely happy! We made it back to the hostel and fell into bed because we were all exhausted. We were rooming with 4 other people, all around 25 that live in London but were taking a vacation in Paris. They were all very nice and no one tried to steal or things or kill us in our sleep so I would say the living situation was a success.

Bright and early Saturday morning, we went downstairs for breakfast. I had my first French Baguette  I think I’m going to have to import those things to the US when I get home because they were delicious! We were lucky enough to stumble across a free 4 hour walking tour that would take us all around the city to see the most famous landmarks. We split up into two groups, the English speakers and the Spanish speakers and made our way across the city. We saw Notre Dame, San Michele, Arc De Triomphe, The Louvre (again), Champs Elysees (The most famous and expensive strip of shopping in all of Europe), The Eiffel Tower (again!), Napoleons Tomb, Opera Garnier (Where the phantom of the Opera comes from!) and many other amazing sites that were unbelievable to be standing next to. The tour was awesome and the guide was really great as well. After the tour, we went back to the Eiffel Tower to climb it but the top of the tower was closed for repairs. Alaina and Rich were going to Versailles the next day and Aaron and I weren’t so we decided to wait and come back in the morning when the tower was open all the way up. Instead, we wandered back to Notre Dame to take some pictures inside. I was so excited when we got inside and realized that mass was about to start so we made our way through the crowds outside the ropes and sat down to witness a French mass. I didn’t understand a thing that was being said but it was such a cool experience to witness Mass in The Notre Dame Cathedral. How many people can say that?? After mass, we got some great pictures inside and outside the church and then wandered down some side streets to find some souvenirs. We wound up in the Greek area of Paris which was quite interesting to say the least. After we bought what we wanted, we headed back to the hostel to have dinner at the restaurant downstairs. We took another AMAZING ride in the Paris metro while holding our breath.

On Sunday, our last day in Paris, we got up early to head back to the tower. We were really lucky to get there when we did because we only waited about 30 minutes to get through the line and to the second level of the tower. We crammed into the line that waited for the elevator that was required to take you to the top floor. I yelled at some Germans in English who decided that they were special enough to jump the line of about 500 people behind us and then jumped back in front of them. I got dirty looks from them but I could care less. They were rude. Haha While we were waiting in line, we started talking to this older couple in front of us who were on vacation in Paris as well. They are from Whales but lived in Durham North Carolina back in the 80’s. It’s always nice to meet people like that. Finally, after a nice little wait in the freezing cold, we shuffled onto an elevator and made our way to the 3rd floor. When I say it was cold, that is an extreme understatement. Outside on the deck, it was -12 degrees. We braved the icy cold for all of 5 minutes to take our pictures overlooking Paris but then we had to move back inside because we had lost all feeling in our hands. We were SO high! It was a really great thing to do though and completely worth the 12 euro that we paid to get to the top. After getting something warm to drink and a French Crepe  at the restaurant on the second floor, we made our way back down to the ground and jumped on the train again to head towards the real Paris.

First stop! MOULIN ROUGE!!! I don’t really know why I was so excited to see this but I was….The Moulin Rouge is in an area of town that you don’t go in after dark. It’s the seedy part of Paris. On this one street alone, we walked by 8 brothels. I’m not kidding. I took my pictures and we made our way back onto safer ground. Haha We stopped at this random restaurant because their menu looked nice…even if it was in French. I had the world’s best lasagna…which is weird because I live in Italy and it just got topped by some French lasagna. Oh well. It was amazing. I could care less where it was from. We had some more baguettes with our meal along with some 3 euro cokes (I don’t see how people live over here…they must all be completely rich) and left to head back to the hostel. We had left our bags there in the locked storage room .We grabbed them and headed back to the metro station again but heading in a different direction. We managed to get to the airport with plenty of time to spare. After this, our life consisted of stuffy airport gate terminals and bumpy connection flights back home to Roma but we made it to the ground safely…where we had to pay 60 euro for a cab ride home because all the trains were closed for the night. At least the cab was a pretty new Mercedes so I guess I’ll get over my strong desire to kill the driver for overcharging us. We got back to the apartment around 11:30 and started making some dinner and the phone calls back to the states to let everyone know we were okay. Class was NOT fun the next day but the weekend was SO great. I’m definitely going back to Paris one day….maybe when I win the lottery….but I will get back. Okay, that’s all for our Paris adventure this weekend. I’ve got a stack of school reading to get through so it’s time to go. Sorry this blog was so long…but I was seriously in love with Paris….except for the smell. Daddy, stop hating the French, okay? Thanks.

Lots of Love from Roma (not Paris…)

Michelle