Paris and I have a love/hate relationship. I absolutely love the language. It was amazing to walk around and listen to people speak French all day long. It’s such a beautiful, liquid language. The downside, of course, is that I hardly understand more than two or three phrases, and people kept speaking it at me. I learned an interesting lesson here though. I have been told on previous occasions that the French hate Americans. This may well be true, I have no proof one way or the other. But it is true that they don’t particularly like to speak English unless you try to speak French first. What I have discovered, however, is that a simple “Bonjour” followed by “Parles vous Engles?” is generally enough. It earns you a smile and a helpful demeanor, whereas assuming they speak English, or even asking if they do in English, will earn you a scowl, or at least an attitude of “I will only go so far to help you out.” I would like to point out to you, hotel personnel, that we all know you speak English, and furthermore, it’s sort of your job, but whatever, Mr. Grumpypants receptionist. Anyway, thanks Mom, for the minor French lessons. I never thought that one phrase would be enough, but it was essential to our survival the last 24 hours.
Like its language, Paris is beautiful! I have never seen such gorgeous architecture anywhere. Everything was unique and pretty, even in the not-so-nice part of town. We should know, because, while the nice british train station lady kindly booked us a hotel room just a ten minute walk from the train station, she didn’t warn us that the hotel was in a shady part of town. It was admittedly nerve wracking to walk, in the dark, after midnight, through a mostly-silent-except-for-the-bars Paris, talking softly so as not to advertise the foreigner thing, while trying to follow a very general map in the dark to our somewhat grungy hotel. We did find it, and in doing so, figured out the Parisian street signs are mostly posted on the corners of buildings, rather than streets. Go figure.
Anyway, hotel, check. No wi-fi in the hotel though, and no lift, so it was an adventure getting Yvette’s luggage up 2 flights of stairs to our room. (Getting it down the next morning was almost more of a challenge; she ended up sort of sliding it down on it’s front.)
There was also no real shower in our hotel room. Instead there was one of those bathtub with the showerhead attached to a hose type deals. The idea is to sit in the tub, and use the showerhead, but
neither of us was really comfortable sitting in that thing all considering, so what to do? Yvette showered first, and I’m not sure what went on, but the bathroom was pretty much drenched by the time it was my turn, which was hysterical. With that in mind, I decided kneeling in the tub was the proper solution, so there was this whole squatting and balancing aspect thrown in that was extra challenging, and I felt very accomplished when I finally figured out the best way to make it work and only got the bathroom a little wet. (By the way, Europe, what’s up with the strange pastel green bathrooms? Floor, walls, sink, tub…I’m surprised the towels aren’t green!)
After leaving our hotel (which looked much friendlier in the daylight, and the day receptionist was much nicer too), we spent the day applying our knowledge of London’s underground to Paris’s, and (after a to die for it was so delicious breakfast of chocolate croissants) took a trip to the Louvre for the afternoon. We waited in a gigantic line for about 45 minutes to get in, but it was worth it. That museum is huge, and we only had a couple of hours, so obviously we couldn’t see everything. We parked ourselves in the Greek and Roman sculpture section and got to see Michelangelo’s Dying Slave, Venus de Milo, and Eros and Psyche. There were also a couple of statutes of Athena and Ares that I recognized from art books and was excited to see. We took a side trip to peek at the Mona Lisa, because she was right there, but as we could see her just fine from the side of the room (smaller than you’d think and behind two or three layers of glass at the end of a long line) we waved and moved on—let the tourists with more time spend an hour waiting for a close up.
Then it was back to the hotel to pick up our luggage, and a couple of train hops to the station where we were to catch our ride to Italy. The more you ride the underground, I’ve discovered, the easier it gets. Paris was even easier to understand than London’s (maybe because we had a good map) although it has many sublevels, which can make navigation a little difficult. And of course, all the signs are in French. Really though, the language barrier wasn’t as awful as I was expecting. I was really nervous about spending a day in France, but it really wasn’t too bad. And the lady who helped us book our train to Italy was amazing (we seem to be getting lucky with the train people). She spoke English beautifully, and gave us a few French lessons while she was looking up ticket and hotel prices (and laughed a little at the ensuing mispronunciation). She also gave us directions to the train station from which our overnight train would be leaving, and went and got a map out of her purse for us to use when we had no idea which stations she was talking about. The lady who directed us to the Louvre was not so helpful, but she didn’t speak much English, so that was part of it.
The one bad part of our Paris underground experience involved a very old, very small lift, Yvette’s giant suitcase, and the door’s refusal to open. There was a panicky moment in which the help button got us an automated response (in French) followed by many French people walking by the lift’s glass doors, which we were banging on, and refusing to even really look at us. Then a nice old lady, who didn’t speak a lick of English but who seemed somewhat amused by our plight in addition to being sympathetic, stood outside the door and used made up sign language to try to help us figure out how to fix the lift. When that didn’t work, she and her cane toddled over to the information desk and reported our problem, and within 5 minutes, a train station official came over with a walkie talkie to help us. The old lady left at that point (Yvette and I calling out “Merci!” through the tiny gap in the door), and the official, also amused by our situation, assured us we’d be out in a moment. And we were. Of course, we still had the problem of Yvette’s luggage, but we weren’t risking the lift again, so we just carried it up the stairs.
And now, here we are, even more tired than yesterday, but happy with our day (although I now want to chop my shoulders off, they hurt so much) and although I enjoyed Paris, I am happy to be leaving and excited about Italy tomorrow. We still have to figure out how this whole sleeper train thing works (how do we make these seats into beds?! The pictures aren’t very helpful!). Also, the train guy took all our tickets and passports and hasn’t given them back yet, which is somewhat nerve-wracking. But I got to eat super yummy French bread in France, and tomorrow I get to see the coloseum, so who cares? ^_^
P.S. I totally came down with a cold yesterday and cannot stop sneezing! Holly, I’m blaming you!
Like its language, Paris is beautiful! I have never seen such gorgeous architecture anywhere. Everything was unique and pretty, even in the not-so-nice part of town. We should know, because, while the nice british train station lady kindly booked us a hotel room just a ten minute walk from the train station, she didn’t warn us that the hotel was in a shady part of town. It was admittedly nerve wracking to walk, in the dark, after midnight, through a mostly-silent-except-for-the-bars Paris, talking softly so as not to advertise the foreigner thing, while trying to follow a very general map in the dark to our somewhat grungy hotel. We did find it, and in doing so, figured out the Parisian street signs are mostly posted on the corners of buildings, rather than streets. Go figure.
Anyway, hotel, check. No wi-fi in the hotel though, and no lift, so it was an adventure getting Yvette’s luggage up 2 flights of stairs to our room. (Getting it down the next morning was almost more of a challenge; she ended up sort of sliding it down on it’s front.)
There was also no real shower in our hotel room. Instead there was one of those bathtub with the showerhead attached to a hose type deals. The idea is to sit in the tub, and use the showerhead, but
neither of us was really comfortable sitting in that thing all considering, so what to do? Yvette showered first, and I’m not sure what went on, but the bathroom was pretty much drenched by the time it was my turn, which was hysterical. With that in mind, I decided kneeling in the tub was the proper solution, so there was this whole squatting and balancing aspect thrown in that was extra challenging, and I felt very accomplished when I finally figured out the best way to make it work and only got the bathroom a little wet. (By the way, Europe, what’s up with the strange pastel green bathrooms? Floor, walls, sink, tub…I’m surprised the towels aren’t green!)After leaving our hotel (which looked much friendlier in the daylight, and the day receptionist was much nicer too), we spent the day applying our knowledge of London’s underground to Paris’s, and (after a to die for it was so delicious breakfast of chocolate croissants) took a trip to the Louvre for the afternoon. We waited in a gigantic line for about 45 minutes to get in, but it was worth it. That museum is huge, and we only had a couple of hours, so obviously we couldn’t see everything. We parked ourselves in the Greek and Roman sculpture section and got to see Michelangelo’s Dying Slave, Venus de Milo, and Eros and Psyche. There were also a couple of statutes of Athena and Ares that I recognized from art books and was excited to see. We took a side trip to peek at the Mona Lisa, because she was right there, but as we could see her just fine from the side of the room (smaller than you’d think and behind two or three layers of glass at the end of a long line) we waved and moved on—let the tourists with more time spend an hour waiting for a close up.
Then it was back to the hotel to pick up our luggage, and a couple of train hops to the station where we were to catch our ride to Italy. The more you ride the underground, I’ve discovered, the easier it gets. Paris was even easier to understand than London’s (maybe because we had a good map) although it has many sublevels, which can make navigation a little difficult. And of course, all the signs are in French. Really though, the language barrier wasn’t as awful as I was expecting. I was really nervous about spending a day in France, but it really wasn’t too bad. And the lady who helped us book our train to Italy was amazing (we seem to be getting lucky with the train people). She spoke English beautifully, and gave us a few French lessons while she was looking up ticket and hotel prices (and laughed a little at the ensuing mispronunciation). She also gave us directions to the train station from which our overnight train would be leaving, and went and got a map out of her purse for us to use when we had no idea which stations she was talking about. The lady who directed us to the Louvre was not so helpful, but she didn’t speak much English, so that was part of it.
The one bad part of our Paris underground experience involved a very old, very small lift, Yvette’s giant suitcase, and the door’s refusal to open. There was a panicky moment in which the help button got us an automated response (in French) followed by many French people walking by the lift’s glass doors, which we were banging on, and refusing to even really look at us. Then a nice old lady, who didn’t speak a lick of English but who seemed somewhat amused by our plight in addition to being sympathetic, stood outside the door and used made up sign language to try to help us figure out how to fix the lift. When that didn’t work, she and her cane toddled over to the information desk and reported our problem, and within 5 minutes, a train station official came over with a walkie talkie to help us. The old lady left at that point (Yvette and I calling out “Merci!” through the tiny gap in the door), and the official, also amused by our situation, assured us we’d be out in a moment. And we were. Of course, we still had the problem of Yvette’s luggage, but we weren’t risking the lift again, so we just carried it up the stairs.
And now, here we are, even more tired than yesterday, but happy with our day (although I now want to chop my shoulders off, they hurt so much) and although I enjoyed Paris, I am happy to be leaving and excited about Italy tomorrow. We still have to figure out how this whole sleeper train thing works (how do we make these seats into beds?! The pictures aren’t very helpful!). Also, the train guy took all our tickets and passports and hasn’t given them back yet, which is somewhat nerve-wracking. But I got to eat super yummy French bread in France, and tomorrow I get to see the coloseum, so who cares? ^_^
P.S. I totally came down with a cold yesterday and cannot stop sneezing! Holly, I’m blaming you!
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