Paris Through Spectacles: The Trials and Triumphs in the City of Love

Part II- Paris through Spectales, concerning the events of tragic and triumphant importance in the so called City of Love.

What can one say about what is supposed to be the most romantic city in the world? What can one say about all the beautiful sights one may see or not see? If you haven't caught onto my slightly sarcastic title let me just preface my experience by saying at times it was less then desirable.

It all started with the plane ride. It was delayed...an hour and half...it was promised to be for two hours and possibly three but we were all delighted when it was only an hour and a half...I don't remember it...I was alseep because when you only have four hours of sleep and are rapidly approaching the City of Love, well it seems necessary to be conscious for it.

This is where the trials begin on this airplane. I decided to put my contacts in, which seems reasonable that I wouldn't want to go about Paris looking like a lost librarian, I was already arriving quite unfashionable and limping slightly because I had developed some nasty blisters on my pinky toes. Then the unthinkable happened between putting my contact in and exiting the plane, one of my contacts decided to stow aboard and continue the journey back to Spain in order to spend more quality time in the country and teach me how to properly portray the sights that I saw in my blog. In other words I was half blind, and eventually totally blind because my other eye could not take the pressure of being the only one gifted with sight. So I entered into the Beauvis airport without my keen ability to see, which I think is an important sense to have when traveling. However it was going to be paris through spectacles because that is all I could do, for one eye blind would not suffice, and would strained eye would be less then pleasant. I was not about to decrease my vision any more by permantely wrecking my vision and having two differeing degrees of vision if I could help it.

Therefore I hobbled off of the plane and within a few moment we had purchased bus tickets to get to the city center of Paris and were on our merry way. I chose this bus to put my other contact away, and put in my ear buds and feel asleep to sound of fireflies and i'm sad to say Rhianna soothing my ears. I woke up with about a half hour left of the trip to find that Kristen had befriended a Parisian man, who had spent the past hour showing her on a map how to get around the metro and showing her which sights should not be missed. This was a great relief for Paris was the city I had fretted the most about and thought I would have the most likely chance of dying and being one eye blind I thought the risk to be even greater then before.

We exited the bus having already purchased train tickets for the journey home and then made our way to find the metro. We found it with relative ease which turned out to be a blessing, and after making our way down we eventually found the ticket booth, it was here I tried to speak French for the first and only time of our trip asking the lady in broken french if she could speak english. She responded no but it was obvious that she could. We purchased all day metro tickets for three days and then set about to go to a destination. After looking at the map our first stop was decided to be the Arc de triumph, which can be seen in many movies, including one of my parent's favorite and I enjoy it as well; Casablanca with Humphrey Bogart. An excellent movie if one ever wishes to see it.

We crowded on and off the metro and made our way up, and behold as we rose out of the paved earth we saw it rising in front of us, quite triumphant but slightly dimmed by the gray overcast sky that seemed to permanently linger like the smell of burnt in the kitchen after neglecting the oven for too long. Yet it was a triumphant sight to behold. We however, focused on another necessity being food, we walked down the Champs Elyees which is a famous street full of shopping, and turned down the side street. We popped into the first bakery we saw and immediately bought bagettes and I a bagette and a pain de chocolate or what is similar to a chocolate crossiant. This enjoyment of pasterying was not to last however, for I stupidly decided I need cash and promptly went to an atm and tried to withdraw money. However, upon selecting an amount the machine read: "At the request of the branch we are withholding your card." Seriously? Yes...it was a very serious matter, no card was returned and I was printed out a receipt saying my card was taken and to see the branch.

So I marched inside, and asked a lady if she spoke English, she said no, and after several minutes she got someone who did. This lady was not much better but she understood and told me to come back at four because she had to call to open the atm. Four it was to be then, and I left a bit hopeful that my card would return to me and this disaster would only be a minor setback.

It was a downcast and distressed mentality that I once again glimpsed the triumphant arc and we made our way underground to cross the roundabout that circled the monument. We got there and saw the eternal flame and the engravings of names and triumphs that the French had achieved. I tried to focus on the positive but my spirits were dampened and quite rightly so, for I had come to the fashion capitol of the world and was near to broke.


We set off walking and after a time made our way to the Eiffel tower it was a good hour of wandering running into random things like a statue of George Washington, yes the American president. We finally glimpsed the Eiffel tower and walked briskly towards it. Yes there it stood, and my first emotion was disappointment, this was it? This huge iron thing was the symbol of love...when I think of love I think of a warm beach and a tropical sunset with waves lapping gently against the sand. Not a cold iron monument only intended to stand for eleven years. The hype it has gotten rendered it to be quite disappointing. Never the less we pressed onward and soon were standing underneath  the enourmous tower staring upwards, it was less pleasent up close. That and the mirads of scammers swarming underneath the tower, selling cheaply made eiffel towers and trying to get quadruple it's worth. I ended up buy 10 mini keychain effiel towers for 2 euros because I was sure someone would want one. We took the regular pictures that now fill my camera and set off in the opposite direction.


About fifty meters from the base three jamician men came up to us and said: "hakuna matata" and grabbed our pointer fingers and looped them through some thread they then started to briskly rap thread around more thread and within a minute all three of us were looking down at our wrists to see a handmade bracelet set upon our wrists. Halfway through the process I had said, "You are going to want money for this huh?" The man responded "You are very wise." After bartering and telling the man a sad tale of my debit card being eaten by the atm machine Kristen and I got our bracelets for two euro instead of five, and Phil was not as lucky and paid 2.75 euro. All in all we were delightfully scammed and I made the man take a picture with me so I could always remember this event.

After this we back on the metro and changed lines many times to find ourselves close to St. Christopher's famous hostel. This was quite a nice little hostel where we found beds with drapes and slept six to a room, it was kristen, phil, and I and three other guys. Yet they were all friendly so it was fine.
 It was almost four by this time so we set about to go back to the bank. We once again saw the arch de triumph and I walked inside the bank and waited. She was helping someone but had my card, after fifteen minutes or so she asked for my id, saw that it was me and then called my bank, they refused to let her give me the card, and she said "I'm zorry! Ze bank vill not give you ze card, it vil be destroyed." As upset as I was, I copied down a bit of my information from the card and left, trying to console myself that at least it was going to be destroyed. With that I walked off a bit of my frustration and had a delicious crepe and decided to enjoy myself inspite of being put at a set back.

We continued to walk down the Champs Elysees and ended up towards the middle to a round about that in the center there were glorious fountains, and something that was familar to me, but did not belong in native france. An obelisk from Luxor Egypt. I had seen it's sister only a few months before in Egypt and had heard the story of the exchange egypt had with France, Egypt giving france a 3,000 BC obelisk and france in the 1800's giving them a brand new clock which never worked, a poor deal to egypt. I was not happy to see that they had covered the tip with Gold, whereas in egypt they leave them bare. Although it was great to see a landmark I had become so familar with.

After this experience we caught a bus and went to a metro station which we took a brief pitstop to The Moulin Rouge, it was the movie that drew us there. Sure enough there was a small theatre with teh words moulin rouge illuminated on the side and a lit up windmill. It was a quick trip and then we took a metro which led us back to our hostel. There I tried several times to call the states, and each time the numbers did not go through, I had even crammed myself into a sketchy phone booth and talked to several phone operator. Alas I did the last thing possible, emailed my parents and had them deal with the situation.

That night we went to a cafe and I had the best pesto I have ever had in my life. It was delicious and creamy, Kristen and I were also forced to watch Phil eat Es Cargo, or Snails. He even had a fancy little snail holder and fork that let him slurp out the nasty little creatures. We wondered if they were from a farm and they found them in the back of the restaurant. Either way they looked quite unpleasant.

My feet were aching and we made our way back to the Effiel tower to see it at night. It was lit up and suddenly I could see why people think it is lovely, for a dull dingy tower in the day, glows softly at night, like it holds a promise, or is a symbol of light in the dark. Then something incredible happened. It started to sparkles, thousand of LED lights started to twinkle all over the tower and we stood in awe and wonder. A lady grabbed my elbow and I instinctively grabbed my purse but all she said was "Have you ever seen anything like it?" I agreed that no, I had not. I found out she was from Texas and after exchanging a few pleasantries she bid us adeu and left. The twinkling lasted five minutes and then subsided, we found out later it twinkles every night at the top of the hour to five after starting at nine.
After staring a bit more we returned to our hostel and went to bed the day still fresh in our minds.

As I have already written a vast amount I will take a break and continue on in the near future, for nobody wants to read a ten page blog!

To be continued in part b of Paris through Spectacles, a three part series in the adventures of travel week one. (Check back soon for the second half of this trip!)






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