Crème de la crème

High Class Saturday.

Following post dates for Saturday, June 23.

Day 3. Today’s theme was wealth.

So woke up and were ready to go today at 8:15 am. More stuff happened last night. So I came back to the room after Michael had gone to sleep and this is what happened:

Me: Rummaging through my stuff.
Michael: Hello?
Me: Um, hello.
Michael: hello?
Me: yeah what’s up
Michael: James?
Me: Yeah, what.
Michael: Oh I thought you were trying to take my stuff. Goes back to sleep

Then in the middle of the night, Michael said I was rolling around and grinding my teeth loud enough to “wake the dead.” I know I do this. It’s a problem, if you want to call it that, I have. My dentists says I have abnormally strong jaw muscles due to grinding my teeth. I can’t seem to replicate the noise consciously, only subconsciously. But it is loud. Apparently if I don’t wear my mouth guard on a regular basis, I will have no molars by the time I’m 50. My mouth guard is supposed to last me 10 years, I’m on year two and I’m already through it. It is bad.

Ok at one point I wake up in the middle of the night and Michael is sitting up staring at me. I can see his silhouette from our window. I was like, “Michael what are you doing.” No response, just staring. “Um, go to sleep.” Then I rolled away and went back to sleep. Neither of recall any of this in the morning.

Ok so to the day’s activities. Our first destination was Versailles. I’ve also been here before, but again, I really looked forward to seeing it, especially the gardens. So we had to catch a train from Paris to Versailles, it took about 25 minutes. Then we walked from there to Versailles. Not much has changed except they are having some huge renovations on the front and it ruined a lot of the pictures. Because of time we only bought tickets to see the palace and gardens. I was a bit disappointed that we couldn’t go see Marie Antoinette‘s estate. I’ve never been, but apparently it’s more impressive than the palace. SO we got our audio guides and made our way through Versailles. Extremely extravagant and impressive.

The tour didn’t take as long as I had thought it would. We went to the gardens in the back at around 12:20 pm. Now they were amazing. I forget the acreage but it’s huge. Apparently there were special showings in the gardens at 11:30, 3:00, and in the evening, but we weren’t able to see these. The fountains weren’t on as well. So there is one main path that overlooks a long square pool lined with trees. Branching off the main road are pathways into the gardens leading you to various fountains and such. The weather was absolutely perfect.

We left the palace and went to eat a light lunch before heading back to Paris. Michelle, Lesley, Deepa and I split off and went to this cafeteria for some food. We met this French guy that the girls all thought was really cute. His name was Arthur. Anyways, he was first commenting on how impolite Michelle was for not covering her outh when she yawned, but he was only kidding. Then he talked about how loud Lesley’s laugh was. Then he thought Deepa’s name was deeper. They took a picture with him.

We caught the next train to Paris. Our next stop was the Arc Du Triumph and the Champs Elysees. This is a very high class area. I actually do remember rather vividly that we ate here on the street. On the way over, I was like, guys we have to have some crepes from a stand at some point. I happened to say this ight next to a stand, so we did. It was amazing Buerre Sacre. Buttered with sugar. So good.

So the girls were really looking forward to going shopping and we split off for about an hour and a half. I went off by myself and hit up the Adidas France store first. It was incredible. The biggest Adidas store I’ve ever seen. I could have easily spent over an hour in here The had this console that you could stand at and design your own shoe. There were camera sensors that picked up your finger, so you could use it as a mouse and a crosshair followed wherever you pointed. I made my own shoe and it cost over 150 Euro. It was dirty. I also checked out a lot of the gear that was way too pricy for me. Everyone in there seemed to be mostly upper class individuals. The things here were almost twice as expensive as in the states and most of it was soccer related. Then I went to the Nike, Paris store. This was less impressive but amazing nonetheless. They have personal shoe designers in the bottom floor that consult you on your shoe. I should work here. I found a basketball rack as well and I couldn’t resist. I haven’t touched a ball in over a month now and I’m about to go crazy. I picked on off the rack, found a bench and dribbled it for about 10 minutes. Nice.

We reconvened at the Arc Du Triumph where they were having some sort of procession, possibly a memorial. There was a band, soldiers, and veterans. Very cool.

It was getting closer to dinner, so we decided to eat before heading over to the Sacre Coeur, which is more of a night time scene. We found a nice little cafe near the base of the church. I had vegetable soup, steak with fries, and another crepe. Service was rather slow and terrible. This seemed to be somewhat of a trend in Paris. Maybe we were going to the lower end of restaurants, but who knows.

Making our way up to the Sacre Coeur is somewhat of a challenge. First, the sea of bracelet makers. So as you walk towards the gates, you get literally stopped by these African guys who loop this piece of string around you finger. You try to tell them you’re not interested, but they are some very smooth talkers. At first I didn’t know what they were doing, so I just watched. They start doing all this stuff with the sting, making a design. All the while they talk to you about where you are from in stuff. They kept saying “I love America, I love America. Hakuna Mattata, I love America.” Then they talk about South Africa. At some point they strap it around your wrist and tie it up. I know that there’s really no point in trying to get out of the sale, so I’m just going along with it. My guy noticed that I was traveling with a pack of girls and was like, “You know, this bracelet will give you magical shagging powers.” I was like ok, thanks. He cut the excess string off and I gave him 2 Euro. Kinda fun. I looked over and saw that Laura and Michael had also got roped in as well. Michael was pissed. It was so funny. After the guy was done, he forced Michael to keep giving him more money. Then he and Michael did the handshake where you pull the other person towards you and do like a pat on the back. Michaels face was awesome. He was so pissed and disillusioned. Turned out the bracelet was a good idea, because there were more waves of these bracelet guys as you moved closer to the steps. All you had to do was point at your wrist and they instantly liked you. Nice.

So Sacre Coeur is a chapel on this very steep hill overlooking Paris. There are a lot steps to reach the top. Michael and I decided to run up them, which turned out to be a very bad idea after food. I felt sick near the top, but the view made it worth it. You can see nearly all of Paris. The sunset in combination with the city lights really created a relax atmosphere. It was very much like the Spanish steps in Rome. People from all over come here at night to sit on the steps, drink, play music, and dance. These two guys were playing a lot of oldies and everyone was singing. We looked around outside for a while, then went inside for a little bit to check out the chapel. It wasn’t as big as some of the other’s that we’ve been to, but still very cool nonetheless. We went back outside and found a nice spot on the grass to lay until the sun had fully set and it started to get dark.

We waited here for a while mainly to relax, but also to let the sun completely set before going to the Red Light District, another great night scene. We left around 10:45 pm and made our way over. First we stopped for dessert, I had apple tart, good.

Now the Red Light District is basically the ‘sex district’ of Paris. The Moulin Rouge is here, in addition to various other adult shops. It is a highly sketchy place, especially at night. But if you go at night, you get the full effect. While we there, I had a ham and cheese crepe at this stand right next to the Moulin Rouge. I couldn’t help myself, it was so cheap and good. I wasn’t even hungry. But hey, when in Paris.

Anyways so walking around, the girls were getting hit on pretty much left and right. Now, before you get worried, know that we were all fine and in no danger whatsoever. But I walked in the front and Michael walked in the back. Eventually we had seen enough and took a couple pictures, so we headed home. Last night in Paris. L Sad. We stayed up for a while hanging out and playing songs on my laptop before going to bed.

Tomorrow the only thing on the agenda is Notre Dame since we didn’t get to it today. Then we will be headed back to Cambridge, where dreams come true.

Viva La France.

-James