My Last Weekend in Paris

So, I leave on Friday to come back to the States, and I really....really don't want to go. I'm just getting to the point in my trip where I am comfortable in Paris, and I really don't want to leave! But I guess I have to get back to reality and all...and earn money so I can pay off this trip!

I had a pretty interesting week.

On Tuesday, my petit panda mort. No kidding. Good thing this little panda was a tiny refrigerator! I had borrowed the fridge from CEA (and it is seriously small...like you can place a bar of chocolate inside, and that's about it) and I woke up to find that it no longer had on it's nose what the temperature inside was...and so I took it back to CEA, and they gave me a new one and my new panda is the coolest! Literally! My old panda would only get down to about 10 degrees Celsius on a good day, and the new one sits at 4 degrees C on a bad day! I totally kept ice cream in there for two days this week, and the ice cream didn't melt. It made me extremely happy.

Wednesday I went to the Conciergerie and St-Chappelle. The Conciergerie is known for being a prison during the French Revolution for those who were getting carted away to the guillotine, but is most famous because that is where Marie Antionette was held before she was killed. I really like how the Revolutionaries at that time said that the guillotine was a perfect way to kill someone because it made everyone equal in death, instead of before when the poor would get hanged and if you had more money you'd get a firing squad or your head chopped off. However, in the Conciergerie, the basic room was a straw floor and had loads of people crammed into it. If you had money though, you could get a bed and a cell with less people, and if you were famous you get a cell to yourself with a bed and a desk for writing. And Marie Antionette herself had her own room plus her own chapel with guards watching over her...does this not make sense to anyone else? I just thought it was funny that the people at that time who were trying to overthrow the Bourgeousie were creating thier own. St-Chapelle was nice, too. It is famous because St-Louis (the only French king that was made a saint) built it to house the relics he acquired, such as what is thought to be Jesus' crown of thorns. They're not there anymore, but the stained glass remains and it is gorgeous! There are like 20 panels of stained galss from the floor to the ceiling depicting scenes from the Bible fom Genesis to Christ's resurrection. I thought it was pretty awesome.

Thursday I went to St-Sulpice, which is famous for having the original Rose Line through the center of the church (which is now in Greenwich, England)...and it was also made famous because it is featured in the movie "The Da Vinci Code". I wandered around the Luxoumberg Gardens with my friend Steph, and it was a pretty hot day. We ended up hanging out in this area that had a lot of little kids around, because there was some sort of kiddie pools there. And these two boys came up to us and said:
Boys: "Tu parles anglias?" ("Do you speak English?")
Steph: "Oui, je parle anglias;" ("Yes, I do speak English")
Boys: "Je sais anglais! 'Rose' est 'pink'!" (I know English! 'Rose' is 'pink'!)
Steph: "Oui! Tu sais 'Bonjour'?) (Yes! Do you know 'hello'?)
Boys: "Hello!"

These boys were super cute, but then we walked away because I felt we were getting a little weird.

On Friday, I was told in my French class that my writing was "barbaric"...but I really don't care because my professor isn't very good at teaching French to non-French language people. I mean, I'm getting better at understanding, but we haven't written anything, we never do any speaking, so it doesn't help very much. However, I feel like when I'm out on the streets just alking with random people like when I order food I am getting so much better. I really like that part of being in Paris. I totally had someone ask for directions today...in french. They thought I was a native! haha I went to Tour Montparnasse after class, which is the tallest building in France at 210 meters and is the only skyscraper in Paris. You can up to the top of the building for almost 10 euros less than the Eiffel Tower, and has the same, if not better, view. I spent at least an hour just sitting and staring out, trying to find some of the landmarks I've hit, and I was able to spot them all. I think I've go to everything I've wanted to see here while in Paris.

That night, I went to the Louvre with Gabriell and Jessica, because it's free on Friday nights for students. I love how so many place have free or reduced admisson for students, it really helps out. I saw all of the highlights; the Mona Lisa, the Winged Victory, the Venus de Milo, but I really didn't care very much for the art so I spent the rest of the time wandering through the Ancient Greek, Etruscan, and Egyptian art. That was extremely cool, and I'm really glad this time around I got to see what I wanted to see and didn't just wander for ages.

Saturday was just a being lazy day. We've spent the last three weeks just going and going that I needed a day to do nothing. I finished a book (my 12th book this trip) and hunug out with some of the other kids on my floor, like the guy from Spain, he's pretty cool. Then Jackie was trying to make a soup, so Gabs and I helped her and we ended up eating it too.

Today I went to the Paris Zoo with Jessica. It was pretty sweet, we saw loads of animals and it's cool because it's definitely not a Paris tourist attraction. We would listen to kids as we went up to each animal to see how they would say it. My favorite was the otters...I've decided that if I ever had to choose to be an animal, I would be an otter. Pretty much because they get to play in the water all day! We then walked to the Natural History Museum and we went into the Evolution of Man exhibit, which was more like just a lot of taxidermied animals, but it was really interesting...and that took all day! I'm off to go cook dinner with Gabriell.

Au revoir, and for those of you who are interested, I get into SFO on Friday night.

I really don't want to go home!

Lesley