Update from the other side of the Pyrenees!

By Jordan Nelson
THE PHOTO ALBUM FOR THIS POST IS HERE.
Well, I'm in Paris! Friday was a national holiday in Spain, so I left Thursday afternoon and I'm skipping one day of school Monday to take an extra long weekend to see the capital of France. Everything went great getting over here. I flew Air France and arrived Thursday night around 9:30pm. I met my pre-arranged shuttle at the airport and was dropped right off at my hotel door! Cool, huh? The wonders of Expedia pass with flying colors yet again. The first night I didn't really do anything other than leave my hotel to go down the street to get a Coke from a store. My hotel is in Montmartre, though, so as I walked I walked past the famous Moulin Rouge windmill place.

My first full day, Friday, I woke up and left my hotel around 8:30am or so. I went straight to the Eiffel Tower, and went up to the second stage. I didn't go to the very top, though, because the line was forever long, I wanted to see other stuff, and figured it would just be more skyline views.

After that I went to Notre Dame cathedral and walked along the River Seine. I stopped at the spot where they filmed part of the Bourne Identity (which was more important, to me haha), the part right after Marie and Bourne finish the drive from Zurich to Paris and they pull the Mini Cooper over and park near the river and Bourne wakes up and eats some breakfast burrito thing Marie bought her ("For $20 thousand I like to throw in breakfast," says Marie. "Did you stop for gas?" asks Bourne. "You were pretty out of it," replies Marie.). In the background you can see the Notre Dame so I had a pretty good idea of where it was and sure enough! I found the parking spot! :)

After that I basically just walked all over the city and just walked around. For lunch I had a fresh tomatoe from a vegetable stand and, oddly enough, Spanish orange juice. It was just a coincidence, but I love orange juice and the vegetable place had a bunch of bottles lined up, so I picked one and bought it, and realized that it was a Spanish brand, and the bottle was in Spanish! It was bottled in Murcia, I believe.

Today I got a bit of a late start, but got out of my hotel around 10am and went to Avenue des Champs-Élysées, one of the most famous streets in the world. I saw the Arc de Triomphe (but didn't go to the top...again, line too long, and I knew it was just going to be a skyline shot! Why are people so obsessed with going to the top of stuff? Everything just looks tiny from up there...so?).

After that I ate a ham crepe and payed too much at a cafe on the same street. Then I headed to the Louvre! Now normally I'm the guy that likes to look at art, but I don't like spending forever on it. I'm NOT one to sit in a gallery and stare at a painting forever, and I especially don't like looking at renaissance-era or whatever portraits and stuff. To me, that is boring. But I LOVE history and archaeology so the Louvre was just my ticket!! Plus, I'm an architecture student so you KNOW I had to go see I.M. Pei's famous glass pyramid outside the entrance.

I especially liked looking at the Roman/Greek sculptures, the Egyptian artifacts, and the early-Christian and Arabic artifacts. Those were my favorite parts....plus seeing some American high school student get totally chewed out by a French Louvre supervisor person for touching a sculpture. I kind of delighted in that actually, if I may admit so. :) It's just that, (and warning, I'm going to make a huge sweeping generalization here that may OR MAY NOT apply to you or your experience so please save any arguments, because I already realize this is not always true), often times you see the "Ugly American" (or any other nationality, b/c they exist everywhere, but "Ugly American" is a common nickname), which is that tourist that is really whiny because they have to walk, and they demand that every country speak English, and want to skip lines and touch whatever they want and do whatever they want, regardless of the rules. And every time I see one of these people, I feel like slapping them out of their egotistical trance, because they are setting a reputation which sometimes comes back to haunt people like me, who like cultures, learning about cultures, making an attempt to speak the local language (no matter how bad my French may be!), and then the "Ugly American" comes in and sets a reputation that is hard to break! Anyway, this was some snot-nosed 15 year old American high-schooler that wanted to touch all the sculptures and looked really shocked when the Louvre person actually stood up for thousands of years of history and culture. :)

After the Louvre, I went back to the hotel to rest a little (I'm walking a LOT here, but I'm not complaining!!) and then I went out a little later. I went BACK to the Louvre to purchase a special pass to the Palace at Versailles for tomorrow, which would include the metro ticket there, allow me to skip lines once I'm there, and save money, but unfortunately the tourism office that sells them at the Louvre was closed.

But that's okay. Instead, I got to see another famous Bourne Identity film site! :) The Hotel Regina, outside the Louvre, is where fictitious David Webb's (Jason Bourne's real name) alias, John Michael Kane, stayed in Paris, AND is where Jason Bourne tells Marie how to get the hotel bill he needs to track down more clues, but that ended up being a deleted scene. I still really want to find out where Jason Bourne's Paris apartment is they used in the film. :)

After that, I walked through the Eiffel Tower area and I went back to the Notre Dame area (which is my favorite so far), and had a REALLY good Panini of mozzarella cheese and tomatoes (if you know me, then you know 3 things. 1) that I LOVE tomatoes alone, 2) that I LOVE mozzarella cheese alone, and 3) that I LOVE margherita pizzas which is just Mozzarella, tomatoes, and basil together, which was basically what the panini was!) I ate it as I walked around the area. The panini guy was talking to me in French and I didn't understand (which was obvious to him) so he asked me what language I spoke. Just for kicks, I told him Spanish (which IS true, afterall :) so when he gave me the panini he said "muchas gracias, adios."

After that, it was nighttime, and I got on the metro back to the Arc de Triomphe for some night shots. I ran into some other Spanish speakers by accident, a novio/-a from Mexico. It just so happened that it was them I asked if they could take my picture for me, and I heard them talking in Spanish so I talked to them for a little.

After that, I headed back to Montmartre and now I'm in my hotel again! It's late, I'm writing this, and then I'm going to SLEEP because I want to get to Versailles early tomorrow!
Much love from Madrid, er, I mean...Paris,
Jordan