Monter la Tour Eiffel

I came to Paris to climb the Eiffel Tower. Seriously, it was the theme of my application essay and my motivation to study in Paris. I visited in high school and due to bad weather, a rude Parisian elevator operator, and a short time line; I never made it to the top. I was stuck on the metaphorical middle floor; somewhere between the ground (my roots in English) and the tippy top (full French immersion).

As I stormed onto the plane in January, I swore that it was the first landmark that I would conquer in Paris. Well- 4 months after I landed in Paris, I climbed to the top—twice, actually. My hesitation for four months was the cold, windy weather, and the fact that it was SO close- I could do it “anytime”.

The day that I took the plunge was a sunny April day after I had made a quick stop at school—which was located 2 blocks from Mr. Eiffel. I had a short wait at the bottom since it was a Tuesday afternoon in the limbo season-- after winter but before tourist packed spring/summer. I bought a ticket for the stairs to the middle floor and started my climb up the infamous Eiffel Tower. I thought of Garrett most of the way up- he was building the Lego Eiffel Tower back in the US. The architecture is incredible. The frame is massive and the iron beams seemed to push and pull and jut out at each other. The view from the middle floor is the most impressive- but I never could have told you that unless I went to the top. The middle is the perfect platform to see the famous rooftops of Paris from and the striking Seine River. However, seeing the Paris skyline without the Eiffel Tower left me with strange feeling; it’s like when you trim a tree and you can’t help but feel like something is missing- even though everything else is the same. The top floor (another 100+ or so stairs) is really cool because they have an indoor section that guides you on which countries you are facing- assuming you have super vision and can see 3,628 miles to New York City.

I climbed down around dusk and walked over to a closer NY landmark, the Statue of Liberty. We all know it was a gift from France; well they gave themselves the same, smaller gift. It was a little tricky to get to since it’s in the middle of the Seine on a small, skinny strip of an island. I waved to her and headed back up the River towards the Eiffel Tower again. It was getting dark and I watched the Bateaux Mouches (tourist river boats) sail along the river. At around 8pm I made it back to the base of the Eiffel Tower. It lights up every night at 8pm and then every hour, on the hour until around midnight. I realized that with my ticket, I could get up the Eiffel stairs again and being waiting on the middle floor when it lit up! Great idea—except for 710 steps!

According to WikiAnswers:
There are a total of 710 steps.

9 steps to the ticket booth, x2
328 steps to the first level, x2
340 steps to the second level , x2
18 steps to the lift platform on the second level, x1
15 steps to ascend to the upper observation platform. x1

Grand total: 1387
Of course I took the Eiffel Challenge to the extreme and climbed it twice in one day—had calves screaming at me for a week—but I made it! Four years after I first stood at the roots of the Eiffel tower- a mix of my American roots and French education, I was ready to call myself fully immersed and at the pinnacle of my French immersion.

Jour des Parcs

It was sunny, warm and I desperately needed to get rid of my milky winter skin, so I decided to take a hike over to the western outskirts of Paris to visit the Parc de Boulogne-Billancourt. Ignoring my guidebook, I got off at the metro stop nearest to me, but not centrally located in the park. Well after a 30 minute trek passed a driving range, horse race track and forest, I arrived at a small lake. Completely unable to find a map or reference point, I collapsed and took an hour long nap in the sun. After my rest, I began walking again and ended up outside the park. This would not do, so I dove back into the forest and somehow managed to find the giant lake that is on the center of every park map. It took almost another hour to walk around the lake, stopping to take photos of the boats and eating some lunch. I was supposed to find the Bois de Boulogne, a villa designed by Napolean or maybe one of the museums in the park, but I was exhausted and I saw a sign for the metro that I needed to catch back- so au revoir park! Another time- probably with a bike or car!

But my day in the sun was not over- I planned to stop at another park before heading home, Parc Monceau. This park had an entirely different energy than the previous one. It is enclosed by giant golden gates and is smack in the middle of a very chic Parisian neighborhood. It was late in the afternoon and all of the local kids were playing excitedly in the park because it was the start of their two week vacances (which means- Paris empties out of Parisians and fills up with tourists). I sat on a bench in the sun and read my book. After a while the older man next to me struck up conversation. He was an author and history scholar (graduated from Sarbonne) and loved talking about politics- was I the wrong person to start chatting with or what? So we talked about travel, America, Europe, the volcano, and a few other things. He was very nice and gave me his business card and told me to tell my French department to make it a required book. It’s about the Vietnam war- so we’ll see...

As I walked home, I stopped at Eric Kayser and had an outrageously good chocolate cookie. Then I wandered passed the St. Augustine church, Rue Haussman (commercial boulevard aka Time Square status for shopping), and stopping to rest in the Tuileries. (For a point of reference- none of these places are near each other and my feet were aching- but cookies work miracles.) I managed to make it to the metro and home for dinner.

Just as I’m sitting here writing this, I have discovered that Parc Boulogne is 2,137 acres and I completely forgot to stop at the Chinese pagoda emporium, which was a recommended site near Parc Monceau. It’s funny because I googled it last night and stopped by this morning- but the one I stopped at turned out to be a movie theatre. The real one is at the corner of Rue Rembrandt and Rue de Courcelles. Oops!

Petit Palais: Yves St. Laurent

Le Petit Palais, across from the Grand Palais, is also a giant exposition hall and from March 11th to August 29th, it is housing the Yves Saint Laurent exhibit. I’ve been holding out to go because there is always a 2 hour wait to get it. I figured that after a few weeks it would die down, but my boss encouraged me to go as soon as I could before tourism kicked up in Spring. So Danielle and I woke up early on weekday morning at arrived at the Petit Palais at 9:30am! It opened at 10am, but we still waited until 10:30 to be let in. The Parisians keep a close count on how many people are allowed to view an exhibit at a certain time, which makes for long lines but very pleasant view experiences.

The exhibit was nothing short of extraordinary. There were signs and films that explained his life, motivation, and all of the people that he worked with. Then there were the clothes- so many of his designs!! They were all on mannequins and grouped according to style and time period. They included his best designs- along with his worst. They grouped some by countries and cultures that he was inspired by, and some were grouped by art movement! Danielle and I guessed them all!!

They had a room of gowns; extravagant, gorgeous, stunning gowns. All of the mannequins were wearing earrings and jewelry as well.

My favorite room was the Smoking Room, which was actually a wall. It was a black wall, with almost shelves of standing black mannequins wearing his lines of tuxedo inspired designs. Black on black on black. At their feet, there was a light which singed orange like the tip of a cigarette. He called his tuxedo designs “smoking” because of their color and status.

The last room was also magnificent, with three solid colored dresses and dozens of color fabric swatches. The colors were vibrant and inspired by his trip to Morocco.

We very dizzy with luxury when we left, so we headed to Chanel to find the staircase that she used to model on. According to Danielle (and I trust this), the mirrors along the staircase allowed Chanel to walk down in her gown and catch the reflection of everyone’s faces at the bottom of the stairs. She could tell whether a design was good or bad based off their reactions. We had to go to two Chanel stores before we found the staircase, and of course, no photos allowed in Chanel- so we had a fun time feeling fabulous. We even stopped for macarons at Laduree. I got the chocolate passion fruit and caramel and she got chocolate raspberry and chocolate-chocolate. I’m still not in love with macarons, my heart only has room for chocolate, but when macarons are good- they are really good! (But when they are eh or OK, they are quite terrible.) So sadly I’ll be leaving macarons, Yves, and Chanel in Paris sans photos; but I’ll keep my memories and this blog!

Sushi

Since we know that the French love their beef raw, I figured that they’d love raw fish just as much. Sushi boutiques (they are actually restaurants but they have really interesting interiors) are all over Paris. So- a bunch of girls from the program and I went to Planet Sushi to celebrate the end of a work week. The Planet Sushi chefs make fresh sushi rolls and then place them on a conveyor belt, which spins through the restaurant. We sat at the counter and grabbed plates of sushi that passed. At the end, you tally up your plates and receive a bill. It was such a cool concept; apparently these are all over Washington DC but it was my first time at one. I stuck with my regular pieces, spicy tuna and sashimi while some girls opted for dessert sushi (fruit and rice wrapped in crepe, held together by Nutella). Verdict? The sushi was good, the presentation was stellar, dessert sushi isn’t the best idea, and don’t shy away from raw things in France.

Rue des Crepes

*The events of this blog are real however “Rue des Crepes” does not actually exist-

A bunch of friends and I went to see Alice in Wonderland in 3D (Alice aux pays des Merveilles), which was fantastic and I strongly recommend seeing it in theatres-- and yes, the French subtitles were 3D too---and the French have far more comfortable movie theatre seats.
But my real story begins with the end of the movie—because they let us out the back of the theatre and dumped us on some random street. We were confused at first, but then realized that we had been transported to the most wonderful street in Paris, “Rue des Crepes”. Every restaurant is a creperie! And in true French fashion, everyone goes out for crepes when they finish their movie! So we decided to join the trend and got in line for a creperie-

After we were seated, I realized that this is what I was expected from a true French creperie. It was packed, loud, the tables were on top of each other, there was one waiter and one crepe maker. The crepe maker made dessert and dinner crepes (we had one of each) and he was manning 3 hot crepe burners with one spatula and the biggest brick of butter that I have ever seen. I ordered a ratatouille crepe for dinner and a sugar crepe for dessert. Many of my friends have recently recommended the plain sugar crepe, claiming it is the best crepe in town. I was skeptical because- well it didn’t have chocolate or Nutella in it. But nonetheless, I ordered it and it was very delicious. It tasted like pancakes, which is ironic because crepes kind of replace pancakes here, but the balance of butter and sucre was absolutely perfect. With the check, the waiter gave us all Chupa Chups lollipops and we waved good bye to little creperie and headed across town to a touristy bar, The Frog and Princess.

*Rue des Crepes --> real street name = Rue de Montparnasse

Geneve

Why Gevena, Switzerland? Because in my guidebook it said that the Swiss consume more chocolate per person than any other country in Europe...so to Switzerland I went. On the way, I found a bunch of quirky things that I wasn't expecting:


Giant Broken Chair outside the UN...


Meeting Room at the UN


Red Cross


Geyser

Escalier en colimaçon

So my boss left for Milan and I am playing hooky with my friend Danielle for 3 days. We started out picking up lunch (baguettes, cheese, and fruit) at Rue de Mouffetard and walking over to the Luxembourg Gardens. We sat in the sun and enjoyed our little picnic, then headed up to Shakespeare & Co. so that Danielle could catch the metro to work and I could go back to Notre Dame.

I decided to climb the 360 spiraling steps (escalier en colimaçon) to the top of Notre Dame to see the gargoyles. The climb isn’t too bad because it is broken up into three parts: gift shop; balcony, gargoyles & bell, and tippy tippy top. The spiral staircase is so tiny that they only let a handful of people in at a time and they have to let everyone go up and down before the next group. My favorite level was the second because the gargoyles were so cool and I felt like I was part of the movie when I saw the bell. The descent, however, is not fun! You spiral down 360 stone stairs in this tiny tower. Claustrophobic!

Then I walked through the Marche aux fleurs, flower market aka allergies nightmare, to Saint Chapelle. Even though I have seen my fill of cathedrals, this one is really nice because it is entirely stained glass windows! With the sun shining through, the room lit up and looked amazing. Unfortunately they are fixing the Rose Window, which is the main attraction there, so I didn’t get that. St. Chapelle is in the same courtyard as Palais Justice and the Concierge, so I poked around there a little too.

I looked at my watch and realized that it was 5pm and the last stop I wanted to make was a park nearby that closes at 6pm!! I jumped on the metro and took it over to Jardin des Plantes, a botanical garden in Paris. This was way more than just a botanical garden though; it was like transporting out of Paris entirely. I walked among giant trees, rows of flowers, funky hedges. I discovered a zoo, 3 small natural history, science, and zoology museums, the cutest carousel, and a labyrinth. Check out the pictures, but the reason I titled this blog “Escalier en colimaçon” or spiral staircase is because all day I felt like I was climbing spinning stairs. Even the labyrinth was a spiral sidewalk lined with hedges up to a gazebo. There were a bunch of parents sitting in the gazebo talking as their kids played in the hedges. The hedges are so thick that kids have carved out little tunnels and passageways through the hedges. This is perfect for 5 year old and a nightmare for parents. As a descended, I could hear all of the parents yelling for their little French children to reappear. It was probably like being in Alice and Wonderland (Alice au pays des merveilles) for the kids and a complete horror for the parents.