Paris Days 6-7
So my last day in Paris started off ridiculously lazy. I didn't even leave Laura's place till like 10. I went to my favorite cafe and had a double espresso and a tartine, which is half a baguette with butter. I ate it the Brasilian way though, by dunking it into the coffee. Soooo good! While I was there some older gentleman started chatting me up. When he learned I was from the US, his first question was what state I was from, and then his second question (which took me a bit to understand) was if said state had the death penalty. :p Yes, Ohio still has the death penalty on the books. I told him it was about 50/50 on states with and without the death penalty, even though I'm really not sure. He gave me his address so I could send him a post card.
Still not wanting to be mobile, I wandered down the block to the vet. Laura doesn't speak French, and she's got a new puppy that's gonna need vaccinations, so I went in to ask some questions and take notes. The man there was *VERY* helpful. Getting a dog vaccinated and fixed in Paris is ridiculously expensive. :p
Decided to go ahead and do one of the walking tours from my guide book. BTW, God bless Rick Steves. His guide book and the free audio tour podcasts he has made this trip so much more enjoyable for me! I learned a lot, and the advice of getting the museum pass was just genius. So. Walking tour. I started at Place de la Bastille. Then I wandered around the Marais area. Marais means swamp, and that's what this place once was. It's all trendy now. I also wandered through parts of the Jewish Quarter and had an amazing, if messy, falafel pita for lunch. About halfway through the walk, I came upon Halles, which is some shopping center (I didn't bother going in) and St. Eustache church, which was quite pretty. At the church, I turned onto this pedestrian street with all sorts of shops. I found the Paris equivalent of a whole foods and there were many specialty stores. One sold just fish, one for just cheese, a couple just for fruits and one even just for spices. It was very nice.
I was meeting up with Laura for Krav Maga that evening, so I went back to her place to grab a quick nap and change. I then realized that I hadn't found a yarn store! So after my nap, I looked it up and found one right back near St. Eustache where I'd been earlier! Somewhat annoyed that I hadn't looked it up earlier, I went back. It was a super cool yarn store. You tell them how much of which kind of yarn you want, and they wind it up for you. It's all in-house stuff. And there were tons of buttons and ribbon and other trim there too. I bought some green wool to make me some socks. It's not superwash though, so I'll have to be careful when washing them; no throwing them in the washing machine!
Then I went to Laura's school to meet up with her. Grabbed some dinner along the way. Had my first chocolate eclair. Absolutely heavenly. Krav was crazy, but fun. I had no idea what was going on most times, I just did what everyone else did. I managed to get a couple bruises, but it was worth it.
We headed back home and I was thrilled to see that my favorite crepe place was still open, even though it was going on 11pm. Those Parisians are NOT morning people. The cafe wasn't open a few of the mornings when I went out, but they sure stay open late! I got one last dark chocolate crepe and savored every bite. I'm salivating just thinking about it. Went up, and packed my stuff for the trip home.
Got up early the next morning and headed to the airport. Getting there was no problem at all. At security though, they confiscated my little metal nail file. I was slightly annoyed, but whatever. I was nice and early, getting through security went much faster than I thought, so I tried to nap a bit. After all, it was like midnight eastern time. My flight back was on a smaller plane. A 767 vs a 777. I liked the smaller plane better. Maybe it's cause I had a window seat instead of being stuck in one of the middle seats. But I felt far more comfortable. Then I got to Chicago. What a pain. So I was in the line for US Citizens and Resident Card holders. Some guy in my line needed to be fingerprinted and have his picture taken for some reason. And then all the fingerprint scanners started crashing. So I was waiting and waiting and waiting. And there were all these people going "ZOMG! I'm going to miss my flight!" The idiots only gave themselves half an hour to get through immigration and customs on an international flight. I got some knitting done. Eventually they just made the guy stand to the side and processed the rest of us with US passports really quickly. Collected my bag, didn't have to deal with customs really other than to say I didn't have any food, and re-checked my bag. Going through security was a pain. I had this tiny tiny purse, a big purse and a small bag (big purse and small bag were about the same size) I got stopped while trying to get in line because I was only allowed 2 items, so I had to put my tiny purse inside one of my other bags. Again, another person in line was trying to cut in front of everyone because they were going to miss their flight. I was also annoyed because I tried to go through security checkpoint 2, and they told me to go down to 3 because there was no waiting, but there was a considerable wait. All in all, I hate Chicago O'Hare.
Flight home was quick and painless. I had to fight to stay awake towards the end though. Got my bags, and Dennis was waiting for me outside of baggage claim. I was out like a light as soon as I hit the pillow at home. Work the next day really really sucked.
My pictures are posted! Also, I uploaded a (crappy) video I took to facebook. pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/karassa/Paris2009#
Still not wanting to be mobile, I wandered down the block to the vet. Laura doesn't speak French, and she's got a new puppy that's gonna need vaccinations, so I went in to ask some questions and take notes. The man there was *VERY* helpful. Getting a dog vaccinated and fixed in Paris is ridiculously expensive. :p
Decided to go ahead and do one of the walking tours from my guide book. BTW, God bless Rick Steves. His guide book and the free audio tour podcasts he has made this trip so much more enjoyable for me! I learned a lot, and the advice of getting the museum pass was just genius. So. Walking tour. I started at Place de la Bastille. Then I wandered around the Marais area. Marais means swamp, and that's what this place once was. It's all trendy now. I also wandered through parts of the Jewish Quarter and had an amazing, if messy, falafel pita for lunch. About halfway through the walk, I came upon Halles, which is some shopping center (I didn't bother going in) and St. Eustache church, which was quite pretty. At the church, I turned onto this pedestrian street with all sorts of shops. I found the Paris equivalent of a whole foods and there were many specialty stores. One sold just fish, one for just cheese, a couple just for fruits and one even just for spices. It was very nice.
I was meeting up with Laura for Krav Maga that evening, so I went back to her place to grab a quick nap and change. I then realized that I hadn't found a yarn store! So after my nap, I looked it up and found one right back near St. Eustache where I'd been earlier! Somewhat annoyed that I hadn't looked it up earlier, I went back. It was a super cool yarn store. You tell them how much of which kind of yarn you want, and they wind it up for you. It's all in-house stuff. And there were tons of buttons and ribbon and other trim there too. I bought some green wool to make me some socks. It's not superwash though, so I'll have to be careful when washing them; no throwing them in the washing machine!
Then I went to Laura's school to meet up with her. Grabbed some dinner along the way. Had my first chocolate eclair. Absolutely heavenly. Krav was crazy, but fun. I had no idea what was going on most times, I just did what everyone else did. I managed to get a couple bruises, but it was worth it.
We headed back home and I was thrilled to see that my favorite crepe place was still open, even though it was going on 11pm. Those Parisians are NOT morning people. The cafe wasn't open a few of the mornings when I went out, but they sure stay open late! I got one last dark chocolate crepe and savored every bite. I'm salivating just thinking about it. Went up, and packed my stuff for the trip home.
Got up early the next morning and headed to the airport. Getting there was no problem at all. At security though, they confiscated my little metal nail file. I was slightly annoyed, but whatever. I was nice and early, getting through security went much faster than I thought, so I tried to nap a bit. After all, it was like midnight eastern time. My flight back was on a smaller plane. A 767 vs a 777. I liked the smaller plane better. Maybe it's cause I had a window seat instead of being stuck in one of the middle seats. But I felt far more comfortable. Then I got to Chicago. What a pain. So I was in the line for US Citizens and Resident Card holders. Some guy in my line needed to be fingerprinted and have his picture taken for some reason. And then all the fingerprint scanners started crashing. So I was waiting and waiting and waiting. And there were all these people going "ZOMG! I'm going to miss my flight!" The idiots only gave themselves half an hour to get through immigration and customs on an international flight. I got some knitting done. Eventually they just made the guy stand to the side and processed the rest of us with US passports really quickly. Collected my bag, didn't have to deal with customs really other than to say I didn't have any food, and re-checked my bag. Going through security was a pain. I had this tiny tiny purse, a big purse and a small bag (big purse and small bag were about the same size) I got stopped while trying to get in line because I was only allowed 2 items, so I had to put my tiny purse inside one of my other bags. Again, another person in line was trying to cut in front of everyone because they were going to miss their flight. I was also annoyed because I tried to go through security checkpoint 2, and they told me to go down to 3 because there was no waiting, but there was a considerable wait. All in all, I hate Chicago O'Hare.
Flight home was quick and painless. I had to fight to stay awake towards the end though. Got my bags, and Dennis was waiting for me outside of baggage claim. I was out like a light as soon as I hit the pillow at home. Work the next day really really sucked.
My pictures are posted! Also, I uploaded a (crappy) video I took to facebook. pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/karassa/Paris2009#