Berlin, Cholet and Paris with my older bro.
I know, I know, I'm sorry! My last entry was so long ago. I finished working as the babysitter of the family in Paris officially on July 18th and headed to Germany July 19th. Easyjet flies from Orly airport south of Paris. To get there, you can take the RER B to Denfert Rochereau and take the Orly bus, or you can take the RER B to Antony and take a direct train from there to Orly via the Orlyval, much like Disney World's Monorail. My flight was at 6am and to get there in time for check in (the metro isn't open at 4am) I had to stay in the airport overnight. It was a bizzare experience sleeping in the airport. The airport security asks everyone to see their ticket and I wasn't the only curled up on a bench. Easyjet is cool. There are no assigned seats and flights can be so cheap if you book early enough.
When I got to Berlin, I had directions on how to get to Kuya Roy's via the Berlin metro. The train I was supposed to take just arrived when I walked up to the platform so I got on. Two other girls got on as well and asked me if it was the S9. I said I thought so. They were American. Some guy came in and told us to get on the other train across the platform, or at least we figured what he said and motioned to us in German. We got on the other train, and of course, it went a completely different way than we needed. We managed to get to the Hauptbahnhof and then I took a bus to Kuya Roys. It was incredible seeing Kuya Roy. I hadn't seen him since I was 16 or so. He lives in a beautiful apartment in Berlin with three roommates, one of which is the ghost they affectionately refer to as Gido and Daisy, Kuya's dog. (It's an old city, with old buildings and a history of a lot of dead people. It's bound to have some haunted apartments.) Kuya James was still asleep when I got there but when he woke up, we both were surprised to see how much weight we've both gained!
I didn't realize how expensive Paris was until I came to Berlin. The only other major city in Europe I had to compare it to was London and London is about the same, sometimes more. Stuff is so cheap in Berlin! I was ballin' despite being so poor. The three of us ate at this delicious, trendy, nouveau-thai fusion place, including drinks, that cost us as much as I would expect to pay for myself for a meal in Paris!
Berlin was incredible and we saw a lot. A lot of which I don't remember how to pronounce or spell the names of. I'm so terribly lazy about being a tourist now. First London and then I go to Berlin with no research whatsoever, except whatever knowledge I have of WWII. There is so much history in Berlin that I feel so guilty in retrospect for not doing more research. Kuya Roy was a really good tour guide, which helped. We rented scooters and spanned the whole city. It was fantastic and kind of really badass. To start, Kuya James was a little uneasy on the scooter and I just buzzed right by him. By the end of it though, I was getting sick of having to pay attention all the time (much like how I hate driving but am good at it) and starting to get really tense about driving with no real protection but a helmet. I do want a scooter though after that experience for sure. It would be so handy on the streets of Toronto.
It was really sad to leave Kuya Roy. I want to go back to Berlin and live there for a bit maybe. There is so much history and it's so beautiful and the metro is so efficient. Some walls still have bullet holes in them. There are also these cute little places called Strand bars, which are beach bars right by the river complete with sand, beach chairs and umbrellas. My only problem is I need to get passed my dislike of the German language. We'll see.
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Kuya and I check out the Berlin wall 'East Gallery' a la Ferris Bueller's Day Off.
We also saw the Segus Soilan, which is a giant Napoleonic era monument to his many victories which is in line with the Arc du Triomphe. Obama's speech happened while we were there too and was packed! Totally history in the making! Oh, another memorable site is the Bauhaus-Archiv. Small museum dedicated to the movement, and kind of a disappointment because of its size, but still pretty fantastic. The building is Bauhaus and the gift shop is full of fantastic reproductions of Bauhaus style furniture, trinkets and books.
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The Bauhaus building.
Then off we set to Paris via ICE with a stop in Frankfurt to head to Paris via TGV! In Paris, our train got in too late to catch the next train to Cholet where we were heading next where Kuya's friend Adrien lives. We were kind of really stuck, but I texted my old boss Rob and he said we could stay at his place. The next morning we head to Cholet on the 15h train. Adrien met us in Cholet and we stayed there for the next few nights. Cholet is a nowhere town South of Paris. Really cute and kind of like, say, Milton maybe. About a 20 minute drive away from Cholet is a place called Maulévrier where the Parc Oriental de Maulévrier is. Apparently it's one of the top 4 of the most beautiful parks in Europe. It's unbelievable how gorgeous it is.
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Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!
On the 31st, we head back to Paris stayed in a great hotel in Montparnasse for two nights and then moved into the most gorgeous apartment I was lucky enough to be asked to housesit with Liz. It was in the 8th, just around the corner from the British Embassy and American Embassy right between Concorde and Champs Elysée-Clemenceau (Line 1). We did all the usual touristy stuff, which was a nightmare because it's high season. I at least managed to talk Kuya James out of waiting around for four hours just to go up the Eiffel Tower. The view from the Tour Montparnasse is far superior I would say. The elevator is so fast. It goes up 56 flights in just over 60 seconds. We also went up to the terrace of the Galeries LaFayette as well. The Sunday he was here was also the first Sunday of the month, which meant a lot of the major museums were free. We managed to breeze through the crowds at the Louvre, Musée D'Orsay and Musée Rodin. Kuya's favourite parts were the Marais and Montmartre where he loved scouting out the different styles of every portrait artist. He pictured himself having a coffee on a cobble stone street (which I said he'd not be short of in Italy), so took him to Ile St. Louis for a coffee at the Pont Saint-Louis. It was the perfect day for it and the streets were busy. There was even a jazz band playing on the bridge. Then the next Sunday, Kuya left for Barcelona.
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The crowd to see the Mona Lisa.
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The top of Galeries LaFayette.
I'm pretty much at the halfway point, maybe a little over, of my adventure here. Of course, all of that homesick BS I was spouting in my first entries is changed to worrying about leaving France. I'm going to be homesick for this place for sure...HA.
When I got to Berlin, I had directions on how to get to Kuya Roy's via the Berlin metro. The train I was supposed to take just arrived when I walked up to the platform so I got on. Two other girls got on as well and asked me if it was the S9. I said I thought so. They were American. Some guy came in and told us to get on the other train across the platform, or at least we figured what he said and motioned to us in German. We got on the other train, and of course, it went a completely different way than we needed. We managed to get to the Hauptbahnhof and then I took a bus to Kuya Roys. It was incredible seeing Kuya Roy. I hadn't seen him since I was 16 or so. He lives in a beautiful apartment in Berlin with three roommates, one of which is the ghost they affectionately refer to as Gido and Daisy, Kuya's dog. (It's an old city, with old buildings and a history of a lot of dead people. It's bound to have some haunted apartments.) Kuya James was still asleep when I got there but when he woke up, we both were surprised to see how much weight we've both gained!
I didn't realize how expensive Paris was until I came to Berlin. The only other major city in Europe I had to compare it to was London and London is about the same, sometimes more. Stuff is so cheap in Berlin! I was ballin' despite being so poor. The three of us ate at this delicious, trendy, nouveau-thai fusion place, including drinks, that cost us as much as I would expect to pay for myself for a meal in Paris!
Berlin was incredible and we saw a lot. A lot of which I don't remember how to pronounce or spell the names of. I'm so terribly lazy about being a tourist now. First London and then I go to Berlin with no research whatsoever, except whatever knowledge I have of WWII. There is so much history in Berlin that I feel so guilty in retrospect for not doing more research. Kuya Roy was a really good tour guide, which helped. We rented scooters and spanned the whole city. It was fantastic and kind of really badass. To start, Kuya James was a little uneasy on the scooter and I just buzzed right by him. By the end of it though, I was getting sick of having to pay attention all the time (much like how I hate driving but am good at it) and starting to get really tense about driving with no real protection but a helmet. I do want a scooter though after that experience for sure. It would be so handy on the streets of Toronto.
It was really sad to leave Kuya Roy. I want to go back to Berlin and live there for a bit maybe. There is so much history and it's so beautiful and the metro is so efficient. Some walls still have bullet holes in them. There are also these cute little places called Strand bars, which are beach bars right by the river complete with sand, beach chairs and umbrellas. My only problem is I need to get passed my dislike of the German language. We'll see.
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Kuya and I check out the Berlin wall 'East Gallery' a la Ferris Bueller's Day Off.
We also saw the Segus Soilan, which is a giant Napoleonic era monument to his many victories which is in line with the Arc du Triomphe. Obama's speech happened while we were there too and was packed! Totally history in the making! Oh, another memorable site is the Bauhaus-Archiv. Small museum dedicated to the movement, and kind of a disappointment because of its size, but still pretty fantastic. The building is Bauhaus and the gift shop is full of fantastic reproductions of Bauhaus style furniture, trinkets and books.
Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!
The Bauhaus building.
Then off we set to Paris via ICE with a stop in Frankfurt to head to Paris via TGV! In Paris, our train got in too late to catch the next train to Cholet where we were heading next where Kuya's friend Adrien lives. We were kind of really stuck, but I texted my old boss Rob and he said we could stay at his place. The next morning we head to Cholet on the 15h train. Adrien met us in Cholet and we stayed there for the next few nights. Cholet is a nowhere town South of Paris. Really cute and kind of like, say, Milton maybe. About a 20 minute drive away from Cholet is a place called Maulévrier where the Parc Oriental de Maulévrier is. Apparently it's one of the top 4 of the most beautiful parks in Europe. It's unbelievable how gorgeous it is.
Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!
Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!
On the 31st, we head back to Paris stayed in a great hotel in Montparnasse for two nights and then moved into the most gorgeous apartment I was lucky enough to be asked to housesit with Liz. It was in the 8th, just around the corner from the British Embassy and American Embassy right between Concorde and Champs Elysée-Clemenceau (Line 1). We did all the usual touristy stuff, which was a nightmare because it's high season. I at least managed to talk Kuya James out of waiting around for four hours just to go up the Eiffel Tower. The view from the Tour Montparnasse is far superior I would say. The elevator is so fast. It goes up 56 flights in just over 60 seconds. We also went up to the terrace of the Galeries LaFayette as well. The Sunday he was here was also the first Sunday of the month, which meant a lot of the major museums were free. We managed to breeze through the crowds at the Louvre, Musée D'Orsay and Musée Rodin. Kuya's favourite parts were the Marais and Montmartre where he loved scouting out the different styles of every portrait artist. He pictured himself having a coffee on a cobble stone street (which I said he'd not be short of in Italy), so took him to Ile St. Louis for a coffee at the Pont Saint-Louis. It was the perfect day for it and the streets were busy. There was even a jazz band playing on the bridge. Then the next Sunday, Kuya left for Barcelona.
Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!
The crowd to see the Mona Lisa.
Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!
The top of Galeries LaFayette.
I'm pretty much at the halfway point, maybe a little over, of my adventure here. Of course, all of that homesick BS I was spouting in my first entries is changed to worrying about leaving France. I'm going to be homesick for this place for sure...HA.