not sleeping on the sleeper train
Nov 16 and 17
After dinner with Susana, Marilena and I had a tearful goodbye with the family (they were, liek, REALLY sad/worried to see us go… I was a little confused cuz it’s not like it’s the first time Marilena and I have left the country; we do it, liek, every weekend)!
On the walk to the station, I laughed harder than I ever have in my whole life (it made my stomach muscles hurt) because of the “midget trying to get out of our suitcase.” After our last trip to Spain and Hungary, Marilena’s luggage completely broke so a few days ago she spent 15 euro on a new bag. It has a compass that doesn’t work, a lock that has instructions to it in Japanese, AND three wheels that get really bad speed bobbles and cause the piece to flip over at any moment. Marilena and I, since we’re a married couple more or less, put BOTH our stuff in this bag… hahaha, thanks for packing my stuff wife! (I’m def the man in the relationship…)
At the station we met up with the SUF crowd (about ¼ SCUers) and managed to end up in a room with me, Marilena, Rachel, and Amelia. Our room was pretty much the same as our room on the train from Madrid to Barcelona. I hopped on my top bunk, snuggled up in my stiff (but clean) sheet and tried to fall asleep; there was NO way that I was gonna feel like I did after the train ride in Spain. Around midnight, when I WAS STILL WIDE AWAKE, I popped a few Nyquil and tried to relax… Around 3ish my blanket fell off of me down three beds to the floor. The room was pitch black and freezing (we were prolly in Switzerland at this time) sooo I didn’t want to monkey down the beds to get it… I ended up stealing Rach’s blanket cuz she was all bundled in her marshmallow of a jacket. Thanks Rach!
Nyquil or not I ended up sleeping horribly. I kept getting text messages every hour or so (for all 10 hours of the train ride) that said: “Welcome to Switzerland!,” “Here in Switzerland…,” “Bye from Switzerland!,” “Welcome to France!,” “Here in France…,” etc. I got ELEVEN texts and heard my phone blow up for ALL OF THEM. It was so annoying.
The 8AM wake-up-knock was not gracefully received. We all felt like crap and weren’t ready to head out for sight-seeing for the entire day. Somehow we managed to get our stuff together (even though I felt like I looked like a homeless person who hadn’t slept all night long and was still feeling the effects of sleeping pills) and hopped on the metro with the SUFers and headed to Hotel Rocroy. On the metro we were serenaded by a homeless guy singing karaoke. Oh jeez.
At the hotel, there was drama about our rooming situation – there were only two triples available and somehow Marilena, Rach, and I managed to snag one of them. This girl that pretty much everyone at SUF hates basically threw a fit about not getting a triple. EW. Biatch. Go away. No one likes you.
It was only about 9ish when we arrived at the hotel and our room wasn’t quite ready for us so we threw our stuff in the holding area and headed out in search of some French breakfast. We walked by a million cheap wedding dress stores (reminded me very much of downtown LA)… it kinda made me feel like our hotel might not’ve been in the best part of town… in the end, we stopped in a bakery (I got a brioche and it was the closest thing to King’s Hawaiian Bread I’ve had since I’ve been here) then grabbed a cappucinno at a sidewalk café (where our bill flew away? Oh wait no, jk. It didn’t).
Back at the hotel we were finally able to check in – our room was on the 5th floor. Just your standard hotel room I’d say, BUT it did have a really nice bathroom; after our hotel bathroom experiences in Spain and Hungary I was, liek, REALLY excited! Anyways, I finally got to brush my teeth, we bundled up, and headed out to explore Paris!
Fortunately we were able to meet up with a local only minutes after stepping out of our hotel. Megan Lyons I studying here and even though I woke her up this morning AND even though she was sick, she hopped on the metro and volunteered to stroll around with us for the few hours we had free before we had to meet up with SUF at the Louvre. We love you Megan!
After a quick stop in Starbucks, we continued on down the street to the Opera House which was really beautiful. Did you know that UNDER the opera house there is a lake? AND there is a HUGE chandelier?! Very Phantom of the Opera if you ask me…
Then we headed back to the Louvre. On the way there we stopped to have a quick view/sit on the Seine… romantic huh? I love my Phi’s!
I loooove Paris too. Love love love it! I am coming back here someday with a guy and it’s going to be romantic and fabulous! No joke.
The Louvre was cool. HUGE (and I need to go back someday) but cool. Art History 13 was fresh in my mind from spring quarter sooo it was really exciting for me to prance around, recognize works, AND be able to explain the significance of them. Well, actually the prancing was minimal; I decided for the first time since I’ve been in Europe to wear my boots that I bought brand new from home… after a few hours in them I almost fainted from the pain they were causing me!
After being lost in the Louvre and not being able to find our way out for 45 minutes, we ran back to the hotel and changed my shoes (YES!). My favorite sights at the Louvre: Nike of Samothrace and Venus de Milo, for sure.
Two baguettes later, we headed to Saint-Michel. The plan was to meet Megan for dinner then bar/club it for the rest of the night. While we were waiting we chose a sketchy bridge to hang out on to sip from our bottle of wine BUT after being harassed by a French man (who we spied on making out with his girlfriend for, liek, a half an hour) AND being approached by a bunch of shady people, we moved to another location: the garden benches in front of Notre Dame Cathedral. Unfortunately AGAIN, one too many sketchy French men came and bothered us; we even told one dude that we spoke Italian, not English, in order to get him to go away!)… I got a hold of Megan after a few calls but she wasn’t able to meet us sooo we braved dinner on our own… oh god…French language…French food…dun dun dun.
Dinner actually went really well. The French onion soup was the best part, for sure. We TRIED ordering in French but it was kinda embarrassing when every word we said had to be corrected. Hahaha, oh well. After dinner we strolled up the lane to an outdoor crepe-maker… nutella, bananas, warm crepe, homeless people playing good music… it was a good way to end our first day in Paris! By the time we got back to the hotel we were full of French food, freezing cold, and ready to call it a night. Psh, it was, liek, 11:30 – we had a looong day of sight seeing the next day!
After dinner with Susana, Marilena and I had a tearful goodbye with the family (they were, liek, REALLY sad/worried to see us go… I was a little confused cuz it’s not like it’s the first time Marilena and I have left the country; we do it, liek, every weekend)!
On the walk to the station, I laughed harder than I ever have in my whole life (it made my stomach muscles hurt) because of the “midget trying to get out of our suitcase.” After our last trip to Spain and Hungary, Marilena’s luggage completely broke so a few days ago she spent 15 euro on a new bag. It has a compass that doesn’t work, a lock that has instructions to it in Japanese, AND three wheels that get really bad speed bobbles and cause the piece to flip over at any moment. Marilena and I, since we’re a married couple more or less, put BOTH our stuff in this bag… hahaha, thanks for packing my stuff wife! (I’m def the man in the relationship…)
At the station we met up with the SUF crowd (about ¼ SCUers) and managed to end up in a room with me, Marilena, Rachel, and Amelia. Our room was pretty much the same as our room on the train from Madrid to Barcelona. I hopped on my top bunk, snuggled up in my stiff (but clean) sheet and tried to fall asleep; there was NO way that I was gonna feel like I did after the train ride in Spain. Around midnight, when I WAS STILL WIDE AWAKE, I popped a few Nyquil and tried to relax… Around 3ish my blanket fell off of me down three beds to the floor. The room was pitch black and freezing (we were prolly in Switzerland at this time) sooo I didn’t want to monkey down the beds to get it… I ended up stealing Rach’s blanket cuz she was all bundled in her marshmallow of a jacket. Thanks Rach!
Nyquil or not I ended up sleeping horribly. I kept getting text messages every hour or so (for all 10 hours of the train ride) that said: “Welcome to Switzerland!,” “Here in Switzerland…,” “Bye from Switzerland!,” “Welcome to France!,” “Here in France…,” etc. I got ELEVEN texts and heard my phone blow up for ALL OF THEM. It was so annoying.
The 8AM wake-up-knock was not gracefully received. We all felt like crap and weren’t ready to head out for sight-seeing for the entire day. Somehow we managed to get our stuff together (even though I felt like I looked like a homeless person who hadn’t slept all night long and was still feeling the effects of sleeping pills) and hopped on the metro with the SUFers and headed to Hotel Rocroy. On the metro we were serenaded by a homeless guy singing karaoke. Oh jeez.
At the hotel, there was drama about our rooming situation – there were only two triples available and somehow Marilena, Rach, and I managed to snag one of them. This girl that pretty much everyone at SUF hates basically threw a fit about not getting a triple. EW. Biatch. Go away. No one likes you.
It was only about 9ish when we arrived at the hotel and our room wasn’t quite ready for us so we threw our stuff in the holding area and headed out in search of some French breakfast. We walked by a million cheap wedding dress stores (reminded me very much of downtown LA)… it kinda made me feel like our hotel might not’ve been in the best part of town… in the end, we stopped in a bakery (I got a brioche and it was the closest thing to King’s Hawaiian Bread I’ve had since I’ve been here) then grabbed a cappucinno at a sidewalk café (where our bill flew away? Oh wait no, jk. It didn’t).
Back at the hotel we were finally able to check in – our room was on the 5th floor. Just your standard hotel room I’d say, BUT it did have a really nice bathroom; after our hotel bathroom experiences in Spain and Hungary I was, liek, REALLY excited! Anyways, I finally got to brush my teeth, we bundled up, and headed out to explore Paris!
Fortunately we were able to meet up with a local only minutes after stepping out of our hotel. Megan Lyons I studying here and even though I woke her up this morning AND even though she was sick, she hopped on the metro and volunteered to stroll around with us for the few hours we had free before we had to meet up with SUF at the Louvre. We love you Megan!
After a quick stop in Starbucks, we continued on down the street to the Opera House which was really beautiful. Did you know that UNDER the opera house there is a lake? AND there is a HUGE chandelier?! Very Phantom of the Opera if you ask me…
Then we headed back to the Louvre. On the way there we stopped to have a quick view/sit on the Seine… romantic huh? I love my Phi’s!
I loooove Paris too. Love love love it! I am coming back here someday with a guy and it’s going to be romantic and fabulous! No joke.
The Louvre was cool. HUGE (and I need to go back someday) but cool. Art History 13 was fresh in my mind from spring quarter sooo it was really exciting for me to prance around, recognize works, AND be able to explain the significance of them. Well, actually the prancing was minimal; I decided for the first time since I’ve been in Europe to wear my boots that I bought brand new from home… after a few hours in them I almost fainted from the pain they were causing me!
After being lost in the Louvre and not being able to find our way out for 45 minutes, we ran back to the hotel and changed my shoes (YES!). My favorite sights at the Louvre: Nike of Samothrace and Venus de Milo, for sure.
Two baguettes later, we headed to Saint-Michel. The plan was to meet Megan for dinner then bar/club it for the rest of the night. While we were waiting we chose a sketchy bridge to hang out on to sip from our bottle of wine BUT after being harassed by a French man (who we spied on making out with his girlfriend for, liek, a half an hour) AND being approached by a bunch of shady people, we moved to another location: the garden benches in front of Notre Dame Cathedral. Unfortunately AGAIN, one too many sketchy French men came and bothered us; we even told one dude that we spoke Italian, not English, in order to get him to go away!)… I got a hold of Megan after a few calls but she wasn’t able to meet us sooo we braved dinner on our own… oh god…French language…French food…dun dun dun.
Dinner actually went really well. The French onion soup was the best part, for sure. We TRIED ordering in French but it was kinda embarrassing when every word we said had to be corrected. Hahaha, oh well. After dinner we strolled up the lane to an outdoor crepe-maker… nutella, bananas, warm crepe, homeless people playing good music… it was a good way to end our first day in Paris! By the time we got back to the hotel we were full of French food, freezing cold, and ready to call it a night. Psh, it was, liek, 11:30 – we had a looong day of sight seeing the next day!
posted by tera a firenze at 3:46 AM
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