OuiOui: Le temps passe vite

The time passes fast! Here I am, just a month away from returning to America and boy do I have a lot of things to recount! (I just realized that the verb "recount" sounds a lot like the french verb "raconter" which means the same thing... HMMMMMM)

These past two weeks I have been on vacation. I know coming to France is already like a vacation, so I guess I was in a vacation within a vacation, a DOUBLE vacation! OHMIGOD! IT'S SO INTENSE. And here is when I stop the "Double Rainbow" video references and commence with the interesting stuff. I was in Paris during the second week of vacation. I have a lot to tell, so this is the first part of 3 blogs on this experience. I left for Paris the morning of the 7th day of March. It was a Monday. After a train ride that lasted around 2 and a half hours, I arrived bright-eyed and bushy-tailed in Paris. Perrine and I navigated the metro to Perrine's Aunt's apartment where we dropped off our stuff and said hello to Perrine's aunt. We had sandwhichs for lunch made with the "good bread" of Paris. It really was good bread, better than a lot of bread I've tried. I'm totally at a loss as to how one can make one loaf of bread better than the other. It's just flour, water, and salt. How can different concentrations of such banal ingredients make for a better tasting loaf? Any bakers out there know the secret?

After lunch Perrine and I took the metro to the Montmartre area of Paris. Montmartre was and remains one of the areas of Paris most populated with artists, poets, musicians, and living statues. I say living statues because there are people around the Sacre Coeur who have painted themselves up and starched their clothes until they look like sculptures. They then stand on a little soapbox, also painted to look like a stone, for hours and hours and hours. They take pictures with people and hope that passers-by feel sorry enough for them to toss a coin into the little bowl at their feet. I wonder if the statues run if someone walks by and takes the money out of the bowl. That would defeat the whole 'statue thing' they had going on... I say musicians because there are tons of street musicians singing and playing instruments wherever there is space to perform. When ascended the staircase in front of the Sacre Coeur there was a man with a guitar and a microphone singing Bob Marley songs. He was doing a really good job too, I wanted to sit down with the crowd that was watching him and sing along. Vive la Humboldt! There are artists at every corner and famous poets have lived in Montmartre. Also, the film "Le fabuleux destin d'Amelie Poulain" was filmed in Montmartre. "Amelie" is one of my favorite films of all time and I was an over-excited fangirl when Perrine and I went to the cafe where parts of the movie were filmed, as Amelie worked as a waitress in this cafe: Le Cafe des Deux Moulins". I was starstruck as well, because Amelie is played by Audrey Tatou, who is a totally awesome French actress... (Also happens to be my favorite French actress next to Marion Cotillard, who Perrine doesn't like because she's pregnant with Guillaume Canet's baby and Perrine is in love with Guillaume Canet) After my wonderful experience at the Two Windmills I went to a little store where I found a music box that played the theme song of "Amelie"! I bought it, moving on...Another funny thing about the Montmartre area is the serious concentration of sex shops. There is the Sexodrome, Sexy Shop, a shop with separate video-viewing rooms for homosexuals and heterosexuals, and at night there is a large community of prostitutes who prowl the streets. I, disappointingly, had to leave before the ladies of the night came out. I want to see if they're all like Julia Roberts from Pretty Woman. There's also the Moulin Rouge in Montmartre as well, the world famous home of scantily-clad girls shows.

The next day Perrine and I walked around Paris a little. We went to the Petite Palais for the little museum there, and across the street from the little palais was the Grand Palais, where Chanel was having their fashion show right as Perrine and I were walking by. The people gathered out front where people of another world. Such fashion, such style, such exuberance and flamboyance...I wanted to stay and watch the people coming in and out of the building but Perrine and I were in a hurry to get our planned schedule in so I could only linger out front for a few moments... but luckily enough we walked by big black tents where fashion shows for other designers were being held and I got to see even more crazy outfits!!! I also walked by models who were being trailed by a pack of paparazzi. It was the first time I've ever experienced the celebrity situation. The poor model was just trying to get from one place to the next and she had to politely pose for a few pictures in order to prevent becoming tabloid fodder as some sort of rude, evil person who attacks paparazzi.

Tuesday was also Mardi Gras! My only Mardi Gras experiences was seeing Shrek on the metro and a group of kids walking by their highschool absolutely covered in flour. Mardi Gras in France is pretty low key, although for some it's an awesome opportunity to dress up and throw eggs filled with flour at their friends. That's what they do here in celebration, Mardi Gras is the only holiday where costumes are worn as there is no Halloween in France. (GASP) Otherwise you have to be invited to themed parties, which do happen often so the French have good outlets for the costume-wearing jitters that strike all humans at one time or another.

Tuesday afternoon I went to the famous Parisien cemetery: La Cemetiere du Pere Lachaise. There I saw the graves of Edith Piaf, a legendary French singer, Oscar Wilde, Moliere, and Chopin. It was sunny and warm and the cemetery wasn't morbid, but a beautiful homage to those who have transformed into something beyond us, be it simply dirt or a being of pure energy, who knows!

So famous their sign is in English and French!

The Cemetary

Edith's Tomb

Just an example of some of the wonderful graffiti in the streets of France. Montmarte has the best graffiti.

Geisha. By the way, help Japan readers! Help all who were affected by the earthquake! Even Crescent City.

A wall in Montmartre where "I love you" is written in x number of languages. Can you find the english, french, and hand language I love yous?

Moliere!

Moulin Rouge

I think he's more popular dead than alive. Huh!

RESIST EVERYTHING BUT TEMPTATION

Le Sacre Coeur... the pinnacle of Montmartre.

Now I'm not a very religious person, but this message made me tear up and get all blubbery nevertheless: It reads: "God reunites those who love each other." Edith Piaf's very words. Sigh!