Early Morning Wake-up...

...because we are going to Paris!!

Breakfast was at 9am and consisted of whatever food was left in my apartment. Conveniently that meant toast and eggs. So I made one-eyes (cut a hole in the middle of the toast – put it on the frying pan – drop egg into the hole) and there was fruit so we kind of feasted. Then we were off…
We were at Cork ariport with plenty of time before our flight. While we waited we went over to a little food-booth to get waters. They had a bunch of expensive truffles, which we clearly were not going to pay for. The server offered us some on a little silver platter, to which Lizzy asked him if we had to pay for them. He sassily replied, “Why would I offer you chocolate if you have to pay for it?” It was funny – and the truffles were delicious. Strawberry, mmm. On our way into the plane we met a couple and their son, who was adorable. They were having a little difficulty carrying all their luggage and his little army print rolly-carry-on was a bit too big for him to carry – even though it clearly made him feel like a king. Lizzy offered to carry the little bag for him and helped them on their way to the plane. While we were on the plane, about to take off the little boy began to count down – 10, 9, 8…and when he reached the end he screamed “Blast Off!!” Now there is an annoying way to do this and a cute way to do this. He was adorable. The entire plane started laughing. It was just so cute,
We arrived in Paris a little early. But we didn’t get off the plane until around 3:40. Once we entered the Charles de Gaulle airport there was a huge line to go through for the customs and security check. Once we made it through, we felt like we were in the middle of a Dr. Seuss novel. The center of the airport was outside so there were these tubes that were moving-sidewalks that took you all over to the different levels of the inside of the aiport. I felt like I was on the Jetsons. Pretty cool.
Genna’s friend Matt gave us pretty detailed directions and we found our way to his apartment without a problem. It’s a really nice apartment – decorated really well, had a great family room and his room is huge with a huge closet that has mirrors for doors that stretch all the way to the ceiling. Only problem – he currently has no running water – well sort of. They can’t run the water because when they do the bathtub back up. Nice, huh? So no water. And to think – we thought we wouldn’t be roughing it. Not the case.
However, we can turn the water on for a hot second to brush our teeth or really quickly wash our face. So we did and then we headed out to explore the city.
Since we hadn’t eaten since around 8am, we all really wanted some food. First stop – crepes! We all got crepes au chocolat. C’est fantastique! Then we started to walk around a bit. We decided we would head toward the Eiffel Tower. Another thing about Matt’s apartment – it’s right near the Louvre. So we walked toward the Louvre and explored it. I don’t know if you know this – but the Louvre is HUGE. I mean bigger than big. And it is amazing. From there we could see the Eiffel Tower, and after taking some pictures we headed off towards it – Matt had told us that it was about a 45 minute walk to the Eiffel Tower – not a problem considering we walk that to get from our apartment to town every day in Cork. We were stopped by two very funny African men that made bracelets. I knew immediately that it was going to cost me money when they asked me to put my hand out btu I figured – what the heck. Lizzy and I ended up with two really cool bracelets, that didn’t cost us more than a ride on the Metro. The men said that we had to make a wish right as they tied them and joked with us about our boyfriends, saying that they are “sex machines.” It was pretty hilarious. Plus, they spoke English and French, fairly fluent in both. I was able to talk a little French with the guy making my bracelet, while Lizzy could talk in English to the guy making her bracelet.
Paris is absolutely beautiful and the walk to the Eiffel Tower was fantastic because there was so much to see on the way there. We took some cool pictures once we got there and then we decided to go get some actual dinner – by now it was around 8 or 9. We found a nice little Italian restaurant –I know – Italian in France? But it was great and the server was very nice to us. Plus we ordered the perfect amount of food and it didn’t cost us more than 10 euro each which was pretty reasonable. It didn’t hurt to know that I could get us through a dinner with my knowledge of French. I may not be amazing at it, but in one day I already feel more confident about the language.
When we finished we headed back to the Eiffel Tower because we wanted to see it all lit up – it was so cool. We took as many pictures as we could, granted it was difficult because the lighting wasn’t perfect but we did our best. The best part was when it was sparkling – it was so cool, it was all lit up and sparkling like a Christmas tree. So beautiful. We had to fend off the vendors, but “Non merci” is pretty easy. Finally we decided to find ourselves the Metro (subway) and head back to Matt’s apartment. We found it without a problem, got ourselves to the right line – and ended going in the opposite direction we wanted. No problem – we realized it right away, got off, switched sides and headed in the direction we meant to. When we got out of the Metro near his apartment, we had our bearings about us and found it without a problem, but we saw a girl with Haagen Daas. We all wanted dessert so we decided to walk around until we found it. It took a bit of walking – luckily in a straight line – but we did find it. More conveniently – there was a bathroom we could use there so that we wouldn’t be dying without one at Matt’s apartment. Finally we headed back to the apartment.
We bothered his roommate Josh, who is from Puerto Rico, but lives in NYC and goes to BC, for a while. I was able to get online for all of 5 minutes. Enough time to send an email but that’s about it. We were hanging out in Matt’s room when he got back. After a lot of debating we ended up sleeping in his huge bed – the three of us – while he slept on the couch. We were all ready to take the couches and the chairs but he would not let us sleep in there and insisted that we all just sleep in his bed. We protested for a while but he eventually won over and after some giggling and chatting I rolled over and went to sleep.