No Parlez Vouz Francais

Bonjour from Paris!  As you can tell, even after three days of staying in the capitol of France, my French has improved almost 0%.  Besides learning a few key phrases like “ja no se pa” (which means “I don’t know”) and “voulez vous coucher avec moi, ce soir” (which means "would you like to come back to my place tonight?"…and I didn’t actually use it, it’s just from the movie “Moulin Rouge”), my knowledge of French is about the same as it was when I arrived.  Case in point: yesterday morning, we were all still asleep in the hostel (even though it was almost 11) and the hostel maid came in to change our sheets and stuff.  I never heard her knocking, but I woke up right about when Matt was groggily yelling in English “We don’t need any,” while the maid kept yelling something louder and louder in French.  I turned over in my bed and quickly yelled out “No Parlez Vouz Francais!” which technically means, “No do you speak French!”  Even though I think she got offended by me essentially telling her to not talk, she at least got the point and left.  Scott: 1.  Maid: 0.

Our entire adventure in Paris has been pretty eventful.  It all started with our long trek to the train station at 4:00 AM in London.  None of us wanted to try and figure out the buses that early in the morning, and we also didn’t want to cram into a taxi, so we instead decided to march the 1.5 miles (sorry, 2.41 kilometers) to the train station with all our bags.  Few men would’ve been able to make that walk, especially after we had walked the entire city of London the day before.  But we made it with a half hour until our train departed and hopped right on.  We were even rewarded with a free complimentary breakfast, which remains the best meal we’ve eaten yet because we’re all too cheap to pay for real food (unless it’s crêpes).

Our hostel here has been way better than the Piccadilly Backpackers in London.  From outside, it didn’t look like much, what with the large plants growing all over the metal frame.  Ryan affectionately referred to it as the compound from Jurassic Park.  But, once we got into our room, we realized that we had made a great choice.  Not only is it more spacious, but it also has big windows which means I’ve actually slept (no fan needed).  The only downside is that it is out in the middle of nowhere (and that's a picture from outside our window).

To counter our hostel’s poor location, we decided to invest in metro passes instead of walking everywhere.  This has worked out pretty well except for one pointless trip to Bastille.  We thought that we’d be going to the armory that was stormed during the French Revolution, but it turns out it was either destroyed in the last couple weeks, or it’s not actually in Bastille.  Either way, that was two metro tickets and an hour down the hole.

Other than that, we did actually see a lot, including the Eiffel tower, the Arc de Triumph, the Louvre, Notre-Dame, and probably every tourist spot you can think of.  We took every goofy picture we had an opportunity for (mainly of Ryan interacting with statues and paintings at the Louvre), so it might have been obvious that we’re Americans.  We also got to watch the French Army do some sort of routine at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the Arc de Triumph, but it mainly consisted of them standing lazily and smoking cigarettes.  We figured they were probably just planning the best way to retreat next time.

The Eiffel tower was of course the coolest thing we saw.  We went to the top and got a lot of great pictures on the first night (at least until my camera ran out of battery which was quite inopportune) and we even went back the second night just to watch the light show that goes on after sunset.  The monument itself was awesome, but the people around were kind of the opposite. First off, there was a massive abundance of public affection (is sunset at the Eiffel tower really that romantic? Come on).  This made it quite hard to be the only group of four guys surrounding the tower while everyone else was a newlywed couple.  Though, now I definitely plan on coming back here with my girlfriend some day.  Also, did I mention the body odor thing before?  Yea, that’s still in effect.

Alright, that was kind of a long one, but I hope it was semi-entertaining to hear of our successes and failures in Paris.  Tomorrow morning we head out again at 6:20 AM (and we have a taxi this time, thank god) and finally make our way to Athens for that thing called school.  I stated today that our vacation is about over, but really now that I think of it I guess it’s just beginning.  Life is so tough.

Special Shoutout of the Day: Sam Knigge, cause apparently she reads the blog, and might be the farthest reaching person I've heard of yet to read it...pass it on people!

European Insult Tally: Bill—1

                                         Scott—2 (My encounter with the maid today qualifies as my second)

                                         Matt—0

                                         Ryan—He made the comment about the French Army retreating,      which might have been offensive, but it also gives him credit for a      good joke.

Ya digg?

Your friend or family member (or random acquaintance)

Scott Twelves