Ohhh you guys...
What to say about Paris...
I was so incredibly excited for Paris having studied French (and France) for two years in high school.
My best friend Bonney and I would dream about going there, speaking perfectly fluent french, and eating every last bite of food we could handle.
So when we woke up at a grueling 4AM to take the Chunnel to Paris, I was beyond excited!
(But also incredibly distressed about my fried hair, which I discovered the night before. I'm sure there will be a blog post about this sometime in the near future. It was traumatic to the point that I ran around the train station like a maniac trying to get good enough WiFi to facetime my mom.)
That train ride was silent, let me tell you.
I'm pretty sure almost all of us were dead to the world the entire time.
Once we got to Paris, there was some immediate culture shock within seconds of stepping off of the train. Ireland and England weren't bad at all because nearly everyone knew English, but here, it was incredibly hit and miss.
I was surprised at the amount of French I remembered though, particularly when it came to food!
I had always heard that Paris was dirty and smelt bad, and let me tell you, that is definitely the truth.
The difference between the undergrounds in London and Paris is night and day, and just the city in general is, well, gross.
Not wanting to let those first impressions get in the way, a group of us girls headed straight for the world-famous Lafayette Department Store after dropping our things off at the hotel.
I was in designer shoe and handbag heaven, let me tell you.
I think I almost passed out at the sight of "PRADA" on the wall!
From there we headed off to find some lunch and the Notre Dame.
On our little walk we got our first glimpse of the Eiffel Tower!
We ended up finding this little outdoor cafe called L'Annexe, which I still dream of going back to!
Our server was so nice and helpful. He gave us some tips on eating out in France, such as that you don't have to tip and the server should swipe your card in front of you.
I ordered a Tartine Provencal which is a baguette, prosciutto ham, cheese, tomatoes, olive oil and herbs.
I realize this sounds easy and boring, but oh no no no...
It was to die for!
This was everything I expected and more after two years of my french teacher telling me how amazing the bread and cheese is in France!
Also, the vinaigrette on that salad was delightful!
After lunch we went to the Notre Dame.
It was breathtakingly beautiful inside!
The stained glass architecture was incredibly intricate.
There was one mural made out of carved wood, I believe, that told the story of Christ from birth to crucifixion.
Each pane was a different snapshot of Christ's life.
It was beautiful!
From the Notre Dame we went to do some souvenir shopping.
I bought two beautiful paintings/drawings and a couple of kitchen-type things for my mom :)
That night we had a YSA Fireside with the Paris YSA ward.
They rolled out the red carpet when it came to feeding us!
There was a whole spread of pastries and desserts, along with a really delicious soup in bread bowls.
So far the food in France was exceeding all expectations, and I was definitely not complaining!
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