Last weekend I went to Paris with my host brother to vist my host sister. She is studying abroad there through ERASMUS, a program from the European Union that coordinates study abroad inside of the EU. The program guarantees that the students won't have to pay more tuition to study abroad and that the credits earned abroad will be recognized by their home university.
The post is called "Paris on Wheels" because we toured Paris with my host sister in a wheelchair. She tore her Achilles tendon in December and had gotten her cast off the day before we got there.
So we walked (and rolled and crutched) through the streets of Paris like this and took turns pushing the wheelchair. In this picture we're on our way to the Notre Dame cathedral, where we had a picnic.
But being with a handicapped person had its advantages. We got to cut the lines at museums and ride the cool elevator in the Louvre.
The Louvre is, by the way, one of the most beautiful buildings I have ever seen. The building itself was actually a lot more impressive to me than many of the paintings. It's so massive that to actually see all of the 35,000 paintings in its collection, you would need over 9 months.
Famous Moulin Rouge, typical touristy picture.
The view from Montmartre, a large hill in the middle of Paris. Fabian is squinting because of the sun. There's a beautiful church behind me and a festive feeling all around. We had a picnic there and enjoyed the atmosphere.
This is a picture of the line outside of the Musee d'Orsay that we didn't have to wait in.
Verena sitting in the wheelchair and Fabian playing with the crutches inside the Musee d'Orsay. I actually liked the art in this museum a lot better than that in the Louvre. The impressionist paintings on the third floor were the most interesting.
The Tuileries Gardens, where we had our third picnic of the weekend. It was just beautiful.
All in all, it was a great weekend in Paris. We got to see a lot of culture, art, breathtaking buildings, and eat a lot of delicious baguettes. Seriously, enjoying a baguette with delicious cheese in the Tuileries Gardens is really something.
What really struck me about Paris as far as the language goes was the lack of English. Although Paris is probably the most popular tourist destination in Europe, there was very little English. Even in the Louvre, the most visited museum in the world, the displays were not very non-native-speaker-friendly. In contrast, many attractions in Germany also have English text under the German text. Is printing the text again in English a sellout to tourism or a hospitable gesture making museums and train stations more available to everyone?
I can really recommend Paris to anyone coming to Europe. The city really does have a charm of its own, even through rampant mass tourism. I guess I can't complain about tourism too much, being a tourist there myself...
PS: If you look to the right, you'll see that my blog has now been visited by people (or bots) from all six permanently inhabited continents! Woohoo!
5 comments:
We just spent the weekend in Paris as well - wasn't the weather great?! I haven't had a chance to post about it yet myself, though. I was also surprised at the lack of English, though it must be a plus to expats in France who are trying to learn French.
Current temperature is about 1 degree Farenheit, and we had wind chills over the weekend in the -25 degree range. Hard to believe that you had picnics outside any time recently!! Happy Valentine's Day.
Hey Kevin!
This is Nick from AFS-USA. Hey I just wanted to let you know that we have a new cool group on Facebook called "Ask an AFSer!" It's a new group of over 130 members, where interested students can pose questions and returnees or current exchangers (you, for example) can go and help them. I'm personally contacting you because there have been a few Germany-related questions, and no one has answered them yet. If you could go on their and help these students out, that would be great! Here's the link:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=24932955872
Let me know if you have any questions. ntriolo@afs.org
Thanks so much Kevin, and I hope you're having a great time. Go help these future AFSers out!
We were pretty fortunate with the weather. Aunt Ceil and Grandma, the weather wasn't typical picnic weather , but it wasn't TOO cold either. We were just happy it was sunny and beautiful in Paris.
At any rate, it will be great to go back there in July with a best friend from the US. In July weather, the experience has got to be even better.
Puj- Mom O'Brien here... Julie's mom from TJ/Annandale/NorthernVA, etc. Great blog. Enjoyed all your posts... yes, I am now caught up, but please don't test me!
Loved your picture of the elevator at the Louvre. Even those are elegant. I can relate to the lines comment. Our family waited in a very long line on a very sunny May day to enter the museum once. Quite worth the wait but the sun and wait was getting to people and grumblings could be heard. Julie was 8 years old and had just bought a bubble pipe from the Disney Store down the street. She started blowing bubbles. People started to pop them and laugh and grumbling time was over. We made so many friends that day!
I look forward to hearing more about your teaching. Great work!
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