Tuesday Morning Part 2

continued....

Saturday evening a group of students and I had a picnic. It was some of the people from the afternoon and a few others who had not been around. We went to the Monoprix supermarket just a few blocks from the hotel (think Super Target) and got some bread, some cheese, some ham, some apples, some white peaches, some cookies, some Madeleine's (oh I love them!) and some Creme Brulee ice cream cones. Okay, lots of food, 8 people, a bottle of wine, some coke and diet coke thrown in, and the total came out to about 4 Euros per person. I don't think we ate that cheaply at any point during the trip. It was more than enough food for everyone, and there was some fruit left over, actually there was soda, fruit and that was about it. The little park across the street was small, but it had park benches, and well, it was a picnic in Paris. After that, we quickly went back into the hotel to change, clean up from the picnic, and then went on a walk along the opposite bank of the Seine to head towards the Eiffel tower. Some of the students hadn't gone up it on Friday night, and they wanted to see it all lit up. We walked along some of the streets we hadn't seen before (and I wish I had brought my camera to take some pictures) and then stood on the bridge in front of the Eiffel tower, cheering the people on the baton mouchees (the river tour boats) and waiting for the Eiffel tower to do its light show at 10pm. After that, it was back to the hotel for a quiet evening (and as I found out, the evening when I knew I was getting sick!).

Sunday was an early morning: leave the hotel by 8:30 for a day out. Giverney, Claude Monet's house and garderns, and then off to the Louvre. At one point during the drive, the bus driver found that none of the bridges could take the buses weight: the recommended one was rated for 3.5 metric tons, while the bus weighed 17 metric tons. A bit more than the recommended weight! So we took a scenic tour to see the French countryside before finding a bridge that could take our weight and then doubling back through small towns which probably never (or hardly ever) saw tour buses. At least one or two of them would have been nice places to stop for 30 minutes or so, but the appointed group meeting time was waiting at Giverney.

The house and the gardens were nice, but I was starting to feel the cold at that point. I hate scratchy throats, and it was getting worse throughout the day. Still, wandering through the house and gardens was fun, and I do have some pictures I will post from there in a short while. After Giverney, it was off to Versailles. The trip there was less eventful, and we had some time before our tour went inside to explore the town. About 90 minutes or so. A small group of students came with me, and we wandered through the back streets looking for a pharmacy to be open but the one supposed to be opened on Sunday was closed. We eventually found the city was shutting its doors around 2pm, so we grabbed some lunch and found a park bench to sit on. My lunch was simple but good: hot, fresh, still steaming baguette and some icy cold diet coke to sooth the aching throat. There is one thing I have to give the French credit for, and that is their bread. Even the bread from the Monoprix supermarket was better than almost any bread I have had in the states, and this simple baguette from a corner bakery in Versailles, hot, cracking the crust to let the steam out, well that was better yet. A few other students joined me in that same sort of simple repast (and I now know what every customer but us in the store bought 2 of the baguettes when they were leaving!). Some of the students wanted something a bit more substantial, so they went to a nearby McDonald's. Okay, even I have to admit I was tempted at one point for the sheer convienece of the McDonalds when everything else seemed to be closing, but that was something I have yet to do on this trip.

Then it was a short wandering through the town, before heading to Versailles and our group tour. Through an odd coincedence, the tour guide at Versailles was the same one at the Louvre! It turns out that she had been doing a friend at the Louvre a favor, covering for her at the last moment, and got our group. Her normal job at Versailles ended up with us again. She was nice enough and took us around and into spots were regular tourists not on groups never get to go. The royal chapel, for example, is roped off and the tourists get to walk down the outside rows-- we mortals got to stand right in the center of the chapel, under the dome. However, when the organized tour was done, it was time to see the rest of Versailles. Bad mistake: 4:30 on a Sunday afternoon, and the place was a disorganized mad house. A couple more of the girls had mass panic attacks (even I could feel the claustrophobia). The guards wouldn't let us out through any short cuts, the nervousness was growing, the stupidity of tourists in a rugby scrum who enter into a massive room, and instead of moving off to one side just stop right there in the doorway...it was all too much for everyone. What normally should have been a 5-10 minute brisk walk through the rest of the palace, was a 20-25 minute brutal push and shove affair. I have to admit, I used elbows, pushes, gentle shoves, etc to get the people out of the way from "my students" who needed to get out. Even outside it wasn't much better, and I have to admit even I messed up at that point. One of the girls wanted to go to the giftstore, and I thought she was alright, but it turns out I was wrong. The other students were in a sorry state, so I took them out of the palace and back to the bus, but I thought Dana would be alright. By the time I got everyone out, Dana had come back to the bus and was in tears. She had been one of the people who had paniced as well, but had kept her expression neutral. When she came out of the gift shop and no one was there...well she broke down. I have to admit, I have been in huge crowds before, but this was just one of those near animalistc herd ones, and not a place to be. I talked with her, one of the other girls talked to her, I made myself into a silly ass and got her to laugh, and well, she eventually calmed down. What caught me by surprise is that she is one of the stronger people I have encountered on this trip, and to see her red eyed and teary, well, it wasn't what I expected.

I promised to by some of them ice cream here in Oxford, especially Dana for leaving her behind. I think I am going to live up to that promise tonight with a trip to G&D after dinner time.

After the Versailles experience, it was time to head back to Paris. A whole bunch of students wanted to go out for the evening, and they got dressed up a bit. They wanted to go to the French Quarter and eat dinner and party. They dragged me along, and I was happy to go. However, I didn't know anything other than how to get there, but we wandered through the crowded streets and eventually found a small French restaurant. Inside, there was a piano player singing and playing American music, and the 12 of us sat down and ordered food. It was about 8:30 by this time, and we didn't leave the restaurant until 11:30, just in time to catch one of the last metro's of the evening. The piano player was a French African who had lived in Hoboken of all places, and with the girls singing along (it was about 8 girls, 4 guys including myself) it was a fun evening for all. He even got a few of them to get up and sing along with him before we left. Remarkably, other than a glass of wine apiece at dinner, it was an alcohol free night, and after the nightmare of Versailles for some of them, they all agreed while waiting on the metro platform, that was the best evening of the night and the entire stay in Paris. It was a great way to end the night...

But when I got back to the hotel, my fever was in full rage (and breaking) and I couldn't sleep. The hotel room was too war, too small, too crowded, too dark or then too light. I eventually fell asleep around 3 am, woke up at 5, then back to sleep until 8, but it was not the best night I ever had. Off to breakfast, packing, and loading the bus before having a free day in Paris. At that point all I wanted to do was go back to Oxford, but we had hours to kill. Outside it was pouring! Gray, overcast and sky opening up. I decided to go off to the military museum at the Hotel des Invalides and to see Napoleon's tomb as well. A few of the students tagged along: a couple guys, one guy and his visiting girlfriend, and remarkably the two most unlikely girls ever, Camille and Lisa. They tend to be the fashion plates on the trip (and they have been nicknamed the Barbies by some of the other students) but they both turned out to be more than interested participants in the experience. I have to say I was impressed by their attention, their own knowledge of history and it put both of them in a different light. However, even by the end of the morning and early afternoon, the cold, wet day was giving way to hunger for them, and they went off to a cafe and I went to wander on my own, the first time I was alone in Paris the entire trip. I hadn't even realized it until then...

I went off to a store near the Sorbonne to look at state of the art French roleplaying games, and while I was impressed, I was sick, and really feeling it at that point, so I didn't really spend as much time with the games as I should have. I actually left the store without buying anything. Got back on the metro and back to the hotel and sat in the lobby talking to two of the students for a while. Then off to the supermarket again to get some supplies, and then the long 7 hour bus ride home. Traffic in Paris, a late student, and well when we got to Calais, we had exactly 10 minutes to use the bathrooms before the train left. The late student, one who was always the last to board (and someone I advised to get back to the bus 30 minutes earlier than she did) was the source of grumbling from some of the students who wanted to burn their last Euros.

Still we watched movies on the bus: Braveheart and Gladiator, and it was an uneventful but wet journey home. So now, this week its back to the rigamarole. Its off to class in an hour or so, then off to town to go to the pharmacy and find a decongestant, to the bank to get rid of 120 or so Euros into pounds (I won't need them for the rest of this trip), a brief jaunt to the supermarket for milk and toilet paper, and then back to class. Tonight is cooking dinner in my hopefully now working oven, and then the ice cream run, before a quiet night back here in Oxford.

Time to post some pictures. Remember, these are just a small selection of pictures from each day, since blogger will only allow 5 pics at a time.

Enjoy!