It was very chilly out today! I took the metro to a stop close to Notre Dame early this morning. Finally, a successful trip all on my own :) I met Danielle there and we walked around and took a lot of pictures. Everything is just beautiful in Paris. Mostly, we have no idea what we are looking at, but it's still great.
Jamie came to meet us and we decided to go to a little cafe for lunch. I had un sandwich au jambon et du café. It was very good, and a pretty reasonable price. It was quite awkward when Jamie asked for the check and the waiter came back and reached over her to hand it to me, upside down. I was confused and looked down and he wrote on the back "you are Very beautiful." I'll take it as a compliment, but it was still pretty creepy....
Afterwards, we went to meet the group by Notre Dame. It was so very cold out, but Notre Dame is magnificent. Each side of the church is so different, but it's so amazing. We had a very nice tour guide and she told us a lot of history, (in french of course) but I luckily understood the majority of it. After talking outside of the church, we walked over to a hospital that was across the street and got a tour of the courtyard. She told us that it was the first hospital that opened that actually worked on getting people healthy again. When someone was sent to the hospital before this one, they were sent there to die. I found that pretty interesting. She also mentioned that in the springtime, we can have a picnic in the courtyard there! After seeing the hospital, we walked to the back of Notre Dame and entered a small holocaust museum. There wasn't much to look at, but everything we saw was symbolic of the holocaust and how the victims felt. Finally, after that, we got to go inside Notre Dame. To be honest, I thought that the outside was so much nicer than the inside. Don't get me wrong, it was beautiful inside as well, but I liked the architecture on the outside better!
We also saw the lock bridge! I read about it at home and was looking forward to seeing it. The tradition is that you write the name of your lover on a lock and throw the key into the river. Some locks happened to be combination locks...obviously they are unsure about their love life! Danielle and I may start a new tradition and leave broken locks or unlocked locks on the bridge for everyone who ever broke our hearts!
After our tour was over, we stopped at a cafe for some hot chocolate since it was very cold out! We then walked to the metro to try to figure out how to load our metro card with the week pass. As we were waiting for the machines that only accept cash, a man came to the window! Thank goodness. I got to pay with my credit card and he told me exactly what pass I needed to buy. Then he asked where in the we lived, so we told him and he went on for a good 5 minutes about all his family there. I felt bad for holding up the line...oh well!
Then I ventured back to my house! On my second metro train, we came to a metro stop, but it never started running again. I heard someone say something about a package and of course I thought there was a bomb. Some people looked confused, but no one got of the train. Then a few minutes after, there was an announcement which I later realized probably said that someone lost their package but then found it so now the train could go. Imagine that happening in New York? I don't think so...
That basically sums up my COLD day. Tomorrow will be the start of ILP (the intensive language program) so I have class from 14-17hr each day this week.
Souhaitez moi bonne chance!
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