Allison's Wonderland

Part II of Day I in Paris

Megan and I had some interesting things happen to us on our trip to Paris.  While on the Metro the first night we got there, some crazy man started screaming at a couple who were sitting across from him.  They weren't doing anything to him and didn't even know him.  One minute he's sitting there quiet, and the next he's screaming.  Another incident occurred with a strung out couple on the Metro.  Megan and I moved away from them on the metro car, but they followed us all the way down the aisle and asked everybody for a lighter.  The guy was sweating profusely with bloodshot eyes and the girl wouldn't stop shaking.  It was creepy.  Even with all our crazy encounters none can compare to our conversation with Paul.  I'll get to that in a moment....

4 Euro Lemonade

Notre Dame

After our visit to the Sacred Heart Basilica, we rode the metro to the Notre Dame Cathedral.  I was so excited to visit the church because I'm trying to get all of the main ones crossed off the list.  I've got St. Peter's (Vatican), Sistine Chapel (Vatican), La Sagrada Familia (Barcelona), St Mark's (Venice), St. Francis, (Assissi) and hopefully will cross West Minster Abbey off the list this summer.  On the way to Notre Dame we had to stop and buy 4 Euro freshly squeezed lemonade which was soooo good!  By Notre Dame there's a little square out front where you can sit and people watch.  Megan and I played "I Spy" but with people and it was pretty fun.  In the middle of our game we had another

I SPY

strange encounter with a French man.  This older man who was wearing a suit that was 4 sizes to large for him just sits down next to Megan.  He then tries to speak to us in French.  We said we didn't know French.  He then starts naming off every other language under the sun.  Portugeese, Russian, German, etc.  All the languages we didn't know.  Megan knows Spanish, and Italian pretty well and obviously English, but those weren't any of the languagesthat he named.  He then asks us in broken English if we want to go have Champagne with him in his van or something.  We both look at each other and are like "Um....No."  He was probably the weirdest other than our friend Paul.

Side View of the beautiful Flying Buttresses

View of the Inside - Rose Window

Notre Dame was absolutely gorgeous and we got lots of pictures.  The rose windows were stunning as well.  It's amazing to see such a structure in person when it's something you have learned about all your life.  After Notre Dame we went and took a quick nap at the hotel and then were out on the town again.  We wanted to go to the Orsay museum, but just as we got there they were 15 minutes away from closing.  So we went and sat on a bridge over the River Seine, waiting for Megan's friend Adrien to call for dinner.  We had an absolutely gorgeous sunset that evening and it was so peaceful over the river up until we met Paul.  

River Seine

You know how growing up you are taught social skills?  Well, as Megan and I are sitting on a bench minding our own business...Paul sits down next to me and immediately asks Megan and I where we are from.  I think both of us were taking aback by this, as most people enter into a conversation with some joke, or saying something witty, or just being not weird and creepy.  Paul was both weird and creepy.  He asked us question after question.  I was getting so uncomfortable I just turned over to Megan and started giggling because Paul had no social skills whatsoever and when I get uncomfortable I do a nervous giggle.There were these long awkward pauses when he wasn't grilling us with questions. He asked us what we were doing the next day and if we wanted his number.  We tried to make up excuse after excuse but he was NOT getting the hint.  That's when I started asking him questions because I was sick of being interrogated.  Found out his name was Paul and he was an unemployed photographer from the Netherlands.  We finally were like fine give us your number so we can go meet up with our friends, who still hadn't called us by the way, but we had to get out of there.  We both were nervous he was going to follow us in to the St. Germain neighborhood which is beautiful by the way.  After we walked a a bit and made sure he wasn't following, Megan was assured that he was a serial killer and that we both just escaped our deaths.  It was kind of funny, but made me a little freaked out.

Vietnamese Dinner - I got DUCK

Adrien & GF at the Restaurant

Goodbye Picture

Finally met up with Adrien after numerous expensive phone calls.  It was ironic too, that in Paris, we ended up eating at a Vietnamese Restaurant.  It was very good, but not really French at all which is kind of what I was looking forward too.  Plus, at the restaurant, the one waiter was reading palms and started freaking out when I showed him my "life lines" on my hands.  He told me to be very careful and that I was prone to accidents.  Which is not really true at all.  At first it was amusing, but after awhile he just kind of freaked me out and got on my nerves.  Megan and I had high hopes to go to the Eiffel Tower after dinner, but since we ate so late, and that Metro stopped running at 12:30 we headed back to the hotel.  Said goodbye to all of Megan's friends and went to bed.

On our way home we had another quite interesting thing happen.  We had to walk about 3 city blocks back from the Metro stop to our hotel.  First of all, we saw this woman on the side of the road just puking her guts out.  We switched sides, but I couldn't turn away.  It was disgusting and we both made mental notes not to walk on that side in the morning.  Lucky for me, I forgot that mental note and walked right through it the next morning.  GROSS!  Interesting thing number two, there was a guy walking behind us and kept coming closer and closer.  So, we slowed down to let him pass.  Once he got past us he just stopped and stared.  Umm...yeah that freaked me out a lot.  After we passed him, he kept staring a bit and went inside the building he was standing outside of.  It was a little freaky to say the least.   We were a little shaken up from the days events, but we were definitely ready to take on Paris for day #2!