The history and arcitecture are incredible and all the stories of acient times that come with it.
Yesterday I got up at 7 and headed for the city as my host was leaving so I needed to as well. I thought I'd use the early morning as a time to hit up Mcdonalds for some free wifi time. Id been there for an hour or so when a dodgy woman came up the stairs asking for money. She appeared to be known by staff as one immediatly gave her a nudge and told her to leave. I went back to what I was doing. Normally I have nothing out except my computer but this time I had my phone out as I was texting at the same time so I put it down on the pad of paper I was writing on right beside my paper. About 15 minutes or so later she came back up this time with a green piece of paper with writing on it asking for money. She put the paper beside me and I said no no no no and kept looking at my computer screen and then she went away. I looked down and noticed my phone wasn't there....it took a second to register as I looked in my purse first to make sure I didn't put it away....then I freaked and JUMPED down the two flights of stairs screaming "SHE STOLE MY PHONE SHE STOLE MY PHONE" I caused a rukus in Mcdonalds and everyone started talking loud in french and one poor woman thought I was pointing at her. When everyone just looked around frazzled I wasn't sure what to do....then realizing I had just left my computer wide open up stairs as well as my backpack with my purse, passport and everything back upstairs I bounded up there as fast as humanly possible. I asked loudly if anyone could watch my things as I had just watched a computer for another guy but he had since left. Everyone shook their heads and said "no englais" So I paniced and started shoving things into my backpack, grabbed my coat, scarf, bag, pulled my power cord out of the wall and with it trailing behind me jumped back down the stairs in a frienzy. One little french woman came up to me speaking very fast and was pretty demanding about it telling me "police police police you stay" I wanted to run out those doors so fast as she couldn't have gone far. Then another little french man not speaking much english told me to stay as well so I calmed myself and put everything back in my bag. That's when the big gorgeous man dressed all in motorcyle gear came in and was on his phone as well as his walkie talking was going off in his pocket. He told me "fine fine, you come" so I follwed him across the street while he's still on his cell phone talking to police. We got over to the other side which ir right where you go to get on the metro lines and two other civilian looking people, also with radios, were standing with two ladies, one of which is the one who stole my phone. I hollared at her "you stole my phone, give me back my phone" She said she had nothing but eventually her friend handed it back over to the big burly police man. Everyone was still going on and on in very fast french so I was a little confused and only catching every other word....when the police car pulled up and I had to get in the back. But it was a normal car, not scary in the back like our police cars back home. They told me I was going to give a statement and all was fine. So headed to the police station, told them what happened and about an hour or so later I left with my phone in hand and very grateful to all the people who helped me in record time! Whew!
So by this time I was late to meet Lauren, Lindsay and their mom and the louvre, so I got directions and headed there. Took me awhile to chill out after that and I have to say I'm no longer very nice to people because here you get apprached ALOT.....to give money, sign something for "pretending to be deaf people" or guys hand you cards with writing on them to distract you while they steal. No way. I clutch my bag, I don't look at them and I walk briskly by shaking my head and saying NO. I learned my lesson!!
Got to the Louvre in all it's glory. You could easily spend a week in there looking at all the exhibits but we saw what we could and then headed for the Eiffel Tower as we wanted to be there at sunset. The girls had the hop on off bus tickets so I said I'll meet them there and I took the metro. I'm learning to love the metro :)
The girls forgot to consider traffic so got there about 2 hours after I did haha. In the meantime I took hundreds of picutres as well as helped other tourists get their perfect shot with the tower as well. Finally just as the sun set they arrived and we got in line to head to the top. We timed it perfectly as we got to be at the top of the tower at 7 pm when it sparkled and we all stood and awwwwed with delight! What an intense, thrilling, challenging day and here we were where things couldn't be more better.
After the tower we headed for dinner in a cute little bistro before I ran off to pack my things and head to meet my new couchsurf host. I was late leaving and ended up not finding my way there until 11:30 pm. Bless his heart he's super duper kind and was waiting for me with freshly ordered pizza :) We chatted for awhile and then I had a long hot shower and headed for bed in my OWN room on a big couch/bed.....the end to an incredible day in Paris!!
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