Our first two days that is.
For me coming to Europe is a little like returning home. As I've mentioned before, my mom is from Germany. She left home when she was eighteen to go on a trip to Italy and never returned. This one trip to Italy was the beginning of a life full of travel and adventure. One of her adventures led to Paris, where she lived for eight years. In fact she and my father started dating while she was living here, and eventually they also owned an apartment in Jouy-en-Josas, a neighborhood of Paris . So, technically when I was a baby, I once lived here too, not to mention the traveling I did to France and Germany almost every year while growing up.
Even with all of that European heritage and familiarity, Sean and I arrived feeling excited, and yet also completely disoriented and out of sorts. It's the different language and the Parisian pace. One always imagines that Europe is slower and while in many ways the culture most certainly is, a big city is a big city and people have places to be ~ in a hurry. This doesn't leave a whole lot of room for tourists to be "figuring things out" like the language for instance and directions to where they are going.
Fortunate for us, I got in touch with a very dear family friend I hadn't seen in eighteen years who lives here. We picked up right where we left off and Philippe, his wife Babette and their family have been beyond wonderful. They immediately embraced us upon arrival, and are showing us the Parisian ropes, so to speak.
We've been so grateful for their help that the one French word, I repeat non-stop is Merci! Merci! Merci!
Now that we are officially here, looking back at a trip that was planned in literally one month, everything could not have gone smoother, but you know there are always some "snafus" {is that how you spell that?} It comes with the territory of travel and adventure.
The less than "romantic" events that have happened, that I eluded to in my recent tweet, is that upon arrival, overwhelmed and exhausted, our bed broke. Yup, it broke. Now don't get any funny ideas as to how it broke, with this being the city of "romance" and all. The bed broke with one person on it. Sean sat down to get under the covers, and in seconds he was on a mattress on the floor. So, we're relatively calm, practical people, we can roll with it. On the next day, Sean fixed the bed. Bless an apartment with a drill, and a French family friend who can help you buy wood glue.
We also almost bought some ham for 47 Euros. That was a fun one. Language barrier perhaps? It seems that when ordering ten slices of ham at the ´epicerie we forgot to note the thickness of the slice. So instead of thin slices, the ten slices were huge, enough ham to feed a small family for Easter. Once again, bless Philippe who exchanged the ham for thinner sliced ham and brought quite a few of those 47 Euros back to us.
We have also gotten lost in the Metro station already, a must do on your first day in Paris. ;)
Other than that, as you see in the photos below, it's already been a full and delightful couple of days. You know having visited here as a child, I honestly didn't know what to expect from this city as an adult. And I won't fully know what Paris will mean to me now, until I'm back home. Paris is a city that is built up in your mind, as a city of romance, glamour, art, architecture, amazing beauty, food and wine and from the little glimpse of it I've seen ~ while Philippe drove us around late on a Saturday night when the city was quiet. It took my breath away.
Today, as soon as I finish this blog post, Sean and I are about to do some exploring all on our own, so I'm going to wrap it up and ask you to wish us luck! I wonder what adventures we shall discover today? Mais non?
1. the Eiffel Tower {of course}
2. waiting for the elevator in our new apartment building
3. or you can take these gorgeous stairs to the 5th floor
4. the Eiffel Tower at night ~ sorry it's a little blurry. It was my very first glimpse of the tower and it was just so pretty all lit up that I couldn't resist. I took it with the Iphone on the drive over to Philippe and Babette's apartment for dinner. They just happen to have a view of the Eiffel Tower from their apartment {not a bad view to wake up to and go to sleep to every day}
4. Babette and Sean discussing the plans of our trip at our very first visit to a Parisian cafe. While we were having coffee Babette ran across the street to the bookstore and picked up this book for us as a gift. I love this photo because you can see both of their excitement expressed through their hands while they talk about this amazing city.
5. my first Parisian coffee in my favorite kind of coffee cup a "Lavazza" cup
6. a trip to fresh fruit and vegetable market
7. springtime in Paris
8. a star light that shines in our bedroom. must. have. this light.
