Highs and Lows

Wednesday - September 10,2008

John and I purposely slept in this morning. We have been going so fast every step of the way so far that we're feeling it very severly now, although we are really high in sprit - our bodies are doing some protesting. So we chose to slow down a bit and take it easy for the day.

I stepped out early in the morning to a boulangerie that we found down the street, Miss Manon, and got a quiche and a breakfast sandwich/turnover type thing then brought them back to the hotel. We had the breakfast tray sent up and ate in the room. After showering and prepping our feet we set out around 10:30am.

We walked through to our destination of St.-Eustache hoping to see some things along the way and we were rewarded with sights of Musee Carnavalet, Hotel Soubise, and Nicholas Flamel's house. We took photos of all the stops and then continued on. We peeked a little at the Pompidou Center once again but didn't linger - we didn't want to loose momentum. We discovered the wholesale district of the city - which was interesting but we didn't pay too much attention to any of the stores because they catered to "professionals" or bulk purchasers only.

Just when we thought we still had longer to go we saw parts of the church peeking out, spurring us on. When we got to its location I felt weird emotions that I couldn't explain. The area around the church, Les Halles, was a mixture of beauty and grotesqueness. There were pretty flowers and lush greenery - but the dome of the mall was dark and unkept. The mixture between reverence and bustling busy activity felt incongruent. The church's exterior was beautiful in its gothic design but felt spoiled by the building that is abruptly next to it.
When we went inside the church I couldn't help but feel this incredible sadness. The church has been the first one we've seen that hasn't been able to disguise its age. The rest have all been able to draw attention away from it rough spots, but this one screams out loudly that its in bad shape. Strangely enough you'd think that it would give it some charm - but it didn't.
It felt cold and unloved inside - there wasn't a lot of people visiting in fact, we almost had the place to ourselves. The stained glass windows still shined beautifully when the sun shone through as if to give the building a voice to say, "I"m just as good as the other guys and gals!" By the time we had toured around through its naves and side altars I had a better respect for the building that was still holding fast even though its interior was considerably delapidated in the cosmetic sense - but like the others, remains intact. As much as I would have like to linger to deepen my appreciation we needed to get going. We got on the nearby metro and made our way to the Musee D'Orsay.

We got into the museum a little later than we should have because by the time we'd gotten part-way through the announcement came that they'd be closing in thirty minutes. I was regretting that I didn't listen to John's suggestion that we go to the museum first. I realized that there was nothing to regret about our timing though because we go to see some beautiful art in the time we were there. I really did enjoy the museum.

We made our way across the Seine to the Tuileries over a metal constructed pedestrian bridge that was pretty fascinating. I was in awe and nervous the entire time we were on it - but obviously more nervous because we didn't take a picture of it!
While we were walking through the Tuileries and the Louvre gardens John and I were talking about my journalling and how I keep finding myself saying that things are beautiful over and over again - and that I've had trouble finding ways to describe what I'm seeing. John - being the very delightful funny many that he is exclaimed, "To the Thesaurus!" as any self-respecting Batman satirist would project. I laughed so hard and loud it echoed through the park.
We exited from the Tuileries on to Rue Rivoli - which our challenged selves at first thought was the Champs Elysees {we could see the Arc de Triomphe from the park and it looked like it lined up...} silly us! While we were looking on the map and trying to find where we were John was trying to figure out what the cross street was that we were by, then I heard him say, "Rue Jambon?" When I asked him if I had heard him right he said yeah, he thought that's what the street sign said (it was acutally Rue Cambon) and I said, "What the heck, Paris can have a a street named Ham if it wants to!" We laughed like silly and everyone around us thought we were crazy!
We walked upwards our newly named Ham street and made our way to Place Vendome passing up designer store after another and even the Ritz hotel and not enjoying the ambience at all. It felt so hurried and snobby, and petulant like a spoiled heiress. It was like South Coast Plaza on steroids - only mildly tolerating its Sears wing (in this case the Sears wing would be the out of place duty free shop at the end of the street). We found Place Vendome and took some photos - realxing for only a tiny bit before moving on to L'Opera down the way.

We turned the corner to the right and I prepared John for the dazzlement that was about to happen. L'Opera Garnier is not only beautiful, its exsquisite - its stunning - its breathtaking - it so nice we that got to see it up close and personal! John was so in awe of the outside and I told him that the inside is even more intense. We sat on the steps outside to rest for a little while and enjoy the scenery.
After relaxing for a few minutes we headed down the street to Gallaries Lafayette - the six floor-two building department store - but we arrived with only two minutes from closing so we only had a few minutes to take a quick picture.

By the time we realized that we were really hadn't eaten any food during the day and we were hungry. Most of the day and we were hungry. Most of the places close to the store were closing so we grabbed a quick sandwich to hold John over and we then headed to the Metro. We got off at the stop close to the supermarche and ran inside for things for a dinner. As we were leaving the store we noticed that it had started to rain really hard - so it made it impossible for us to get to the cyber cafe to upload any pictures or send off any news home. So we took our groceries back to the hotel and had a picnic in the room.

All in all the day was very full and we saw so much and experienced very extreme levels of emotion that we were very tired - but it was a good sort of tired. We relaxed and unwound from the day and feel into a deep relaxing sleep.

-Karen