Are you going to Paris?

The Experience
We have been for a short vacation for some time now and actually got into finalising our plans. We planned to travel in May. That was also the examination month. I wrote my last paper on Friday's morning May 26th and we flew off to Paris, widely knowns as La ville lumière, later that night. I was already on the edge of losing 'it' all as my stress of examinations was mixed with excitement of our Paris retreat. So, yes, we are going to Paris.

The failure of last year's trip to Rome escalated our worries that we might not go to Paris this time because of Schengan visa problems. But thank God everything went well and pictured above are the two of us, HF and I, waiting at our departure gate 7 Manchester International Airport, filled with exciting anticipations and I have reasons to believe that this moment was one of HF's most ecstatic moment.

It was an hour's flight to CDG Internationalè and got on the RER train to the city, which took about 50 minutes. A French gentleman, who looked like he just returned from a business trip, helped us determined which station we should get off when we both looked lost & confused with the train map still held in our hands each.

Our experience in Disney park, a 45 minutes train journey, was exhausting but every minute in the park was so worthwhile filled with childish joy & happiness as we walked back on memory lanes that we were not even aware of time.

That would be my first Disney experience. Everything was déja vu and they were all quite magical, really. Pictured on the right is a photo when we just arrived on the grounds of Paris Disney by train. The weather did not look very promising but after a prayer's request, everything went the way we wanted. Some little magic there.

HF were photo-crazy most of the time and it was not quite uncommon under the circumstances; even I was not an exception.

I have surely realized that when you're happy and and your surrounding never stops that encouragement, the essence of time departs from you. When the sun was setting and the beautiful twilight skies became evident, it struck me that we've been on the park for already the past ten hours and we were still not tired. I have a flat-feet condition and oddly enough both my feet did not complain as regularly as when I'd accompany HF out for shopping, which would otherwise bored me and reduce me to a complaining slop. Thousands of people then congregated before the castle waiting for the fireworks show of Magical Disney. Lo and behold! The experience was awesome!

Displayed here are some of the pictures taken. Do drop by http://www.flickr.com/photos/xenodat/ for the rest of them.

Our Disney experience was over that night and I realized that we were amongst the majority who have been at the park since morning. But it was not quite over for us as the experiences gained lived on.

The following days, we visited:
1. Funiculair de Montmartre
2. Moulin Rouge
3. Arc de Triomphe
4. Champs Elysees
5. Louise Vuitton store
6. Boat cruise on Seine river
7. Eiffel Tower
8. Notre Dame
9. Musée du Louvre

Ever heard that Paris is the most romantic place on earth? I still think that any place (must be tourist's hot spots) can be as romantic as long as you're with the right person and right place. The Funiculaire de Montmarte was one of such place to me at the time.

At the top, there was a harpist playing his melodies, just perfect for the occasion. Every tourists just sat and relaxed at the steps while he plays on the plateau as though it was his little orchestra with amphitheatre seatings. It was just perfect. It was romantic. I believed the tunes have strummed the strings of HF's heart; well, mine too.

The cathedral was awesome. We arrived just in time for the Catholic Mass. One should experience this as part of one's travel.

There is, however, an important note that must not go unnoticed. There are a lot of black people hanging around this place seemingly waiting for an opportunity to take advantage of. BE CAREFUL! They are very convincing to lure you into their/his trap where you will be ripped off. Each of them will have colorful strings/threads in their hands and will approach you to "just try this on" and if you allowed, he will start to weave the strings into a braid either on your finger or around your wrist. He will keep talking to you and when he finished braiding, he will ask you for a small donation of at least 50 EUROS (€50) and you cannot help feeling extorted for money as he will not accept anything less. In this picture (left), the girl in the pink handbag has been victimised. I overheard her conversation to her partner saying "... but I don't want this stupid band. He asked a lot of money for this stupid thing..." after the entire ordeal was over. She threw away the band. There a lot of these bands on the ground, all of them unwanted and thrown as rubbish. Do you want to spoil your holidays over a small colorful 3-4 inches band?

When you arrived at the Abbesses subway station (Green line: Porte de la Chapelle), just go to your destination and ignore any person offering you "try on" some braided rubbish. Thanks to my girlfriend who warned me beforehand.

Moulin Rouge is in Paris?? I thought it existed only on the silver screens! Moulin Rouge is Paris' red light district area (Pigalle station)?? I was dazzled by the fact that HF brought us there just to check out the place. The Can Can dance was popularized here, I guess. HF noticed some very good looking French hotties but only later did she realize they were actually "working" -- prostitutes. We were there to take a shot of the red windmill as seen in the musical film of Moulin Rouge (Nicole Kidman).

There were not many tourist that stopped by here as we did but rather, passed through this area in their tour buses. We went into this Supermache Erotique, which is a stone's throw away from the Can Can girls showroom (Illustrated), to do some contemporary shopping. I was surprised that HF liked the big ones more, I felt a little intimidated. No, I was just pulling some legs here. The surroundings of this area was slightly different from other places we've visited.

To sum it all up, it was all a memorable experience that we have each taken home with. Will we come back again? Definitely, but next time we will dine in a proper French restaurant and I will be able to place orders in French!

Excuse Me, Can you photo us?
In this era of digital photography, the question above is a question that you will not have NOT heard of. Even I have defied that trend by boldly going up to a french couple and say "Do you want me take picture for you?" accompanied with some Italiano sign languages. Hereafter I have learnt my lesson and that is to mind my own business and not intervene because they both said no. I guess they were happy with the pictures. *laughs at myself*

HF and I were the only couple with a big & heavy tripod and I was the only person with a SLR camera; and everybody else thought I was some sort of photographer maniac (more like an expert as I would prefer). I even overheard someone exclaimed, "Tripod! A tripod. I should have (&*^%$&@$(* brought mine...!" after walking past us. In a tiny place with not much space up on the top of the Eiffel tower, I bet some tourists have already recognized us as we have circled the top for more than 10 rounds.

Many have came to me asking for a little favor. Some approached the amicable and pretty HF for the same favor but she kindly passed the favor to me. One person, probably a Lebanese, just turned to me and spoke, "Uhh, do you know why I cannot take picture of there", pointing out to the scenic city view of Paris in the night. "Everything black!", he continued. After much explanation about how flash photography is a bad idea for night photography, he tried it without flash and still didn't work. When asked him how much he got his camera for, he said £49. I was like "No! Seriously?! No wonder!"

Even though I brought my own tripod, when we left Eiffel tower's park and headed back to our hotel, I actually thought I have been a walking tripod for most people. Bring your own tripod next time!

Parlez-vous Anglais?
I was exicted and was looking forward to practise my French but little did I know that I did not even have the confidence of a mustard seed to speak out because I did not understand what was spoken. I could speak the language and understand some parts but not entirely but I was confident enough that I did not make myself a fool.

Are the French too arrogant to speak English? I would like to believe this widespread of French arrogance rumor is not quite true. The answer to "Parlez-vous Anglais?" would usually be a "Non" followed by a silence so uncomfortable that one would just walk away cursing him/her as arrogant. Firstly, not everybody knows the English language. Secondly, the French are not as arrogant as people think (language per se) but the tourists themselves are ignorant of the language.

If one goes to China, Ukraine, Russia, Germany, or Indonesia, one would naturally assume the locals either do not speak English well, or do not speak English at all. It is not their language.

Arrogance in behavior in the French people? Maybe. I'm not too sure about that, so this will not be discussed.

You might be interested to know that, generally, we got around Paris with English... of course, with some difficulties. I stepped into a French restaurant wanting to ask for their menu. A french waitress walked towards me and said,
"Je peux vous aider?"
"Bien sur", I replied. "Parlez-vous anglais?"
"Non.", she turned her head and walked away immediately and muffled something under her breath. Nobody came to us in the next couple of minutes so we decided to help ourselves to the menu and looked. We left the restaurant anyway.

Vivian stopped by a pastry store and was enticed by them. I took her in and we were greeted in French, thereupon I asked "Parlez-vous anglais?"
"Non.", she replied and kept silent.
I was confused as I did not know what else to say in order to ask what was the pastry called and its contents.
"Yes? How can I help you?", the lady who said no to us decided to speak to us again in her French accent.

Bottom line is, as a tourist, try to look as innocent and modest as possible by admitting that you do not speak French well. Ask politely if you can communicate in English with him/her. You will get turned off a few times but not all the time. They all know Paris is a tourist hotspot and over the years they have learned a few basic conversation in English. However, there was a little incident on our arrival where I actually felt I was being bullied just because I couldn't speak French. Ironically, the snob was not French-French, but an Arabic French bloke who was just showing off he spoke French so well as a foreigner with the intention of putting me to shame.

The weather
Through out the days of our visit, the weather was quite favorable but was not perfect on the last day. It was mostly cloudy and strong breezes but thankfully there was not even a drop of rain.

Debates
When couples go out traveling, they often run into little arguments and would normally engage in little debates over the final decisions. I like to keep it simple. Anything to do with directions should always be left to the man, whereas, planning travel routes and where to go next (travel iteneries) to the woman.

HF was trying to read the tube map!! And she was dictating to me where we should get off and switch stations to continue our journey! I was like, "No, honey, we're now on this line, we should get off here to switch to that line, then get off here to switch to this line and we arrived!". And she was like, "Hey, why don't we try... umm, okay, you said we're on this line, so why not take this line at this station, then take that line... uh, Danny, where are we now??". By this time, I was already confused because we would be going in cricles had we decided to go with her suggestions.

Before we left for Paris, she told me once that we have to stop by Louis Vuitton store in Champs Elysees, to which I agreed. We were at the store and she totally, totally lost grip of herself, which reminded me of a scene in Ice Age: The Meltdown when Scrat entered the gates of the Heaven of Nuts. The million dollar (or Euros) question for her I bet was "Should I buy?? Or Should I really, really buy now?". I do enjoy watching her fashioning up herself with those leather bags and seeing a different kind of smiles and emotions flashed out knowing that she was in her dreams. Spent an hour in the store. I enjoy my experience too, watching at people spending hundreds or thousands just to get a leather bag or other apparels with the LV insignias imprinted all over on the exterior, especially HF. However, I felt a little regret that I had to bring reality back to her and she understood and it took another 30 minutes before we arrived the exit.

Another warning worth knowing: There will be some people around this area coming up to seemly innocent tourists with a request to help them buy any leather products from the store. They will give you a credit card or something making it looks like you're not losing anything. I was told that your passport information will be noted down whenever you purchase from the store for either security reasons or for certificate of authencity or tax reclaimation purposes. DO NOT help! You will get into trouble with either the local law enforcers or the immigration department when you leave the country. To stay safe, just mind your own business. Being nice is being gullible to those people.

Yet another debate was over the exchange of English pounds to euro currency in desperate time. We were running out of time as we have to catch our train from Louvre Rivoli (station) to CDG and HF was still running about looking to buy a souvenir for her parents. We both ran out of euros for any more souvenirs and just the right amount for train tickets to the airport. She wants to get the little Eiffel tower that cost €3.00 but they would not accept English pounds. I found a Bureau d'Exchange and HF only wanted to change £1.00 coins to the equivalent of €3.00 but the person at the bureau said he doesn't take coins. HF has a £5 bill and I told her to change it for the euros she needed to get the souvenir but she was reluctant and refused and said "What am I going to do with the remaining euros?? I don't want to have the extra euros! It's a waste!". We were on very tight budget so I understand what she meant.

At that point, I was determine to grab her £5 bill and just hand it over to the bureau for some euros and I did. We went back to the souvenir store. She, on the other hand, was still sulking at the fact that I took that £5 bill and wasted the remaining euros. We got that souvenir and rushed to the subway station and was IN TIME for our flight. Had I not grabbed her £5 bill, we would have been late; we would still be arguing and debating whether or not that little Eiffel tower should be purchased. I asked her, "Look, what do you want? A souvenir for your parents? OR, to save your £5 bill and no souvenir for your parents?"

The answer under that circumstances was not very difficult to answer. Identify which is the bigger regret if you did not do, and avoid; choose another alternative. Woman, wake up!
Later, on the train, she admit she did not make the right choices given the situation. Everything was sorted out and we were pleased. We learned more of each other in this trip and I'm glad of the outcome too.

That's that.