We take a taxi from our hotel to the train station. We’ll take a local train to Nice, and then get on the high-speed TVG train for a 4-hour 1st class trip to Paris! Our taxi driver tells us a great story about how his parents were supposed to emigrate to America from Russia in the 1920s, but they got sick and had to get off the boat early – in France. They never finished their journey, and now their son is in his 60s and thoroughly French. He said he still has their visas to enter the US!
All of our great plans fall apart when we get to the local train station and find out we’ll miss our rendezvous with the TVG high-speed train if we follow the original plan. There’s a huge line of people behind us and the clerk speaks very little English. She’s insisting we take the local train to a different station to meet the TVG. We freak out, but take a chance that she’s not exercising an instinctive hatred of Americans, and follow her advice. When we get off, a helpful train guy tells us that we’re going to be fine. He says we’re picking up the TVG one station later than planned. WHEW!
The TVG is a 2-story train and we’ve got reserved seats on the upper deck! The French countryside races by. Fields, lakes, hills, farms, towns, cities… it’s amazing to look at the things we pass and wonder if they were built by Romans, or Gauls, or someone even earlier. What’s it like to live surrounded by so much history? Wish we had pictures to show you… read on to find out the terrible tale of why we can’t!
Arriving in Paris, we step out into the most amazing old train station you can imagine. Iron girders soaring high into an arched roof, massive trains lining the endless platforms, the hubbub of people everywhere – the Gare de Lyon station was incredible. Jordan was so excited he wanted a picture – and that’s when we discovered the camera was missing. We’d taken photos of each other on the train and that’s the last we saw of it. Jordan races back to the train to search it before the cleaning crews start work, but the camera is nowhere to be found in our car. It’s a total mystery.
Stepping out onto the street - SK’DOOSH!! - the feeling hits that we are truly in Paris! In front of us are streets crowded with Mercedes cabs, scooters zipping madly around them, and huge avenues of classic Napoleon-era apartments. You know the ones – pointy roofs, little round windows on the top floors, wrought-iron balconies – there were posters of them on the walls of every girls’ room in your dorm at college. Jordan is gawking and oohing-and-ahhing like the tourist he is. Katie’s the old pro and secures us a cab. Driving to the Marais, Jordan is still slack-jawed. Tourist! Good thing there’s nothing in the cab to trip on.
Our hotel is perfectly situated in the heart of everything, on Rue de Rivoli near the Hotel De Ville (not to be confused with Cruella DeVille, she lives somewhere else where they allow dogs). Unfortunately, our hotel is narrow and tiny. Even ants think it’s tiny. Only one of us can fit in the elevator with our luggage and our room is on the 5th floor! Once we get up there, it’s like a rental in Alphabet City – TINY TINY TINY! We can barely fit.
(yes, that's Jordan touching both walls simultaneously! And he's not even stretched out all the way!)
The shower has a 6-inch high rim on the floor to keep the water in, but the curtain hangs far beyond the rim, which guarantees we will soak the floor every time we shower:
But the biggest stumper is how to turn on the lights! We click all of the light switches in every possible combination for at least 20 minutes, in the dark, to no avail. Two college educations, gone to waste. Eventually the desk clerk solves the mystery – you stick your square plastic room key into a slot above the light switch, and that “approves” the power in the apartment. Really? That’s your design premise? Really?
It’s time to for a laundry trip, so the minimum wage student working the front desk (an Asian girl with bright purple contact lenses) gave us the card of a nearby laundromat. Inside was a kind fellow who didn’t speak much English, but did speak the universal language of yes-I’ll-wash-your-undies. Love you! We left him with a couple bags of filth. Our way of making a good name for Americans.
Now it’s dinner time and we’re ready for something satisfying. No more baguettes, please! We need something new. We wander our Paris neighborhood, checking out the many restaurants. Just like in J-le-P, all the menus have a section for salads, pizzas, and main courses. I thought a place like France would scorn pizza, but it’s more common on the menus here than it is in the States. Unfortunately, prices in Paris are just as expensive as J-le-P – about $35 per person. Just when we thought we’d die of hunger and frustration, there it was in front of us – BREAKFAST IN AMERICA! (that’s the name of the restaurant – really!)
It looks like a classic American diner. Could it be? Please? We walk in. The waitresses are speaking to each other in English. One is even wearing a Ramones T-shirt! The menu’s in English and it’s all the food we want! – burgers, chicken sandwiches, fries, nacho chips, beer! The answer to all our prayers! Much gluttony and satisfaction ensues. Plus our waitress is a great source of tips – including where to find movies in English. That’ll come in handy in couple days…
