August 1st, 2010

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY MOM AND DAD!!!!

My parents asked me today what I was getting them for their 29 year wedding anniversary. I told them my present was me not asking them to send me money... hehe. Since that's apparently not the kind of present they were thinking of, and I'm a little far away to make them something, this post is sort of my present to my mom, who keeps asking me for pictures and posts that aren't food related...

I'm pretty burnt out from the weekend, as it proved to be quite a busy one. We spent Friday with two friends who are about to embark on a world road trip, starting in the US with our beloved and dearly missed van, the Dirty Turtle.

That evening we met up with some more friends and had a picnic at Les Jardins du Trocadero, which is located on the north side of the Siene River, overlooking La Tour Eiffel. I think picnics are one of the greatest things about living in Paris; there are so many different parks, hidden gardens, and secret courtyards... you can really find one that fits your personality. But I have to be honest, Les Jardins du Trocadero wouldn't be my ideal picnic area. I was curious about this particular park because it is located on the opposite side of La Tour Eiffel, or well, opposite of the side I usually visit(Parc du Champs de Mars). I also found an image of Les Jardins du Trocadero in a travel book my dad gave me. It looked simple and quiet, with lush green grass and weeping willows overlooking a still pond... the perfect setting for a picnic, right? Wrong. Tourists and their cameras, merchants selling mini Eiffel Tower key chains, and performers trying to earn an extra buck fill the Palais de Chaillot and the surrounding gardens. We couldn't even find a grassy spot where there weren't cigarette butts embedded in the dirt. Hey, I'm not bashing the place, trust me, it could be much, much worse. We all still had a great time, and I got some pretty cool night shots of the Eiffel Tower.

Saturday we met up with Rey and Laetitia, some of our really good friends from Atlanta who were passing through Paris. They spent the past few weeks in the south of France, where Laetitia's family lives. We walked around the city to show Rey the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, Jardin des Tuileries... and got some(more) delicious hot chocolate from Angelina! It was so good to see friends from back home... Rey never fails to make us laugh, and I can always count on Laetitia to be my chocolate buddy!!

Today, I got pretty lucky. I've wanted to go to the Centre Pompidou for a while now... but was hesitating due to the 10-12 Euro entry fee. But today was my lucky(or luckily timed) day, as it was Sunday, August 1st, the first Sunday of the month, when the museum has no entry fee! Luckily the month of August is also when most Parisians go on vacation, so the museum wasn't as crowded as it might be during the other months. I won't ramble on too much; just wanted to mention that the view from the top of the Centre Pompidou is absolutely amazing. You can see all of Paris, from the Sacre Coeur, to the Eiffel Tower, to Notre Dame. If you ever come to Paris, you can't miss this sight. I'll leave you with some of my favorite pieces from the museum... Bonne Nuit!

Happy Floody Fourteenth

Have you ever had one of those mornings where you were like, "Aw, SHIT!" before you even had time to rub your eyes? You know, like when you sleep through your alarm clock? Today was one of those days... and a rainy one in fact. As I told you in my previous post, we are watching over a leaky roof in a friend's apartment in exchange for a free stay in the center of Paris. Romain told us that the day he noticed the leak, he slept through 3 hours of rain, and woke up to a flood in his bedroom. So today around 10am Quentin woke up peacefully to the pitter patter of rain... then immediately after opening his eyes came the "Aw, SHIT!" moment. He jumped out of bed and ran to Romain's bedroom, where the major leak is located. Luckily, it wasn't raining too hard, and nothing was leaking through. Whew.
 

I, on the other hand, woke up around noon(niiiiiiice!) to a dark and dreary Paris... Happy Bastille Day by the way. Being that I already slept half the day away, I was immediately starving for something to eat(hey, when am I not?). Quentin and I didn't want to leave the apartment(in fear of the leak), but our stomachs were growling for breakfast... uh, er, lunch. Everything was pretty much closed for the holiday, with the exception of a few restaurants and shops in the more touristy areas of the city.

We waited for a break in the rain and ran out to find an open boulangerie nearby to get a baguette for breakfast. Just as we got to the boulangerie, of course, it started to rain... but I'm not talking a little drizzle here... I'm talking torrential downpour. Ok, maybe not that bad, but it was enough for Quentin and I to look at each other, look at the 5 to 6 people in line in front of us, look outside, and say, "Aw, SHIT!". We hurriedly paid for our baguette and darted out into the rain. We ran up the 5 flights of stairs(my legs and butt are going to get the best workout here) back to the apartment and opened the bedroom door. Romain was not joking. Rain was pouring in through the ceiling like a mini waterfall, dripping ever so unwelcomely on the shelves in the wall cabinet and all over the floor. We got there right in time though, and started placing pots, bowls, and buckets anywhere we could to lessen the damage. I seriously felt like someone in a sinking boat, taking buckets of water and tossing them out, only to replace it with another full bucket. I have to say though, that I am so glad we were there... for Romain and his girlfriend's sake, because they would have returned from their vacation to an absolute disaster.

After about an hour or so the rain died down, and we were able to ring out the towels and hang them up to dry. By then it was around 4pm and we were hungry again. This time, I stayed at the apartment, and Quentin ran out to grab some food. He came back with a Baguette avec rosette, cornichon et beurre... Yum Yum :)

and Fougasse aux Lardons(not the best one).

 

 

Since it is Bastille Day, the French Independence Day, I was crossing my fingers that the rain would stop before nightfall. I was desperate to see the fireworks at the Eiffel Tower, since we missed the fireworks on the 4th in NY(long story). I didn't want to miss two Independence Day fireworks shows in less than two weeks. Thankfully, it turned out to be a gorgeous, and almost cold night! The fireworks at La Tour Eiffel are absolutely amazing... I'm going to try to post the videos of the fireworks tomorrow... it's getting super late. For now, I'll leave you with a photo from before the fireworks show.