I arrived in Paris after a somewhat terrible travel day - leaving Oostende was easy enough (aside from saying goodbye to my tremendous hosts), but there had been some trouble on the tracks in the South of Belgium so it created a bit of a clusterfuck in trying to get to Paris. It involved taking an extra bus between train stations and changing trains one more time than originally expected and arriving in Paris about 2 hours later than I had hoped. Further agitating my zen on this day, was that the trip involved the worst bacon cheeseburger known to man in Lille, France. I know what you're thinking, how the F can something with bacon and cheese be terrible. I agree, that's nonsense and contrary to at least thirteen articles I've read in Science and The New England Journal of Medicine. But, I'll further admit that this burger was purchased at a VERY chain-restaurant-looking Irish Pub which was the only eating establishment in the train station there. I know. I did it to myself. But, seriously, how did they fuck it up - not even the bacon tasted good. And there was terrible bread. I WAS IN FRANCE AND THE BREAD WAS TERRIBLE. OK, I didn't realize that this meal had impacted me so.
Anyways, moving on. Right, I'm in Paris. How was that?
Finding my hostel was also quite the adventure. I am admittedly not great at getting around in places, and I'm pretty bad at getting a feel for which direction is which. Moreover, I'm especially bad at being able to discern places I've only just experienced for the first time. So basically, I think all corners look similar and I kind of forget which direction I am pointed in about five seconds after orienting myself in that direction. Quality characteristics for this whole trip around the world thing, I KNOW. But, one thing I'm tremendously great at is reading maps. I can with serious confidence point at maps and points on these maps and decide which direction on the map needs to be traveled to successfully accomplish the task of hitting up wherever I need to go. Well, I've come to realize that with those three characterics combined, I'm probably worse off than if I couldn't read a map. Because the second I read my map, I'm tremendously confident of the plan of attack, but since all new buildings and streets look the same to me and because I really can't remember or understand which cardinal direction I'm heading after starting to walk, I'm just a dude who's really convinced he's going somewhere that is aimlessly wandering.
And so it went upon my arrival in the Bellevue neighborhood where my hostel was located. I had read that this hostel was potentially difficult to get to, but I had confidence in my map reading capabilities. That confidence was misplaced. I walked around aimlessly and asking Parisians about how to get to my hostel for about an hour. WITH ALL MY STUFF STRAPPED TO MY BODY. Turns out I'm carrying around 31 Kilos, which I think is like 68 pounds. Which actually didn't sound like too much to me before I've been having to carry it around all the time in three bags, my primary one being a non-trekking backpack that really isn't designed to be easy on the back and shoulders when carried as a backpack. The other two also just don't really fit comfortably on my shoulders when carrying the big duffel as a backpack. Long story long, I walked around with my awkward collection of not very functional luggage strapped to me for an hour but finally found the hostel. The first words out of the kiwi reception lady: "Can I offer you a glass of water, you look like you need it." Indeed, woman, indeed. I was drenched and looking pretty uncomfortable, and really the only thoughts in my head were: I hope I'm not on the fifth floor of a walk-up and god is it time for a beer yet.
Anyways, it worked out and I wasn't on the fifth floor, and there was no one in my room for the night yet. This I thought was a huge score (I had flashes of my time alone in the dorm in Brussels - this was not how it turned out, more on the roomie situation later). I cleaned up and hit the courtyard for a beer.
Within seconds I met Giovanni, an Italian guy living in Poland for work and actually in Paris for work as well, but staying at a hostel because he can't fathom being in a flat or hotel for over an entire week. "I'm Italian, I come from a huge family, If there aren't ten people in the room when I go to sleep, I feel lonely." Dude was full of these types of Gio-philosphy that I found hilarious and fun. We quickly were hitting it off and another hostel mate joined us. James from Belfast. Another great guy who ended up being a great companion for a weekend in Paris. Turns out the best language for all of us to understand each other in was Spanish, which I could not have been more amused by.
The three of us sat around drank beers, chatted and just enjoyed hanging out for a while then we went out to explore our neighborhood and get some grub. We stumbled upon a street that was lined with cafes bursting at the seams with Parisians. It was great there were NOT a lot of tourists were around. And we sat at Trippette and proceeded to have an excellent meal (I tried steak tartar from Giovanni's plate and hated it but, he seemed to love it) We joined a table of young french folks out for drinks on a Friday night.
My Dinner at Tripette:
We ended up staying at this cafe till closing time and got to chat with the locals a ton and really just have fun getting to know one another. It was one of my favorite nights out in memory. It ended pretty late with some dancing to rather good techno music. (Random aside: Giovanni had just come from four days at "the techno festival" - i never got clarity on which one or where, but I think many of his maxims and interesting stories started out with, "when at the techno festival, [insert life lesson in a great Italian accent here] - amusing.).
Saturday I woke up too early for being out till four am and hit up a GREAT street art tour. Turns out the neighborhood I was staying in was actually the epicenter for street art in Paris. It ended up being a great way to spend the day and I loved it. I snagged some cool pics with the good camera to be shared later. Saturday night I hung out with Giovanni and James a bit at the hostel and then headed down to the center to check out the tour at night (I Know, I Know - pretty touristy, but it's cool, terrible light show and al) Then hit up the Latin Quarter and basically walked for three hours. Tremendous good fun.
Saturday night I returned to the hostel room to find my really strange dorm mate in the same position she had been in early afternoon and the night before at four am. This woman was one weird cat. It was clear to me upon retiring to the dorm room that she hadn't left the room in well over 36 hours. Beyond that, in the afternoon she had monopolized the bathroom for about 4 hours. And every time I came back to the room to see if I could get in there. All I could here was either the shower being turned off and on repeatedly or the toilet being flushed incessantly. Over, and over, and over again. Then, when she was sitting not the bed not doing anything other than staring at the wall, she would scratch her skin in strange ways, blow on that patch of skin, and then rub it with her hand. She did this for hours. And all over her arms. Just on and on and on again. I'm convinced now she had some form of OCD but, although I really felt sorry for her, I couldn't help but be TREMENDOUSLY uncomfortable sharing space with her. There was another girl in our room from Argentina and she also was creeped out, and informed me that the scratching woman had asked her for money twice. Disturbing. Oh and she slept on newspapers spread out on top of the sheets provided by the hostel.
Inspite of the strangeness going on in my room, Sunday was an amazing day of travel in Paris. Giovanni, James and I went to the museum of modern art in the morning (the louvre line was about 3 hours at 9:15AM). This was a ton of fun, as Giovanni has a ton of opinions about art and is kind of amusing to just hear talk. So I think the three of us really enjoyed walking around checking out strange modern art and reacting to it. It was lots of fun. After that we checked out a market to buy some food for lunch. We had a delicious picnic of fresh breads and cheeses. Quite nice. Later that afternoon I went to Montmarte for the first time and fell completely in love. Next time in Paris, I'm definitely staying there and hanging out in that neighborhood more.
The later afternoon was spent at the Centre Pompidou. This was a blast - the building itself it tremendously strange with tubing running all over the exterior of it. It was pretty busy cause if was free on that Sunday. But still very enjoyable. I am decidedly a fan of contemporary art - it's just so much fun to wonder what the fuck these people are thinking when they make these things. Excellent way to spend some time. After that we returned to the hostel for happy hour with some other travelers which ended in some drinking and snacking in the park above Bellevue. Pretty great way to close my time in Paris.
Centre Pompidou:
Next day was a travel day to Dusseldorf and aside from some light worry I would miss my train, was pretty uneventful. Much like Oostende, Paris was unplanned but ended up being a highlight of the trip thus far. Too much fun was had.
It feels like I'm on a roll.
Some of my favorite pics from the street art tour:
