Mile 30: Paris, the Crazy

My second day in France, I was fortunate enough to get a free SAS trip ticket to Paris on an architectural tour (so excited!). The idea behind the tour was that two professors, one architecture and one engineering, would take students around Paris’s major monuments; however, the day was quite depressing because of the many itinerary changes and lack of contact with professors. After a long drive to Paris, we arrived at Notre Dame. The actual monument was spectacular and the elements of French Gothic Architecture resonated with the exterior flying buttresses and interior statues and windows (the large rose one was breathtaking). But, the guide was so absentminded that he failed to notice a long line forming. He gave us a long speech instead of letting inside the church and by the time we got in, we only had 15 mins to explore. We clicked a ton of photos and when we came out, the guide had changed the itinerary; we headed to lunch instead of the Pompidou museum.

Jacqui, Ray and I grabbed some sandwiches at a cute roadside café (which had some seriously cute waiters!), did some souvenir shopping (I bought two magical scarves) and then rode the bus to our next stop, the Eiffel Tower. Initially, we were supposed to take the metro there but once again, plans changed (seriously!?). The traffic in Paris was so bad that it took us over an hour to get to the Tower. We had a guided tour of the tower and a reservation to avoid the lines, or so we thought. The Eiffel Tower was magnificent in its architecture and engineering but the guide moved through the structure so fast that he lost some students in the crowds and also didn’t allow the professors to give information about its construction. 
 

We waited in two 45 min lines to see the views from 2^nd floor and the very top floor. The views, as you can see, were breathtaking and all of Paris spread out in rows before us. But, once again, we had very little time to take photos (15 mins) before having to run back to the bus. Our final stop, the Pompidou museum, was close to Notre Dame so we took another long ride back to that area of town. I really enjoyed this ride, however, because it had begun to rain hard and the city seemed to be washing away the awkwardness of the morning.

A fresh start? Not really. When we arrived at the Pompidou, the tour guide stated that they did not have tickets for us and we were supposed to admire the place from the outside. The professors attempted to tell us about the structure, but once again were thwarted by the guide who interrupted continually. The museum was unlike anything I had seen before; it reminded me of a giant hamster maze. Finally, one of the professors paid for our entry into the museum to see the views from the top, since he felt it had already been a hard day (very nice of him!). Once again, we were there for about 15 mins before we had to head back to the bus and the guide stated we could grab dinner on the way home.

The guide wanted to leave Paris by 6pm but this choice, again, turned out to be a bad one because 6pm was rush hour traffic in Paris and it took us more than 2 hours to get out of the city (had this guide never been to Paris before?!). We rode another 3 hours back to Le Havre and stopped at a truck station for dinner (so annoying!). It seemed to me that if we had been given an opportunity to eat dinner in Paris and perhaps stay at the museum longer, we would have avoided this traffic and had a better experience. Students and professors alike were so disappointed by the day that none of them wanted to fill out evaluations. We finally did but I believe all of them were negative since we spent more than 8 hours on the bus, more time than in the city of Paris.

I really had no right to complain, since my ticket was free, but it was hard not to look at the day as a waste. It would have been more efficient to just go off on my own all day instead of being herded around and seeing sites for very short periods of time. On the way home, I listened to my ipod and tried to sleep, attempting to empty my frustrations. From my end, I didn’t really feel like I got to see the real Paris. It seemed like a blur seen through a cloudy window mixed with hoards of people and a very rush-rush attitude. I know that this is not the real Paris, the one everyone raves about when they visit, so I hope I get to go back and see it again with fresh eyes (rose colored ones). Can I have a mulligan?!