Man, what a day! I'm exhausted. I don't think I've done this much walking since I first got here. I got an extra hour of sleep this morning thanks to daylight savings time. This morning, like mornings past, Jean-Francois was still sleeping when I woke up so I was forced to eat my breakfast in the small kitchen. I guess it isn't that bad, but I'd like to sit at a table and watch tv or something. Renee was already gone when I woke up. I took a shower and headed out for a day of exploring Paris. I took my metro line (13) to Montparnasse and transferred to the 6 and rode it all the way to the end of the line. I knew that it was going to be a long ride so I brought my headphones so I could listen to my iPod on my phone. Last night I put "Sweet Caroline" on my iPod and when I went to turn it on, I noticed that "Sweet Caroline" was the only song I had on my iPod. I don't know how it happened, but all of my songs that were on my phone got deleted off of it when I put "Sweet Caroline" on it. So I listened to the song twice and then put my headphones away because I couldn't listen to one song the entire time.
It took about 30 minutes to get to my final destination. I got off the train and all of a sudden some behind me screams in my ear and grabs me. I nearly peed my pants. It was Amber, the girl I invited along with me. She thought it was just SO FUNNY that she scared the crap out of me. I looked at her with my "I'm pissed face" and told her it wasn't funny and don't do it again. Maybe I overreacted a little, but it really wasn't that funny at all. We walked out of the metro and headed into Pere-Lachaise cemetery. Pere-Lachaise is the biggest cemetery in Paris, most visited and is one of the biggest in all of Europe. There are many famous people buried there including: Frederic Chopin, Eugene Delacroix, Jean de la Fontaine, Jim Morrison, Victor Noir, Edith Piaf, and Oscar Wilde...just to name a few. I thought about picking up a map of the cemetery somewhere because I knew that it was very big. But I didn't because I didn't have a map in the Montparnasse Cemetery, so I thought I'd be fine. A piece of advice: if you ever come to Paris and want to visit Pere-Lachaise, b
ring a map if you really want to see the popular graves. W
e just walked around, and while we did end up finding them it would have been a lot easier if we had a map. I took so many pictures in the cemetery. Here are a few of my favorites... to the left is obviously trees. The streets, I guess you would call them, are all cobble-stone and are lined with trees. It was so pretty. I've heard that it looks really pretty in the spring too because of all the flowers that are planted there. The next picture is inside the crematorium. It was a huge open complex filled with squares that hold the ashes. This wasn't the only section. It kept going and going and going. A lot of the squares had little holders where you can put flowers as you can see from the picture. We kept walking and came across the grave of Victor Noir, a French journalist. The tomb is very realistic. I read on Wikipedia that it appears that Noir was sexually aroused because of his "large penis pushing his part-unbuttoned f
ly open." It also said that the sculpture has become a fertility symbol. People kiss his lips and rub his crotch. You can really tell that people do in fact rub on Noir because his penis is golden from all the rubbing...to the bottom left is Victor Noir in all his glory. The whole thing is really funny if you think about it. I love how someone put a flower in the lapel of his jacket. Classy. We kept walking and ended up at the very bottom of the cemetery. We came across many monuments dedicated to the Jewish French who lost their lives at concentration camps such as Auschwitz and Buchenwald. The monuments were really sad, but were very touching at the same time. All of the monuments were written in French and I was able to read and understand the majority of them, which makes me really happy. If you didn't know this, there is a scene in "Paris, Je t'aime" that takes place in the cemetery. Here's the clip from YouTube...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJYd7lelmqs We found Oscar Wilde's tomb and although I've seen pictures of it, and I've seen Paris, Je t'aime a million and a half times, it really wasn't as grand as I expected. I mean it was pretty cool looking
and all. I thought about kissing the tomb like everyone else does but then I decided not to because who knows how many millions of people have kissed it, men and women because I'm pretty sure Oscar Wilde was gay, I didn't want to get some weird disease or something from smooching Oscar Wilde's grave. Here's a picture of it to the left. After staring at everything that has been written on the grave, we left and started looking for Edith Piaf's grave. Amber didn't know who she was, or who Oscar Wilde was...I'll admit, I was pretty shocked, so I told her everything I knew about them. Edith Piaf's grave with difficult to spot. It's not as big as Oscar Wilde's. We saw this American couple and asked to look at their map. They asked who we were looking for and they told us exactly where to go. We found the right street and were able to find it because all of the people that were there. I believe she is buried with her family. The picture of Edith Piaf's grave is below Oscar Wilde's. There were a lot of people there and it was in a very small space so we did not stay there for very long. We made our way back to a map and found where Jim Morrison's grave was on the map. It seemed like it was going to be pretty easy to get to, we just had to go near the entrance and it sh
ould be right over there. Well, we made it to one of the entrances, and ended up missing his grave completely. As we were staring at the map trying to memorize it so we wouldn't get lost again, this guy came up to us and asked us who we were looking for. We told him Jim Morrison, I bet Amber didn't know who that was either, and he said he was looking for him too. We decided to walk there together. His name was Teddy, he's 21 and from Milwaukee....small world right? He's studying in Italy for the semester and is in Paris on fall break. He seemed like a nice guy. Amber was drilling him, asking him all these questions. I felt bad for the guy. We thought we were going the right direction but, got lost yet again. Teddy, who speaks Italian, asked this Italian family, how he knew they were Italian I have no clue, where Jim's grave was and they pointed us in the right direction. The picture of Jim's grave is below and to the left. The grave was barricaded off, which I thought was weird. I read that in the past they had problems with people going to close to the grave or defacing it. There is an inscription in Greek, ΚΑΤΑ ΤΟΝ ΔΑΙΜΟΝΑ ΕΑΥΤΟΥ, on the tombstone that translates to, "true to his own spirit." It is one of the most popular graves in the entire cemetery, and I can see why, he was a rock icon. There used to be a bust of Morrison on the grave but it was stolen...go figure. We hung
around the grave for a while just looking at it. There were a TON of people there. I guess it's pretty easy to spot it once you find the huge crowd. We left Jim's grave and Amber and I headed for the exit and Teddy wanted to wander around still. He did that whole "kiss on the cheek thing" as a goodbye. I guess they do that in Italy too...whatever he was cool I guess. We left and got back on the metro and headed to Sacre-Coeur.
ring a map if you really want to see the popular graves. W
e just walked around, and while we did end up finding them it would have been a lot easier if we had a map. I took so many pictures in the cemetery. Here are a few of my favorites... to the left is obviously trees. The streets, I guess you would call them, are all cobble-stone and are lined with trees. It was so pretty. I've heard that it looks really pretty in the spring too because of all the flowers that are planted there. The next picture is inside the crematorium. It was a huge open complex filled with squares that hold the ashes. This wasn't the only section. It kept going and going and going. A lot of the squares had little holders where you can put flowers as you can see from the picture. We kept walking and came across the grave of Victor Noir, a French journalist. The tomb is very realistic. I read on Wikipedia that it appears that Noir was sexually aroused because of his "large penis pushing his part-unbuttoned f
ly open." It also said that the sculpture has become a fertility symbol. People kiss his lips and rub his crotch. You can really tell that people do in fact rub on Noir because his penis is golden from all the rubbing...to the bottom left is Victor Noir in all his glory. The whole thing is really funny if you think about it. I love how someone put a flower in the lapel of his jacket. Classy. We kept walking and ended up at the very bottom of the cemetery. We came across many monuments dedicated to the Jewish French who lost their lives at concentration camps such as Auschwitz and Buchenwald. The monuments were really sad, but were very touching at the same time. All of the monuments were written in French and I was able to read and understand the majority of them, which makes me really happy. If you didn't know this, there is a scene in "Paris, Je t'aime" that takes place in the cemetery. Here's the clip from YouTube...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJYd7lelmqs We found Oscar Wilde's tomb and although I've seen pictures of it, and I've seen Paris, Je t'aime a million and a half times, it really wasn't as grand as I expected. I mean it was pretty cool looking
and all. I thought about kissing the tomb like everyone else does but then I decided not to because who knows how many millions of people have kissed it, men and women because I'm pretty sure Oscar Wilde was gay, I didn't want to get some weird disease or something from smooching Oscar Wilde's grave. Here's a picture of it to the left. After staring at everything that has been written on the grave, we left and started looking for Edith Piaf's grave. Amber didn't know who she was, or who Oscar Wilde was...I'll admit, I was pretty shocked, so I told her everything I knew about them. Edith Piaf's grave with difficult to spot. It's not as big as Oscar Wilde's. We saw this American couple and asked to look at their map. They asked who we were looking for and they told us exactly where to go. We found the right street and were able to find it because all of the people that were there. I believe she is buried with her family. The picture of Edith Piaf's grave is below Oscar Wilde's. There were a lot of people there and it was in a very small space so we did not stay there for very long. We made our way back to a map and found where Jim Morrison's grave was on the map. It seemed like it was going to be pretty easy to get to, we just had to go near the entrance and it sh
ould be right over there. Well, we made it to one of the entrances, and ended up missing his grave completely. As we were staring at the map trying to memorize it so we wouldn't get lost again, this guy came up to us and asked us who we were looking for. We told him Jim Morrison, I bet Amber didn't know who that was either, and he said he was looking for him too. We decided to walk there together. His name was Teddy, he's 21 and from Milwaukee....small world right? He's studying in Italy for the semester and is in Paris on fall break. He seemed like a nice guy. Amber was drilling him, asking him all these questions. I felt bad for the guy. We thought we were going the right direction but, got lost yet again. Teddy, who speaks Italian, asked this Italian family, how he knew they were Italian I have no clue, where Jim's grave was and they pointed us in the right direction. The picture of Jim's grave is below and to the left. The grave was barricaded off, which I thought was weird. I read that in the past they had problems with people going to close to the grave or defacing it. There is an inscription in Greek, ΚΑΤΑ ΤΟΝ ΔΑΙΜΟΝΑ ΕΑΥΤΟΥ, on the tombstone that translates to, "true to his own spirit." It is one of the most popular graves in the entire cemetery, and I can see why, he was a rock icon. There used to be a bust of Morrison on the grave but it was stolen...go figure. We hung
around the grave for a while just looking at it. There were a TON of people there. I guess it's pretty easy to spot it once you find the huge crowd. We left Jim's grave and Amber and I headed for the exit and Teddy wanted to wander around still. He did that whole "kiss on the cheek thing" as a goodbye. I guess they do that in Italy too...whatever he was cool I guess. We left and got back on the metro and headed to Sacre-Coeur.Sacre-Coeur sits atop this huge hill, the highest point in Paris. It really is breath taking; the view of the church and the 266+ steps up to the top of the hill. After the first flight Amber was like I need to stop, and I was like omg, come on you're fine. I was trucking it up that hill. There is a little tram that you can take up to the top but what fun is that? To the bottom left is me, and Sacre-Coeur before we started climbing the steps. I haven't retouched the picture at all....it really is that white. I can't imagine all the cleaning they must do to keep it that white. The next picture is the view from the top of the stairs. There are more stairs that lead up to the church. 
People sit on the steps and just hang out and people watch. I wanted to sit down but there were so many people on the steps it was difficult finding a spot. We went into the church,
which I did not go in when we came to Sacre-Coeur in high school. It was very pretty. You aren't allowed to take pictures in the church, so that's why I don't have any. It's a Roman Catholic church and is very pretty inside. You can buy a candle and light it but that was 2 Eruos....so I didn't. I really didn't see the point of it anyways. When we got out of the church we walked around to the other side 
where a bunch of cars were parked. We got an awesome view of the Eiffel Tower. I don't think people really knew about this awesome view because there was no one over there except us. We decided to start walking down the steps because Amber had to get back to babysit. We headed down the first flight of stairs and this guy was singing "Let it Be" and everyone was singing along and clapping their hands. I was singing too, it was pretty awesome. To the left is what it looked like when everyone was singing along. Amber asked me what the song was, apparently she'd never heard it before...again, I was pretty shocked. It was one of those experiences where you're just like wow.....it's really cool how people from all over the world, sitting on these steps know all the words to one song. The guy stopped...he was actually really good, and everyone cheered. We headed back down all the stairs. After looking at a few shops and picking up a few gifts, we headed for the metro. Amber went one direction and I went the other. The ride back was pretty long. Good thing I didn't have my music to listen to...
People sit on the steps and just hang out and people watch. I wanted to sit down but there were so many people on the steps it was difficult finding a spot. We went into the church,
which I did not go in when we came to Sacre-Coeur in high school. It was very pretty. You aren't allowed to take pictures in the church, so that's why I don't have any. It's a Roman Catholic church and is very pretty inside. You can buy a candle and light it but that was 2 Eruos....so I didn't. I really didn't see the point of it anyways. When we got out of the church we walked around to the other side 
where a bunch of cars were parked. We got an awesome view of the Eiffel Tower. I don't think people really knew about this awesome view because there was no one over there except us. We decided to start walking down the steps because Amber had to get back to babysit. We headed down the first flight of stairs and this guy was singing "Let it Be" and everyone was singing along and clapping their hands. I was singing too, it was pretty awesome. To the left is what it looked like when everyone was singing along. Amber asked me what the song was, apparently she'd never heard it before...again, I was pretty shocked. It was one of those experiences where you're just like wow.....it's really cool how people from all over the world, sitting on these steps know all the words to one song. The guy stopped...he was actually really good, and everyone cheered. We headed back down all the stairs. After looking at a few shops and picking up a few gifts, we headed for the metro. Amber went one direction and I went the other. The ride back was pretty long. Good thing I didn't have my music to listen to...When I got back to my metro stop I decided to stop at the bakery because I was starving. I didn't eat lunch today. So I bought a pain au chocolat and ate in this dog park next to the apartment. When I was done I went back to the apartment. Jean-Francois left a note on the table....he finally left. I made pizza for dinner, and ended up burning it. I ate it though because I had nothing else to eat. It was alright...a little crispy. Renee came home from work and walked into the living room where I was listening to music and writing this and she asked me why I didn't eat the pastry she bough for me. I didn't even see it this morning. I thought it was just bread and I didn't want bread. She was like I told you I'd buy you some thing special on Sunday mornings. I felt bad, but told her thank you, and that I'd eat it tomorrow morning. I didn't think that she would keep doing that. She bought me something a few Sundays ago, before she left for vacation but I just assumed it was a one time deal. She ate dinner and we decided that we're going to have dinner tomorrow night instead of our usual lunch on Monday, because I probably won't be here.
It feels a lot later than 9:35, but I guess I did have to change my clock back an hour. The Bears game is on back home so I'm probably going to listen to that for a while and try to put my music back on my phone. Wish me luck. Tomorrow I'm going to Notre Dame, Shakespeare and Company and take a walk along the Seine...should be a good time.
A bientot
ugh it hurts too much to read this. i cannot wait.
ReplyDeleteahhhhhhh
(and i can send you the sweet caroline song, i got it lol)