A Parisian Love Affair

Finally got to Paris after so long. They say, Paris is the city of romance… city of love… city of branded goods. I agree to pretty much a large extent of it. After experiencing it myself, I must say that it's a place where people are extremely proud and highly racist too. I am not making a sweeping statement, of course there are people who treated us, as in Asians very well, give us very good service, but what was disappointing was that in such a high class society, high class city. There are people in branded boutiques who don't give two hoots about customers who walked into the shops, treated us as if we were invisible, as if we were dirt. Security guards looking at us as if we are thieves, searched the girls’ bags when we enter. Yet at the same time when the locals came in, they just waved them through. Think there is still much to be done towards the mentality of the people to make them as beautiful as the city itself. Their attitude is certainly a huge black mark, huge eye sore in this beautiful landscape. Just as much as they hated the Effiel tower, claiming that the huge metallic iron is standing out like a sore thumb, an eye sore to the city’s skyline.

Nonetheless, despite all these, I still pretty much enjoyed myself during the stay, having fun exploring the city with the company of 2 lovely ladies. First day, we went to a Vietnamese restaurant for lunch. I had heard so much about this restaurant even before I got there, claiming how delicious the food is. What is a better way than to taste it for yourself. I was indeed won over by how tasty the food is, no wonder it's a must go when we are there. After lunch, the girls decided to go shopping, for of course what Paris is famous for. First stop was some streets where only Goyard was found and some of the rest pop over to Hermes. I myself, luckily was never into such stuff, so this is a money saving trip for me. I am more interested to see what this city has to offer. Nonetheless, after visiting these 2 places, we went over to Champs-Elysees, supposedly the main shopping street of Paris, the Orchard Road of Paris where you can find all the big brands. I had a fun time taking photos of this beautiful street with all the lightings and Arc de Triomphe at the end of the street giving the pictures a very nice view. Catherine brought us to LaDuree for dessert, suppose to be a very “upmarket” restaurant with very find food and dessert. Due to some unpleasant incidences which I mentioned above, we ended up choosing not to eat there and just packed some dessert to go back to the hotel to eat. In the end, we ended up having mussels at Leon’s which was near our hotel. Much was heard about this Leon’s mussels too and certainly it didn't disappoint as well. We had nothing but just mussels for dinner, huge bowls of it cooked in different styles before going back to the hotel to sample the desserts and for the girls, to check out their shopping spree.

The next day, Liwen and Leane were my buddies to go sightseeing. Even before they were up, I was already out in the blistering cold trying to take morning sunrise photos at the Arc de Triomphe. It was a beautiful sight, though not as nice as what we saw on the first day where there is a red ball of orange in the middle of the arch. But it still provided some of the most beautiful pictures I captured for this trip. After that, I went back to meet them before heading out to our first stop – Monmarte. It's an area where a very famous cathedral is located on a hilltop and boy! What a view it is. The white building looks gorgeous against the clear blue sky and a antique looking carousel brought us many memories from our childhood days. We had a whale of time taking photos there and climbing up to the cathedral at the hilltop allowed us a scenic view of the Parisian skyline. An extremely beautiful view. After Monmarte, we headed further down the street after being told that Moulin Rouge was around in the same area, being hardcore sightseers, we have no qualms of walking in the cold to get to see this famous playhouse that was in the movies. Reaching there, it was somewhat disappointing because it was not as grand as what I thought it would be. It was merely a pretty shabby looking two storey high building with a windmill at the top of the building. Well, at least I seen what izzit like.

Next stop was towards Notre Dame Cathedral where the cartoon Hunchback of Notre Dame is based on and where certain scenes of Van Helsing was shot. Its some distance away so we had to take metro to get there. The church is beautiful and as usual, we had a lot of fun taking photos at the church with exquisite carvings. From Notre Dame, we took a long stroll in search of the Lourve Museum. Who could give Lourve a miss with the beautiful glass prisms being such a unique feature. We spent quite some time there taking photos after photos… until one of our camera went flat. It was then when we realize that its time to move on to our last stop, the Effiel tower before we are totally out of battery for any photos. The huge bronze tower was a sight, we had a lot of fun fiddling with our camera, shooting random, stupid photos, ending up in endless laughter. That was not the end as someone had to get some items somewhere else before the shops close and we headed back to Effiel again later in the night to see the light up before having dinner at some cafe nearby to settle our hungry stomach and heading back for the night.

Was certainly one of the more fun sightseeing trips that I had so far, and I find myself caring a lot for a certain L. maybe its her character and who she is which attracted me to her. Actually, I dunno what to do now, for fear that I might scare her off if I come on too direct… just gotta see how things go I guess.. take things easy, it might just be a crush afterall. Paris is certainly a city with love, a city of Romance…