Day 37: Paris to London

Highlights:

• Familiarity with the Boulangerie Assistant
• Tony Shaw's Tour of London
• Ligretto and Game of Knowledge, a 80s children's trivial pursuit

After checking the election results, I packed quickly in the morning (did I mention that I'd washed and folded all my clothes already?) and then went for a quick farewell to the Boulangerie. Turns out she knew my order already; two croissants and a baguette tradition. I've only been here ten days. I 100% believe I haven't eaten 20 croissants and 10 baguettes. That's insane. I also stopped off for some journey supplies, and accidentally became involved in one customer's annoyance with the staff. I made some French sounding 'ooh la la, non, merh' sounds in response which seemed to satisfy her though I had NO idea what she was talking about. I went to take a quick photo of Mavis (below) and then went back to tidy up and listen to another Bernstein. 

Like all international high-flyers, I was getting the Megabus home. On Wednesdays, if you're under 26, the maximum you pay on any journey is £5. If you have £2.50 of T*sco club card points, this doubles in megabus vouchers and pays for the entire journey. So for this bus ride, I only had to pay a 50p reservation fee. Seriously. 50p to get home from Paris.  The bus station was at Porte Maillot just slightly north west of where I was, so I grabbed my final Metro and then an RER line (which I think is their overground?). It wasn't exactly clear where you had to go as you came out of the RER station, but I asked and found you had to just walk past the Palais des Congres, and then turn right and you can see a few buses parked up. Not an obvious, huge bus park, but a little common sense will get you there. I don't know why I thought the driver of the Mega Bus would be French, but I started trying to say "J'ai un billet pour Londres" when in his best southern accent said 'You're going to London? I'm going to London too!'. What a joker. He greeted all the passengers like they were long lost friends. Calvin, his name was. He made a few more jokes and then we were on our way.

So after trying to defend English humour to Isabelle, I was somewhat struggling as Calvin told an anecdote about how he saw a man give a homeless guy some food. The guy's face lit up then fell as he realised it was some Pedigree Chum for his dog. The driver thought it was classic. He laughed for ages. I felt like crying for that poor man. The only thing that cheered me up was discovering the free WiFi on the bus. 50p for a half-full bus with toilet (I didn't try it, but the whole bus looked pretty clean/modern), a Ferry crossing and free WiFi. Brilliant. We raced through France, which was looking pretty grey and miserable, and at some point along the way when I must have been napping, Calvin got off and someone else started driving us. An easy bit of passport control at Calais, and we made the earlier ferry crossing than planned. 

Not really much to say about ferries, is there? We were on the Spirit of Britain if that's of any interest? You can read more about it on this informed website (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1345529/Spirit-Britain-Biggest-cross-Channel-vessel-steams-Dover-port.html). Look at those pictures and just imagine me and some strangers sitting there, charging our phones. I bought some Fireman Sam tissues (he's Welsh, you know) and then had to defend myself to the shop assistant for my choice. He obviously thought we were kindred spirits and broke into an anecdote about Andy Pandy or something. He was trying out Movember but definitely fell into the looks-like-a-sex-offender-who-lurks-in-park-playgrounds category.

We pulled into Dover. I took a deep breath to prepare myself for miserable England (Facebook updates from my UK friends over the past few weeks have been mainly about the weather) and looked out above the White Cliffs with a sense of foreboding only to see a nice blue/purple sky, with the sun just setting. Beautiful! It didn't take long for that feeling to fade though, and I felt myself descending into post-holiday blues. I sulked as it got dark quickly, and I put on some Bon Iver to match my mood. But as we neared London, I decided to fix up. I spotted Canary Wharf in the distance and I put some big songs on that would bring the city to life. Elbow, Arcade Fire, Alabama Shakes, Beck and then as we drove properly into the centre, I put on some solid music*. 

So despite having been all over Europe and seen so many cool cities, London is still an impressive city to come into. Landmarks aside, other features had all of a sudden developed a nostalgic warmth. Never before have New Cross Gate station and Elephant and Castle roundabout looked so beautiful. The big Tesco near Old Kent Road looked like some sort of architectural masterpiece. The kebaberies and insert-any-word-here-FCs (Fried Chicken) houses looked mouth-watering. The bus crossed the Thames (probably the best European river?) and I could see Big Ben (Is it Elizabeth Tower now?) all lit up and the London Eye in all its Ferris Wheel glory. What a sight. 

We pulled into Victoria Station around 6pm, and my brilliant housemate Tony was waiting in his car ("Barbara, call me Barbs") to pick me up. It was peak rush hour (yeah, so London is the worst city in Europe that I've seen for traffic. Paris second worst), so we ended up taking a slow tour through central London. It was just as good as, if not better than, arriving in the European cities. We drove past Buckingham Palace (Tour Guide Tony 'That's Parliament), down the Mall (Tony - "That's Marble Arch"), across Trafalgar Square, seeing the National Gallery and Nelson's Column (Tony - "That's Cleopatra's Needle"), along Embankment seeing Somerset House, the National Theatre and the new Blackfriars Solar-powered Bridge (which is actually really cool if you haven't seen it - http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/picture/2012/jul/05/blackfriars-solar-bridge). Up past the Crossrail works near Farringdon (apparently even with this super-fast new train, it's still going to take 46minutes from Shenfield to Farringdon. That doesn't seem much more of a timesaver than the current train service....), seeing St Paul's (Tony - "That's the Shard) and the Shard lit up with red lights (Tony - "That's St Paul's").

So an interesting development; we passed a bus which advertised the PQA (Pauline Quirke Academy of Performing Arts). Seems somewhat niche. Also, seems people have mastered the Boris Bike Wheelie since I've been gone? That was pretty impressive. I also listened to my first ever Zane Lowe (WHO'S ON BOARD?) as we drove up through Angel. He announced that they're playing Arcade Fire's 'Neon Bible' in full next week as part of their 'Masterpieces' segment. Apparently mixed in with interviews with the band. We headed to Becka's house just off Essex Road. Wednesday night is normally Dodgeball night (we're in a league, and our team seem to have suspiciously only started winning since I've been away...), but there was a week off (following the Fancy Dress special the previous week) so the team had congregated at Becka's for a games night. There was a beautiful reunion with my friend/editor/landlord Abbie, and then after dinner we got on with the serious business of Ligretto (http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=ligretto). This is actually a really fun game, if a tad aggressive with certain players, so I'd recommend it. Then we played some 1980s kid's board game that we found in the corner of the room called GAME OF KNOWLEDGE. It was a bit like Trivial Pursuit but instead of cheeses you got planet rings. The questions might have been easy in the 80s, so even by answering the kids questions, it was a bit tricky ("Who is the current pope?" etc). I've found a link for it but bear in mind, this version is MUCH more modern than ours. Our cards were all crusty and dusty. The game asking about English 1980s general knowledge was perhaps slightly more difficult for the Canadian players amongst us (http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/3514/game-of-knowledge).

After a few serious hours of gaming, we up and left, passing this creepy mofo on the way out:

Back home, I found my new Kindle Fire waiting for me, but even better, a new hob. A hob that can heat up in under 20minutes. What a treat. Tony is probably the only 20something guy I know who could fit a new hob by himself; he's a total DIY marvel. 

I went to bed on my MEMORY FOAM (which I'm pretty sure remembered me. It seemed to sigh with relief at my return), wearing new pyjamas and fell asleep watching an episode of Red Dwarf on my Kindle Fire.

End of Day 37.

* A selection of my Driving-into-London playlist: Talking Heads (Naive Melody), Blur (End of a Century), Django Django (Default), Arcade Fire (Rebellion), Alabama Shakes (Hold On), Elbow (One Day Like This), Jamie T (Sticks and Stones), Supergrass (Moving), Beck (Think I'm in Love), De La Soul Presents Plug One and Plug Two (Must Be the Music) and Bloc Party (One More Chance)

Day 33: Paris

Highlights:

• Argument in the local Monoprix
• Film conversation with Isabelle
• Bar Dix with Marthe and Siemen
• Wayne Shorter at the Salle Pleyel

So I think I've made a good attempt at paying my way here. I mean, Lewis has provided the apartment, the scooter, he cooked most of the food and provided the Leonard Bernstein Symphony 60 disc boxset, but I went out to get the croissants again this morning whilst Lewis went to buy an iPhone. The normal Boulangerie was shut (it's a Saturday after all !) so I walked down Rue de Levis (Rue de Lewis) and stopped off at the Monoprix and then an alternative bakery. A young cashier was coming out of the storeroom in a huff. She was hobbling, and had obviously been asked to do something she didn't want to, like stacking shelves presumably. She stormed in front of me saying 'Je ne comprend pas!' a few times. I queued quite patiently for a while, with only one cashier in service. The lady was buzzing for help but no one came for 10minutes. Eventually her younger supervisor came out, and reluctantly helped out, then immaturely called the trolley man over and started whispering in his ear and then laughing whilst looking pointedly at the older lady. I wanted to deck him on her behalf. Dick.

I came back to the apartment and made Lewis a coffee (PAYING MY WAY) and sat speaking to his housemate Isabelle. She's originally from outside of Paris and had spent four years in Boston when she was younger, so her English is particularly good. Her dad was a Mathematician, and her mum was CEO for Sodexo's International business. In a slightly different style, Isabelle was studying film editing, though she admitted she had a natural ability for maths like her dad but it bored her. I told her about my attempt to plough through Bernstein's 60 discs over the next few days, and she said she'd been put off classical music after 7h car journeys being forced to listen to it by her dad as a kid. I reciprocated with my story about how my Dad had Johnny Cash's greatest hits stuck in his car cd player for 2 years. Similar.

Isabelle had spent a few days in the country with her parents for the holiday, but had come home a little early when she'd reached her family-time limit. We had a good conversation about Hitchcock (my new favourite Director, after seeing three films in a week at the BFI Festival this summer. 'The Lady Vanishes' was both of our favourite of his films. So much funnier and clever than I could have imagined) and then a good chat about the Alien trilogy; apparently the reason the Jean Pierre Jeunet (Amelie and Alien: Resurrection director) instalment was so awful was that no one respected him as a director. He was a mild, unassuming French guy without a great level of English, so the actors just didn't listen to him and did what ever they wanted. Hence Alien: Resurrection, which I haven't seen because I've heard it's the pits.

Lewis had work to do (though I suspected he spent a good few hours spending Angry Birds on his new iPhone), and I was meeting Marthe and Siemen later, so I kicked back with some good Camembert and read my Idiot's Guide to German. I've got a fair few of this series, clearly. Perfect for travelling and picking up nifty facts. Interestingly (you may all know this already but I'd call it my find of the day), I learned that the German for Thunder and Lightning is Donner und Blitz. Like the Reindeer. C'est tres interessant, oui?

I went to meet Marthe at my favourite Bar Dix Sangria Bar. They'd spent the day at the Sacre Coeur on Montmartre enjoying the view over Paris, probably the best place for it. We had some Sangria and reminisced about Essex University (our American friend Amanda falling down a muddy slope whilst wearing flipflops, then falling again when she tried to turn over and stand up, and Marthe crying with laughter for the next hour. As we talked about it, Marthe burst into peels of laughter again). Siemen told me about a series of airport security checks he'd been subjected to. A blonde, blue eyed dutch guy who somehow gets picked on around the world, then makes it worse by cracking up with laughter during questioning. The Chinese thought he didn't look like his passport picture (because all Westerners look the same) so he got taken to the side and had to sign his name five times to verify it was him. He was laughing the whole time of course.

I had to get back, so we left at 6.30pm and caught the Metro from L'Odeon, passing another mega queue in front of the cinema. They bloody love it here. On the Metro Marthe and I were trying to remember how to say 'The Laughing Cow' in French (yeah, the red laughing cow with cheese earrings. That's the one). Marthe commented that it must have sounded ridiculous to the French passengers to just hear an English and Dutch accent repeating (Le Vache Qui Rit!) again and again, and then cracking up with laughter, and repeating it again. Bloody tourists.

I was running late, so I actually ran back to the apartment from the Metro, sensing from Lewis' terse one word replies that he was annoyed at my timekeeping. I inhaled a plate of pasta (trop vit!), used the opportunity to put on my nice dress for the second time this trip, and then walked with Lewis to La Salle Pleyel on Rue du Faubourg (I recognise the word Faubourg from the Edith Piaf song 'L'Accordeoniste', but will have to research it later to give you and interesting fact about it). We were going to see Jazz Legend Wayne Shorter in concert with his quartet. I don't know much about Jazz. Lewis played some in the summer when I was getting ready for a temp job interview. It was hot, late on a Friday afternoon and I was trying not to drown in misery at being back in a suit. It was awful. The music was so unfamiliar, complex and hard to follow, that in my stressed state of mind I couldn't even begin to WANT to understand it. That was apparently Wayne Shorter (Lewis told me this after we'd bought the tickets for this show) but I figured a month of holiday had put me in a better frame of mind to understand it. This whole trip has been about trying new things, and taking advantage of whatever the cities and countries had to offer. It's led me to Kafka in Prague, photography in Krakow and Ballet in Budapest. And so Jazz at a famous venue in Paris seemed perfect. Lewis had played me some Wayne Shorter over the week and whilst I didn't completely get it, it made a bit more sense to me than before and I'd begun to enjoy it.

So Wayne Shorter is now almost 80, and had a famous period playing with Miles Davis in the 60s, and then (I've just learnt) playing on 10 studio albums for Joni Mitchell, as well as an expansive career with various other musicians and as a composer. He's primarily a Saxophonist in performance, though is by all accounts one of the greatest Jazz musicians alive, if not ever. Read more about him here if you're interested - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayne_Shorter.

We arrived just in time, and the hall darkened, with just some sportlights on the four instruments on stage. The quartet (pianist, saxophonist, double bass and then drummer) came out to a huge applause and began to tune up and play. I couldn't follow the first piece. It was about 20minutes long, and I couldn't work out what was happening. It was like four threads of separate music were playing, and I wasn't sure where they joined to make music. The dim light made it hard to focus, and the warm room started putting me to sleep. But then the next piece began, and I focussed and thought about it - what was happening visually and musically, and what it might mean - and (whilst I'm not sure this is the interpretation Lewis or any other Jazz fan would ever have about this music) I put my own reading to it, and it became exciting and crazy and so powerful, it was almost overwhelming. The way I saw it was that unlike a standard rock album or pop concert or film score, the Jazz seemed a much more realistic soundtrack to life. I mean, you don't walk down the street to the building sounds of a violin crescendo, or to nifty little songs about emotion; you walk down the street to sounds of birds, mixed with traffic, and shouting and rainfall. Each sound is very independent of the other, and don't quite appear beautiful or even musical! But then sometimes the threads of sound cross over and you can suddenly hear them work together in complete harmony. Like those two snorers in Ljubljana who at one point sounded like a dubstep beat. Or the beginning of Little April Shower from Bambi (bear with me on these weird, unsophisticated reference points). So I began to listen to this Quartet like I was listening to these sounds in someone's life. But what would normally be the sound of traffic was instead a phenomenal piece by this incredibly talented drummer, and what would be rainfall was this cool, complex and unusual build up by this amazing pianist. And you could focus in on one instrument at once, or sometimes two that worked together, or then even three if you were paying attention. And then at these perfect moments, all four came together and it was absolutely incredible. Without looking at each other, they all completely lost themselves in their own and each other's sounds, with complete trust and respect, and began to play something amazing. And I found myself grinning, and laughing and sitting on the edge of my seat and completely lapping it up. The drummer was bouncing about on his stool and when he sledge-hammered on one drum, the double bassist seemed to be physically forced back from him for a nanosecond, before diving back onto his instrument with a battering that felt like he was joining the drummer in battle.

This may be the ponciest thing you've ever read, but I'm not really sorry as this is what I felt and thought whilst I was watching, and what made it a powerful and exciting experience for me. I'm so, so glad I went, and had someone to introduce me to a genre I never thought I'd get. The quartet played for 1hr 45 solid (this guy is 79!), and then came on for an encore. This older guy next to me (not Lewis) was buzzing with excitement. He let out a 'Wow' at some point as he grinned away, and literally leapt out of his chair to applause at the end. It was really endearing, and it felt an honest reaction rather than a show he was putting on for other people, which is sometimes what I sense at a gig.

We poured out with the rest of the audience, a bit stunned and walked home, having a quick glass of some poor supermarket Bordeaux I'd bought, and then hitting the hay. I eventually fell asleep after one of Lewis' neighbours ended their heavy bass-filled party and my body stopped rattling.

End of day 33.

Day 32: Paris

Highlights:

• Bateaux Mouches
• Les Deux Moulins and Creme Brulee
• Scooter to a Friday night French Gym session

With a coffee and croissant, I listened to Beethoven's 2nd, 7th, 4th and 5th (duh duh duh, duuuuuh, da da da daaaaa) Symphonies before skipping to disc 56 to listen to some Sibelius. I reckon I can make a significant dent on this stuff before leaving. Master wine tasting, tanka writing and classical symphonies. I then listened to Lewis give me a healthy dose of grief about how sarcastic I am. I think I probably responded with the finest sarcasm I could muster. Highest form of wit.

I got the train to Assemblee Nationale via Saint Lazare (said in my finest English accent to annoy Lewis). You can buy 10 tickets at once on the Metro - costing €12.70 instead of €17 - to be used at any time, so really worth the money. There was an Accordion busker on the metro, so I sneakily listened in without him knowing, and vaguely paid attention to Michel Thomas teaching me how to ask someone to come to dinner, because I have something very important to tell them. Can't see me using that line over the next few days.

Marthe, Siemen and I had planned to go to the Musee d'Orsey, but there was the most ridiculously long queue outside. The only way I can quantify it is saying it's the largest queue I've ever seen. You can question me on previous queue sightings when I get back. Surprising really to discover any sort of orderly queueing in Europe. It's normally an imploite free-for-all. Anyway, we really couldn't see the point of queuing two hours for probably a one hour viewing. Because of the 1st November Thursday public holiday, most people also take the Friday off to make a long weekend, so that could explain all the visitors. Can't imagine the Brits spending two hours queuing outside the latest
V&A exhibit on a bank holiday.

The weather was pretty shocking, so we decided to get the Bateaux Mouches
(Fly Boats I think might be the translation?) from Pont de l'Alma. I figure you can't do the boat tours in every city because they'd become really dull (Europe all looks relatively similar, and a river is a river), but Paris has probably got to be a good choice. €11.50 a ticket for an hour's ride, and then a fairly priced small bottle of Evian for €2.50...They had an option called the 'Night ride 'yes'' tour, which involved a greeting by the Captain followed by a romantic dinner for two on a boat, being serenaded by a violin and piano, drinking champagne and eating chocolates...presumably all as a set up for a cringingly unoriginal proposal, where the lady is presumably too bombarded by the sickening display around her to say no.

It was raining from time to time, but Marthe and I went out to the front and took some photos of the Notre Dame (translation 'Our Dome') and the Eiffel Tower, whilst Siemen took a nap. I was going to drop in my knowledge of Gustave Eiffel, but Marthe beat me to it. Going to have to save those facts for someone else.

After the boat ride, we headed up to Montmartre (translation is 'martyr mountain' I think) by Metro. It felt like rush hour London; we were proper sardines. Marthe joked that she was going to use the opportunity to pinch my bum, and I eyed a few dodgy men who probably were actually doing that to unsuspecting women. We got off at Place de Clichy and headed to Les Deux Moulins on Rue Lepic.

(Photo taken in July 2012)

Presumably everyone knows why this is famous? It's the cafe that Amelie Poulain works at in the film 'Amelie', and whilst it's now the sort of tourist spot that I'd usually avoid, I've yet to meet an Amelie fan I dislike and figured at least the guests would be at worst decent and at best, lifelong friends I'd yet to make. We were sat at a table and had a look at the basic menu; seemingly it only served a few types of brunch and then Creme Brulee (one of Amelie's favourite experiences is obviously cracking the top of a creme brulee with the side of a spoon), so we all ordered a portion, and then later some pommes frites. A nice dinner course reversal of dessert first, mains second. The cafe is only slightly adapted from the film, with a few film posters up on the walls, a few extra tables added and the tabac store removed. I guided myself to the loo based on the scene where two customers have sex in the bathroom (success!) and whilst being pretty grubby like most French toilets*, the wall was covered with photos of Amelie's dad's garden gnome in front of famous sites around the world.

When I first watched Amelie, I assumed it was set in a town just outside of Paris, as the images didn't at all match my visions of Paris. It mentioned the Notre Dame, but I figured she'd gone on a day trip. Only on visiting Paris did I realise the film is actually just set entirely in the Montmartre area. Amelie's love interest works in a sex shop called 'Palace Video' on Boulevard de Clichy, and she lived in a flat up the hill from the cafe.

After our food, I took Marthe and Siemen on a mini-guide of Montmartre. I was aiming for the Abbesses Metro but of course got us lost. To M&S, I described it as an intentional 'early evening meandering stroll around a nice part of town'. The roads all rise up to the base of the Sacre Coeur, so at least we worked off half a teaspoon of creme brulee going up the steep roads. I eventually found what I was looking for. The wall of love, with 'I Love You' written in a gazillion other languages. Unfortunately, the park was shut so you couldn't actually see it, making my tour somewhat pointless (though see the photo below that I took in the summer). Redeemed it slightly by going into the St Jean de Montmartre L'Eglise. It was a large church just off the main Abbesses courtyard and with it's wide open doors, it felt welcoming where many other churches feel exclusive or intimidating. The style seemed more rustic than a traditional church, with wooden domed ceilings and dim lighting, and it had a real warmth despite being so wide and sparse.

I knew my way from here, and left M&S at the cinema looking up times for Skyfall whilst I walked back to the apartment. Lewis had spent the day writing a jazz hit (I'm optimistic) so we listened to that a few times, examined what looked like a minor bike scrape to me but seemed the equivalent horror of losing a limb to Lewis and watched another episode of Red Dwarf. I love Cat. Tomorrow I think I'll practise his walk.

Around 8.30pm we headed to the gym. Friday night in a budget gym in the Latin Quarter. Living the dream. As well as working off the 6,000 croissants I've eaten recently, it did have the added benefit of a late night scooter ride across the Seine. Seriously can't get enough of Mavis (it's sticking, Lewis). So Lewis had described the gym as being the grimiest I could imagine, which probably was an accurate representation of the 6 x 4metre gym. I liked it though. Having only three of every machine meant you were forced to spend longer on each one to make it worth the wait, or because you were waiting for something better to come free. Even longer spent trying to work out French fitness terms on the machine. Vitesse is speed, apparently and 'Razel' got me somewhere on the rowing machine). We spent 2hours or something there, then I went to brave the French changing rooms. Hello nudity. After a moment's hesitation, I decided against the nude sauna (do you really need to be nude?) and embraced the row of non-private showers. Liberating, it was.

I was shaky from those extra rowing kilometres, so Lewis drove us to pick up a Lebanese Kebab. It had tomato in, how unhealthy could it be? We then went back to Lewis' part of town and went to a cool bar he knew for some wine. It was ALLOWED; it was 11.30pm on a Friday and we'd just worked our socks off at the gym. The bar was cool, like the scene from a painting of a local Parisian bar, jammed with people all laughing and cramped around tables, with labelless green bottles of wine. There was an older man in an adidas jacket with long scraggly gray hair dancing to some sort of electro beat in his head.

We went back to the apartment, listened to some Wayne Shorter and then watched Ian Hislop rip into Conrad Black on HIGNFY.

End of day 32.

*No restaurant or bar toilets ever seem to have seats and during my last visit, at the Cimetiere du Montparnasse, I had to use some of those crouching hole-in-the-ground sorts. Lovely.

Day 30: Paris

Highlights:

• Riding a Vespa through Paris
• Musee Rodin
• Bar Dix, the Sangria bar
• Red Dwarf and Roasted Chestnuts

Whoa. Talk about a hangover. I woke near midday and had a mini argument with Lewis over who would get up to go to the Boulangerie. Victory for Nicole, though I promised to make the coffee to do my bit. Only problem was that I over-estimated how long it would take Lewis to get the croissants (my usual experience in stumbling through some words I hope are French is probably double what his is). Lewis got back and made the coffee as well, and we feasted on pain au chocolat, croissants, pain au raison and some pomme thing.

It was SUNNY. I had a nice look out of the living room windows and chilled out while Lewis (hungover) went on a bike ride to Versailles. After he arrived home, we watched the replay of his route (we're not talking road footage, more Harry Potter Marauder's map dots. Yeah. Fascinating) listened to a little jazz, and then strolled out into the sun to pick up his Vespa. 
                                   

I've given Lewis a lot of grief about his scooter; I always though ray-ban and leather jacket wearing guys nipping through town on a scooter looked like proper tools. Nothing cool about it. But I am now completely and utterly sold on scooters. It was amazing. Barely scraping through tiny gaps in traffic, the cool whine of the engine accelerating away, racing across the Seine; I bloody loved it. It more than took away the regret of not getting on the bike of the Hungarian Led Zeppelin fan at midnight in Budapest. 

Lewis attempted some tour guide facts until we arrived at Musee Rodin. So, interesting to know; if you're an EU citizen and under 26 then you get in all museums in France for free. I wish I'd known that when I paid a bomb to get in the Louvre (which I'd never pay to go in again).

So Rodin - anyone know much about this guy? I didn't really have a clue, and so was just happily wandering around the Musee Jardin when I came across this bad boy:

                                                       

The Thinker. Well, I recognised him. I got out my Kindle which conveniently already had a copy of 'The Dummies Guide to Art' and had a little read. BRIEFLY Auguste Rodin was a French Sculptor (though dabbled in other art forms) who had a relationship with his assistant, and later also famous sculptor, Camille Claudel. He broke up with her (supposedly after stealing some of her ideas) and after a while, she descended into madness. Lewis says there's a film about them. So Rodin is most famous for The Thinker and The Kiss, which is a surprisingly sensual piece of stone. 

Rodin seemed pretty keen on Balzac (looked him up on my Kindle - a French author) and Victor Hugo (that one's easy), and so there were numerous sculptures of those guys. The best being the naked Balzac piece, where with his big belly and short stature are proudly thrusted out toward you, as Balzac has a triumphant smile on his face. It was a cool museum, and serene to walk around the gardens in the sun, with the Eiffel tower in the distance. 

We were going to head to a Mosque Lewis knew for some mint tea (this seemed like an unusual idea, but I was just keen to get back on the scooter so I jumped at the chance) but then as we rode, we found ourselves near the Sangria Bar Lewis had recommended on my last visit. Change of plans. We stopped off for a crepe, where I successfully ordered UN Crepe (I think I can speak French now) and then went to Bar Dix. 

The owner greeted Lewis like an old friend. Over the next hour he kept coming over and rested his hands on Lewis' shoulders like some sort of proud father. I told Lewis if he played his cards right, he could probably inherit the place. I'd run it for him. It's a small bar, with lots of small round tables and old posters on the wall. Behind the bar, the wall is covered with bank notes, a lot of which seemed to have Chairman Mao's face on. Lewis said the owner used to be a racing driver, a few leagues down from Formula One. He was a smiling older guy with a bit of a belly and cool John Lennon-style coloured glasses.

We had some delicious Sangria and then headed back to the bike. I'm not sure she has a name, but I think the Vespa would most likely be called Mavis. As standard, I'm sure Lewis would disagree. We were still south of the river, so I asked for a detour to go by the Eiffel Tower. The road runs so closely to the tower that you can ride right by it. It really shouldn't be that spectacular*, but at night with the entire thing lit up as you look up from directly below? It looks cool. Really cool. Apparently on the hour the lights all sparkle. I tried to impress Lewis with my knowledge that Gustave Eiffel had also designed the train station in Budapest and then that one of the Munich Olympics plotters was murdered in Paris after eating at a Hippopotamus as we passed the relevant buildings. I don't think he found those things as interesting as I did. Probably more interesting is the Eiffel assisted in constructing the Statue of Liberty, which I'll have to drop into conversation tomorrow. 

We stopped off briefly at Decathalon so I could buy some sportswear (as the saying goes, when in Paris, go the gym with your mate...?) and then for some food at the supermarket. Back at the apartment, on a high for winning me over on the scooter, Lewis tried for the 100th time to get me to watch Red Dwarf. I'd always thought I'd probably like it, but had held out purely because I knew it annoyed Lewis. Still, as he made us a salad for dinner, I felt the least I could do was watch it. And yeah, it's funny. 

I'd bought some chestnuts in Switzerland (grown in Italy though apparently) and we roasted them in the oven. Lewis had never had roasted chestnuts before either! I thought it was a standard english tradition to go chestnut picking and then roast them, but that must just have been my idyllic Billericay youth. Despite my insistence that they had to be eaten straight from the shell, Lewis still tried to get us to add them to the salad instead. I wouldn't let him have that victory and was quite satisfied when we ate so many chestnuts that the salad was ignored. 

I'd agreed to meet my Dutch friend Marthe and Siemen at 9pm as they got off the bus from Utrecht, but had underestimated how long it would take to get to the station so I text asking to change the location and headed to Pigalle. I arrived a little later than planned and became increasingly concerned that they hadn't picked up my message when 30minutes passed and there was no sign of them. It was Halloween and I was standing on my own at 10pm in the seedy part of town. I've probably never been approached by a weirder, larger number of people ever. Ghosts, dead pirates, perverts and a skeleton holding a broomstick as a gun.

So it turns out Marthe was arriving the following day. On the offchance I'd made a mistake (unlikely), I checked the facebook message stream. Yeah, they were arriving on 1st November. I slunk back home to Lewis' and decided it was probably time to call it a day. I whacked my knee getting into bed, and wondered if these two things were some sort of sign that something bad was going to happen. 

As I was falling asleep Lewis came into the room, took off his trousers and did some press-ups.

End of day 30.

*Last time I came, whilst waiting for them to wrap my bottle of wine, I mentioned to the shop assistants in Nicolas that the tower was really just a big ole pylon, and not at all as impressive as films make out (all this said in jumbled French) while my friend Joella looked on in horror at my rudeness. I think they would probably have asked us out if not for that comment.