Paris, cont'd.

So, the band, The Fanfare as they call themselves. Some of us were sitting in front of Notre Dame, enjoying some wine that we had picked up and watching a street performer juggle fire.
After he had finished his show off with a great deal of fire works and the crowd moved on, we could hear Britney Spears' "Toxic" being played by a brass band in the direction of the river. We all looked at each other and thought, "No way!". The first night we were in Lille, we had heard this same song outside our dorm, so we were sure it was the same band. Sure enough, from the bridge we could see the tops of hot pink tubas, so we ran down to the river banks to check it out. The Fanfare had managed to draw quite a crowd, and we spent the rest of the night talking to people, swapping travel stories with other Americans, and just enjoying ourselves overall.

I've really become a fan of hanging out with other tourists. When I was younger, I lived in Williamsburg, VA for a few years and was pretty turned off by the idea of masses of tourists in one location by the time my family moved away. For this reason, I was kind of weary of visiting Paris and especially the Eiffel Tower to begin with. After the first night though, I fell in love with the Eiffel Tower. After dusk, every hour on the hour, the tower is lit in a sparkling manner for 5-10 minutes. It's surprisingly not tacky at all in my opinion, but just the opposite. Standing in line the following day for over an hour, I couldn't wait to climb to the top. While waiting in line with two 20 year old guys, you can only imagine what their primary goal was. They took several opportunities to strike up conversations with other girls that would snake past us, which was awkward for me at first, but I ended up liking talking to most of the girls more than they did! We got to share some travel tips and just girl talk in general. In the end, when we all made it to the top, we were very satisfied with what we got for 11 euros. It was a a clear, beautiful day and you could see every landmark in the city clearly. A nice change from the cloud, rainy view we had from Notre Dame the day before. I loved every minute of it.


Since arriving in Europe 2 weeks ago, I've developed a huge appreciation for gigantic, old cathedrals. Nothing in the States even compares to the magnificence of these buildings. All the paintings and sculptures tell a story, some more obvious than others. So much work, thought, and detail went into these churches, and many times those who started the work didn't live to see completion. A friend told me that he read that once the men who began the work on Notre Dame were able to accept the fact that they would never see the finished masterpiece, they were able to work at their full potential. I found the sculptures on the facade of Notre Dame to be the most interesting. In the center of the center door, sits Jesus Christ on Judgement Day with people lining up below him awaiting their fate. Above the lefthand door, there is a small sculpture of Adam and Eve in the Garden and Eden with the serpent. The serpent is sculpted with a women's head, which is hard to notice at first. Various saints and kings are also sculpted along the facade. Far above the 3 doors are a line of 28 kings from Judah and Israel. During the French Revolution, the kings were believed to be French kings and were decapitated. Eventually the heads were replaced, but the original heads weren't found until about 30 years ago. There are many other stories like this to go with Notre Dame. I find it fascinating that a building can have so much history!

Visiting these old cathedrals always involves climbing to the top of the dome or belfry regardless of the cost. Most of the cathedrals have separate "up" and "down" staircases, the exception being the the belfry in Brugge. The staircases are often extremely narrow and winding, with at least 300-400 steps. Trying to maneuver past people going in the opposite direction in Brugge was nearly impossible. I've climbed more steps in the past 2 weeks than in my life time I'm convinced; every weekend involves a mini stairmaster work out. The view at the top always makes these climbs worth it though. I always like to think of people hundreds of years ago climbing the same staircases and how the view must have differed to them. Overall, the view from the top of Notre Dame and the church at Montemarte may have been very similar, minus the Eiffel Tower and the Paris business district. Whereas in London, the view from St. Paul's was full of skyscrapers and cranes, it's hard to imagine what it had been like at the beginning of the church.