Bread for Breakfast, Bread for Lunch, Bread for Supper

Yes, it's true. The French eat a lot of bread. I am growing weary of so much carbohydrate.

In the back of my mind, I remembered my Aunt Sharon telling me about a church she liked to attend when in Paris. So on Sunday, we got up and decided to walk to the American Church in Paris, the first American church established on non-US soil. You can get American or French tax receipts. It was a longer walk than we'd anticipated so we ended up being late for the early service, but early for adult Sunday School. So we just went to the adult class. We were the first ones there for the class led by a Filippino man. A young guy soon came. People slowly filtered in through the next hour. It was a strange time. There seemed to be a lot of miscommunication and little discussion. Mainly, the leader read from the study guide and the man beside me kept bringing up Bible passages that didn't have anything to do with what we were talking about. The whole time, we didn't know what to think and I had to speak up and correct some opinions a guy gave about Jews and faith in the Old Testament. We didn't know what to expect the eleven o'clock service to be like.

But we loved it. The church was packed. The service and its liturgy were well explained. The children's lesson was meaningful. I felt quite at home there. If I were to live in Paris, this church would be my church home.

Mer took off to watch tennis. I don't know enough about tennis to want to sit and watch it all afternoon plus being in Paris, I wanted to see Paris. (Mer had a good, yet interesting time. If interested, read Meridith's Murmurings from the link on my blog.) So I found lunch and walked to the Eiffel Tower. It's not as large or imposing as you're led to believe as a child. I've heard some people say it's an ugly piece of metal. But I quite liked it. I like the shape and the scroll patterns and the color even. I took a picture of myself in front of it and continued on roaming the city.

Since it was the first Sunday of the month, most of the museums were free. My first stop was the Rodin museum. To get to it, I had to walk past Invalides, with its golden dome. Some of Napoleon Bonaparte is buried there. The Rodin museum is a sunny house full of sculptures surrounded by gardens full of sculptures. The main attraction is in the garden - the Thinker, a sculpture I think you all should know. It is amazing how well Rodin knew the human body. His sculpted hands are so life like.

Next, a young boy hiding behind a map tried to pickpocket my backpack at a metro station. Luckily, I noticed his presence before he could get to my camera.

I had time for one more museum so I checked out the Picasso museum. An interesting biracial English family argued about religion and economy behind me as we all waited in the overly long line. They helped me pass the time. I didn't enjoy the Picasso museum as much as the Van Gogh, but it was still fascinating to see the diversity of Pablo's talent. He is best known for his cubist work, but he could do so many different styles of art, using all kinds of mediums. My favorite exhibit was five pictures of Francoise (one of his mistresses?) all done in different styles. Then I walked past where the Bastille used to be and headed back to the hostel to meet Meridith for supper.

Yeah, she wasn't there. But thankfully she called to say she wasn't going to make it. Unfortunately, I didn't get the message until I had already decided to give up on her. So I took my ghetto-tripod and my camera and went to see Paris at night.

The best part of the night was walking from Concorde to the Arc de Triomphe. Concorde has a giant pillar that was once in an Egyptian temple. Hieroglyphics dance all over it. It's in the middle of a traffic circle and nearby a plaque marks the spot where Marie Antoinette and Louis lost their heads.

Going northwest from this spot, you are on the Champs Elysees. For the first while, I felt a little alone in the dark park, but soon, I was in the blazing light of the commercial district. I smiled at the muted colors of the McDonalds there. Most of the time, my attention was at the far end where the arc stands in a gigantic traffic circle where twelve avenues converge with no lane distinction to prevent anarchy. I would cross the street and purposely get stuck in the middle in order to take a picture. When I reached the end, I walked through a dingy underpass and came up under the Arc in its night lit glory.

Man, it is grandiose. It's huge and ornate and wow. It's such a famous landmark, but you don't understand it until you see it. That Napoleon was quite a guy.

When I got back, Mer was sleeping. Not too surprising :)

Monday morning it was raining. We've been pretty blessed with weather so we couldn't complain. Metro back to the Arc so we could ascend to the top. It was neat seeing Paris, even though the hazy clouds made picture taking less fun.

Almost as soon as we were down, the clouds dissipated and the sun came out.

The only shopping we did on the Champs Elysees was pay way too much to get our camera memory cards burned onto disk. It cost fifteen bucks a CD. So that's my Champs Elysees souvenir. We wandered to the overly ornate Alexander III bridge, saw the tunnel where Diana's car crashed and people leave graffiti to her, once again to Concorde. In the Tulieres gardens, beggar woman approach you by asking, "Do you speak English?" Then they pull out a card in English detailing a story of woe. After approaching us, one lady immediately went to the pay per use toilet. I thought that was interesting.

In the later afternoon, we took the metro up to the Montmartre area. We climbed the stairs to the white dome church of Sacre Couer. It was a beautiful view of the city and the inside of the church is beautiful too. Even though France is technically Catholic, there is little spiritual life here. But it was cool to be in this church and still feel a sense of holiness.

Then we made our way to the artist square of Montmartre and watched the painters at work and got approached by portrait artists. Everything was out of my price range, but I loved the ambience and just watching the painters at work. I totally understood why my mom loved it up there. I wish I had more time in Paris just to wander those streets. We had supper since it was already dark. We didn't get to go to the cemetary where Jim Morrison is buried.

At night, the Eiffel tower is lit up brightly. Right now, every hour on the hour, lights flash all over like a Christmas tree does with blinking lights, only brighter. It's really kind of beautiful. Since I may only be in Paris once, I had to do the tourist thing and go up to the top. The elevator was in three stages, but we had to change elevators for the final stage. It was so cool to look out over Paris at night while standing at the top of such a landmark. I was quite excited and a smile is on my face just remembering it now.

Today was the planned day to go to the Musee D'Orsay, the impressionist museum. This is the period of art I know and love best. I love light and how it changes and I think that's why I like the impressionist so much. So before Mer was ready to go, I in my excitement was literally bursting to be there already so she let me go on my own.

Monet, Manet, Degas, Renoir, Millet, Cesanne, Pissaro, Van Gogh, Seurat, Sisley . . . All those impressionists and post-impressionists and pre-impressionists for me to see. It was like heaven. I would turn a corner and suddenly see a picture that I had been seeing all my life. Only now it was real, not a copy or a little photo. It was real. I guess that is what heaven will truly be. Right now, everything we have is a copy or a disintegration. In heaven it will be real. We will see God for real, not just the glimpses that we can handle here on earth.

I think I could spend weeks in that converted train station. To say I loved it is putting it mildly. But it almost felt natural. Like I was supposed to be there all along. Sadly, a few of the most famous works were on loan to Vienna, but I knew enough of the other ones to be more than pleased. And I got to finally see Degas' ballet dancers. Now, he was interesting fellow . . .

The day was quickly filled. We went to the Opera house, best know by North Americans as the place where Phantom of the Opera is set. It is an ornate, opulent, fantastic place full of marble and chandeliers and gold. Quite interesting . . .

And speaking of opulence, tomorrow we go to Versailles.