Paris and Reims

Paris was quite an experience.  Our first night was spent at the YMCA which in France is UCJG.  It’s the world’s oldest YMCA and it shows.  The building was under construction over the summer because it serves as student housing during the school year.  It was a quirky quirky building.  It looked like it was build without a floor plan in mind one room at a time.  The floor was everywhere uneven, the floor plan was odd, and the stairs were so old and worn that they actually sloped downward.  I took pictures of the doors that were curved to fit curved walls.  We only stayed one night there because we found a cheaper place to stay after that.

The cheaper hotel was cheap for a reason.  We booked a double room and pretended that only Keith and I were staying there.  It was a tiny room with a double bed and a sink.  The bathroom down the hall was just a hole in the floor with a place to put your feet.  I figured I racked up some serious Rick Steves points by using that thing – not once, but twice!  Showers there cost two euros so we bathed in our sink.  It’s neither easy nor efficient to wash your hair in a sink.

We got to do some fun touristy stuff in Paris.  We went to the Arc de Triomphe but we didn’t climb to the top because you had to pay for that.  After that we walked down the Champs-Elysee which really wasn’t that exciting.  I think that would be a lot more fun if you could afford to stop and have lunch at one of those very chic (and very expensive) cafes.  We did however stop at Laduree for some macaroons.  In French “macaroon” doesn’t mean that delicious pile of coconut that I was expecting.  The French macaroon is a sandwich cookie with a gooey filling.  Laduree had a huge variety of flavors.  We tried chocolate flavor and pistachio flavor.  They were delicious and you could still taste a hint of coconut in the pistachio flavor.

At the end of the Champs-Elysees we kept walking right through the Place de la Concorde and through the park until we reached the Louvre.  We didn’t get to go in that day (it was almost closing time) but we came back the next day to go inside.  Keith and I went in for the last hour before closing.  We got to see the Venus di Milo and the Mona Lisa along with a nice variety of paintings, sculptures and artifacts.  There are pictures on facebook.  We couldn’t really read the informational plaques about the art because there were a lot of French words that we didn’t know.  But that was probably just as well since we didn’t have a lot of time.

Later we went to the Eiffel Tower.  The 15th of August is a holiday in France (the Assumption).  That was the day we went to the Eiffel Tower so the place was a zoo!  We busked for a couple of hours and made 36 euros.  Not too bad.  We had a good time and got some cool pictures of the tower too.  A cute little girl complimented us in French and when I didn’t understand her she said “you’re super!”  : )  Her dad took a picture of her with us.  It made us smile.  The next day we returned to the Eiffel Tower and Keith and I paid a few euros to climb up to the second platform.  The view was more spectacular than I had imagined and climbing up was sort of fun (almost 800 steps).

The night before the Assumption we were busking at Notre Dame.  There was quite a crowd there and we were doing alright.  Suddenly all the bells started ringing and we realized there was a procession crossing the courtyard in front of the cathedral.  All we could see over the crowd were white banners and a gold statue (I’m not sure what the statue was of).  The church was celebrating the Assumption!  The sign said free entry so we went inside.  They were having a very canned church service with no one actually leading worship.  There was a video screen playing a montage of religious images (mostly of Notre Dame) and recorded voices speaking French.  There was also some really awesome music being played (through speakers, not live).  We quietly explored the cathedral and marveled at the huge high ceilings and the intricate stained glass.

After that we found the area called Saint Michael.  It has a ton of night life so Keith and Nahum busked there and we returned on multiple occasions for cheap food.  There are a lot of doner kebab shops in France that serve really cheap meals.

The night before we left for Reims we stayed up all night because we didn’t want to pay for another night at the hotel.  Paris is really expensive (worse than London!) and we weren’t doing super great busking.  We had planned to hang out in the train station but they booted us out at 1am.  However, the cop who told us to leave was very nice and sent us across the street to La Maison Blanche, a 24 hour cafe.  We had some drinks and later some pasta and went back to the train station around 5:30am.  La Maison Blanche was playing music videos all night, all by female artists.  It was fun to see the Spice Girls (who are apparently still famous over here), All Saints, and Shakira.  We heard recent songs and songs from years and years ago.

The next day we took a train to Reims and had a hell of a time finding the tourist information office which was miles from the train station.  We got into town dead tired around noon and after many trials and tribulations finally booked a hotel around 5pm.  Our room here is more than we were hoping to spend, but it’s worth it.  The hotel is right on the main drag where all the shops and cafes are so we can busk within blocks of our hotel.  We have our own bathroom complete with a shower and we each get our own bed.  After the place in Paris it feels super luxurious.

Last night we did some busking and made a killing!  In a total of about 3 hours of busking we made 72.76 euros!  That’s the best we’ve done so far.  That’s especially exciting considering it was a Tuesday night.  We also got our biggest single tip to date – 10 euros!  If we keep this up, we’ll actually have enough to pay for Nahum’s share of the hotel and food.  We got some really nice compliments from a jazz fan who stopped to watch us play.  He said he could tell we were American because we swing!  It’s nice to know that Americans have a good reputation for SOMETHING.  I feel like my playing is definitely improving and I played some great solos last night.  We’re also communicating better as a band and our endings are getting tighter and more varied.

We love Reims.  Food is MUCH cheaper than it was in Paris.  Last night all three of us ate dinner for a total of 8.50 euros.  It was a great dinner too.  We made sandwiches on baguettes with tomato and lettuce and cheese.  We’re hoping for more great busking tonight!

We have one more night booked at our super fancy hotel and then we’ll have to go to Frankfurt so Nahum can catch his flight home.

Advertisement