Justine's Weekend in Paris!

Writing my B.A. is kind of like pulling teeth. I mean, I have a LOT of ideas... but, good god, I'm terrified of penning them! The idea of freezing ideas, of isolating them and forcing them into stasis, is scary. Very scary. Especially with such delicate subject matter and such brilliant thinkers. I feel as if barely-over-two-decades of existence does not give me the license to grapple with such esteemed literary and philosophical minds.

Anyway, given my current sleep deficit, I've decided to finally post an update (with pictures!) until my tea cools off. Once my tea reaches a drink-able temperature, I'm heading to bed and waking up hella early in the morning to get this B.A. churned out!

So, this is my weekend in a very, very smushed recap.

Thursday evening, I went to the opera around the Bastille to watch "Madame Butterfly." I spent a good portion of the opera fidgety and nervous, though, because Justine was flying in (1) at night, (2) from an airport that I can't really locate, and (3) would have to make it to my dorm on her (4) non-existent French. To aid her on her journey to Maison du Cambodge, I gave her pages of directions and sent her plenty of pictures of the RER station and buildings around where I live. Long story short, everything worked out and my sister didn't end up sleeping on Parisian streets. Success!

The next morning, I dragged my sister along to my class trip to the Cinémathèque Française. Photos weren't allowed in the building, but I highly recommend going to the museum - among other really awesome things, we saw Mrs. Bates' head! After the museum, we got some terrific Indian food for lunch:

Afterwards, my sister and I went to Montmartre. We popped into the Sacre Coeur (no pictures because I have too damn many as is), the Espace Dali (awesome in its own right - it was like a little piece of the Figueres Dali Museum in Paris!), and took pictures with the Moulin Rouge. For dinner, we went out to fondue in St. Michel:
On Saturday, we went to Versailles. We saw the palace:

And the Queen's Hamlet:
As someone who went through a Marie Antoinette obsession in high school, the Queen's Hamlet was pretty much the stuff of dreams! I'm going to restrain myself from putting up more photos, but there are PLENTY in my picasa album!

Later that evening, we ate a savory crepe from somewhere in St. Michel... then climbed up the Arc de Triomphe:
It turns out that the view from the Arc de Triomphe is absolutely GORGEOUS at night:

Sunday began with a trip to the Marché aux Fleurs (the bird and flower market):

We discovered that St. Chapelle was very, very close by... and, since it was the first Sunday of the month, very, very free. I was absolutely floored by the beauty of the stained glass inside:

On account of feeling icky and sickly, I went back to Cité and slept while my sister checked out Les Invalides. We re-convened to wander around the Grand Mosquée of Paris:

After a quick and cheap Chinese takeout dinner, I said goodbye to Justine... for now. I am currently plotting a means and time to sneak out to Berlin in the next two weeks. We'll see, we'll see...

xoxo,
D