----

So, this morning (the 28th) we got up a little later, had a relaxed
morning
in which to finalize all the packing and stuff, try to get the shampoo
packaged so it wouldn't leak all over the place, that kind of thing. We
got
it all together and were ready to go by about 11:30. We took a cab to the
ferry, with all our bags and stuff, and schlepped it all into Central
Station (have you noticed yet that nearly all european train stations are
called Central Station??). We tried to lock it up because we had a good 2
hrs to kill, but we couldn't find any open lockers, so we schlepped our
stuff up to the large seating area near the Burger King (at platform 2)
and
hung out there for a while. We found another Ben and Jerry's shop - we
suppose either B & J like Amsterdam, or the people who work for B & J do.
Amsterdam has at least 2 B & J shops, Philadelphia has NONE. San Francisco
only has one. Hmmm.

We made our way to platform 14 to wait for our train - the high speed
Thalys to Paris! The Thalys is the French equivalent of the Swedish X2000
we'd ridden before. Hillary had a concern regarding the
seasickness-inducing capability of the Thalys, but it turned out not to be
a problem. While we were waiting for the train, a different train stopped
to pick up passengers bound for Bruxelles - this was a train that would
get
there 10 minutes before our train would. After that train left, some guy
came running up to us and said, in English with a french or belgian
accent,
"where is the train to Brussels, here?" and then "it left! Oh shit!" and
ran off. Ooops. :) We were all set though, because we had our reservations
in hand, and everything under control.

We got onto the train and managed to find the right seats in the right car
and even to stow our luggage conveniently. The train was great - Hillary
liked it better than the X2000 because it had red plush seats and blue
curtains, but Michael said the X2000 was nicer. It turned out that the
people sitting behind us had a little dog with them - about a 35 lb dog,
or
so - they carried it in a canvas shopping bag with its head sticking out,
and then they put it under the seat! It was a very good dog the whole
time,
not like the other dog in our car who kept barking now and then. We think
Septa should allow dogs!

The trip to Paris was relatively uneventful. As we left Amsterdam, we saw
some very picturesque Dutch country farmland, with many many cows and
sheep
present. We also saw some other Dutch cities, which appeared
architecturally similar to what we'd seen in Amsterdam, for the most part.
The Rotterdam station was the last stop in the Netherlands, and it was a
really cool train station - it had multicolored walls and big cut outs
like
tunnels or something in some of the walls - it looked like a childrens'
playground/ art gallery combination.

Hillary slept for most of the ride through Belgium, but Michael remarks
that it was mostly farmland with cows and sheep. When we got to Bruxelles,
Hillary woke up (and also woke up Michael who had *just* fallen asleep -
oops) and was glad she did, because the city was worth a look even from
the
train - large rowhouses somewhat reminiscent of Amsterdam but not made of
brick, and painted in pastel colors!

>From there, it was only about an hour and a half (at 300 Km/hr) to Paris.
When we got to Paris we gathered all our stuff up, got off the train, and
set out to fulfill our first mission - to obtain french francs from an
ATM.
We walked up to the first available map of the station and found our way
to
the cash machine. Yay! It worked fine, despite the pessimistic entries in
our guidebooks regarding North American ATM cards and Parisian ATMs.

While we were walking through Paris Gare du Nord (the train station) we
saw
TONS of world cup stuff - they had all these information booths set up and
so forth. People are REALLY out of their minds with this football stuff.
We
were in a strange country where we couldn't understand much of the signage
or the people talking around us, we had no idea where to go, AND half the
world was on their way here to go to a football game. Great.

But never fear, we figured it out. We went down into the Metro, armed with
a plethora of maps and guidebooks, and stood in line to purchase tickets.
Hillary spoke in French to the sales clerk, "Quel est le tarif pour deaux
personnes aller a Madeleine?" and they told us it was 16 ff, so we paid,
got our tickets, and headed for the subway. We headed over to the subway,
we headed down to the subway, we headed across to the left, we headed back
up, and finally onto the actual car. It was similar to Madrid, with a few
less stairs. We had to change metro cars at the Republique stop, but we
managed, and finally got to our final stop. When we came out to the
street,
we were somewhat overwhelmed by the fact that we were actually in France,
in Paris no less, and that there were all these giant French buildings
around us, and all these people speaking French and stuff, and we just
kind
of stood there for a minute. We were also overwhelmed by the warmth, and
the sun, which hadn't been so evident up north...Then, we realized we
still
had to get to the hotel and so we took action.

Hillary stepped over to a nearby street vendor and asked "Ou est Rue
Cambon, s'il vous plait?" and they told her it was "something something a
droit" so she astutely figured that we could walk down the street and it
would be on our right - and it was! woo hoo! Two down, one to go. We got
to
our hotel - located in a WONDERFUL central location that really more than
makes up for the Amsterdam hotel being located off the beaten path as it
was - the walk there took us past a number of couture shops and crystal
showrooms and so forth. We stopped at the Reception desk of the hotel and
they greeted us by name "Michael Israeli and Hillary Gorman? Hello! You
are
in Room 35." We talked to them a bit about the possibility of changing to
a
room with one big bed instead of two beds pushed together - but, again, we
were faced with what we like to call the "European Paradox." This means
that the probability of a large bed being in a large room is inversely
proportional to the probability of two small beds being in a large room,
and that air conditioning is only available in large rooms which contain
small beds. In other words, we could have a nice big room with air
conditioning (and two small beds shoved together) or a small kind of
crappy
room with no air conditioning and a really nice bed. Hmmm. We caved in and
took the big room with small beds. We were really HOT.

Once we settled into the room we were again amazed by the football fever
going on. There is a heavily trafficked area near here and there were cars
going by honking for the team, and there were people screaming and
yelling,
it was insane. So we cleaned ourselves up and went out to walk around, and
find some dinner.

We walked from our hotel the one block over to the Jardin des Tuileries,
where there is a huge amusement park. We then walked down the Rue de
Rivoli
and over about a block and a half to the Place de la Concorde. This giant
traffic circle is where Dr. Guillotin's invention was housed during the
French Revolution. They say about 1500 or so people were executed in this
fashion at this site between 1793 and 1795. It was kind of creepy to
consider what it must have been like, with the crowds of people yelling
and
shouting and clamoring for the deaths of King Louis and Marie Antoinette
and all those other people...There is no remaining sign of that, though.
Instead, there is a large 3300 year old monument, called the Obelisk of
Luxor, the oldest monument in Paris, standing where the guillotine used to
be. We took a photo of it. When standing in the Place looking north, you
can see the two hotels on Rue de Rivoli and Rue Royale (they are on the
corners, facing each other) - these are giant, matching colonadded
buildings left over from before the Revolution. We took a photo of them,
as
well. The Hotel Crillon currently occupies the building which used to be a
nobleman's home in the 18th century; the Hotel de la Marine occupies the
other building which is a former royal warehouse, but is now the navy
headquarters.

Also in the area of the Place de la Concorde are a couple of art museums
which we didn't check out (it was about 10 PM, realize), and the Palais
Bourbon, which houses the French Parliament, which we observed from afar
(and photographed). We did check out the Rue St-Honore, which was nearby,
and which houses a number of posh shops - which were closed...but it was
nice.

We started getting HUNGRY so we walked up the Rue Royale (checking out
Maxims and some of the other posh establishments on our way) until we dead
ended at the Eglise de la Madeleine, a big white building with red
flowerbeds, which Michael photographed while Hillary looked it up in our
book, because it was so impressive. It was built in 1806 as a "Temple of
Glory" for Napoleon's army, and it has 52 Corinthian columns (we didn't
count, we're taking the book's word for it, but there were a lot of
columns.)

Then we took a right on Rue Capucins, and headed over to Avenue de
l'Opera.
We stopped to check out the opera house, as well as the Ministry of
Justice
and Place Vendome, in the middle of which there is a giant monument to
Napoleon, which looks like a penis, because - well, we'll show you the
photo. The monument is covered in bronze taken from 1200 cannons at the
Battle of Austerlitz, FWIW.

Finally we settled down on a Moroccan restaurant, where we had an
excellent, if a tad bit expensive, Moroccan meal. Hillary communicated
reasonably well with the waiter -we got everything we wanted, and we
didn't
get anything we didn't want, and the bill was correct, so we were happy :)

A short walk back to the hotel and here we are! We're gearing up for an
early start tomorrow, we want to pack in the sights of Paris while we're
here!

Love,
Hillary and Michael

>From izzy@izzy.com Sun Jul  5 08:37:00 1998
Date: Mon, 29 Jun 1998 17:46:59 +0200
From: Michael Israeli <izzy@izzy.com>
Subject: June 29th: promenading through paris

Bonjour!

Today we got up early and headed out to see what the big deal about this
place is, anyway. We walked down to the Jardin des Tuilleries again to get
a look at it during the day...this is the most historic garden of Paris,
so
we are told. It paves the way from the Louvre (which we plan to visit on
Wednesday) to the Place de la Concorde - which is where we were
approaching
from. Catherine de Medici commissioned these gardens and the associated
palace in 1564, because she feared for her life and wanted a more secure
area. Unfortunately, her astrologer warned her that this would be a
mistake
and the astrologer turned out to be correct - during the Revolution, Louis
XVI and Marie Antoinette were imprisoned here (before having their heads
cut off in the Place de la Concorde) and much later when the royal family
tried to escape in 1762, 600 of the King's guards were massacred here.
During the uprising in the 1870's the whole place was burned down, but the
garden remained intact, and lovely! There is a large fountain where kids
like to sail model boats. There are also a lot of marble statues and some
shrubs made into curlicues, and things like that. We snapped a couple of
photos here :)

Then we went into the Musee de l'Orangerie. This museum is within the
Jardin. From the outside, it is pretty unimpressive, but on the inside -
hoo doggies!
The museum contains a collection of about 150 paintings - Renoirs,
Cezannes, Gaugins, Monets, Picassos, Modiglianis, and some other lesser
known (to us anyway) artists' works. While Hillary still thinks she likes
Renoir the best, even she admits that the most impressive thing in this
museum is the basement, which contains 40 foot long panels of Monet's
Water
Lilies paintings - 8 enormous paintings in beautiful blue/green/purple.
These paintings were given to the French government following WW I - Monet
said "It isn't much, but it's the only way at my disposal to participate
in
the Victory." The government built the exhibition hall at the Musee de
l'Orangerie to Monet's specifications, and agreed not to display the
paintings until he died. This was because Monet, who had had cataracts for
some time, wanted to be able to keep retouching the paintings until he
died, to make sure they were perfect.

Anyway, we really liked the Water Lilies, and wish we could have taken
them
home with us! However, we couldn't carry them out without being caught, so
we just left and continued on the walk we had planned for the day. We
walked around the Place de la Concorde - stopping briefly at the Pont
(bridge) de la Concorde where we had an excellent view up and down the
river, and from which we took some photos of the city in general and of
the
Pont Alexandre III, a stunning bridge nearby with many statues and lots of
gold trim. Then we continued around the Place to the Avenue des Champs
Elysees, planning to walk to the Arc de Triomphe. We were immediately
distracted from this by the presence of the Jardins des Champs Elysees,
where there were many really beautiful flowerbeds. It's obvious that
people
spend a lot of time taking care of these gardens - we got one picture of a
stunning flower bed which had someone working on it at the time.

We continued on up the Avenue, passing many fancy and some not so fancy
stores, banks, fast food and slow food restaurants, and movie theaters. We
took note of a couple of theaters showing British and American films in
the
VO (version originale) with french subtitles :) and we stopped in at one
department store to pick up a small gift for Hillary's cousin Jessie.

We finally got to the Arc de Triomphe, and we walked up (and later, down,)
all 284 stairs in the tiny little spiral staircase to get to the top. The
views from up there were outstanding and we're glad we went up there. The
carving of the Arc, on the inside, is really something to see also.

We came down and walked back the way we had come. We stopped at a bank to
change our remaining Dutch Guilders into French Francs, and managed to get
a pretty good exchange rate at the "CCF" bank (Commericiale Credite
Francaise, or something like that). Then we stopped in another store to
pick something up for Hillary's cousin Andrew, and then we stopped at Chez
Clement for lunch. This was a charming place - we sat in the sidewalk
section since it was such a sunny and warm day. We had roasted chicken and
an assortment of fresh summer cheeses with bread and salad and
strawberries. Yum :). Oh, we also had some regional rose wine (that e
should have an accent on it - we didn't have *rose* wine :)).  Before
leaving, Michael wanted to visit the bathroom, so Hillary taught him how
to
ask "where is the bathroom" and also told him the words for "to the left"
and "to the right" so he could figure out where to go. However, she didn't
tell him the words for "straight back and up the stairs" so he had to
figure it out on his own. Ooops. But, at least they understood his
question, because they answered him!

>From there, we went south, down Avenue Marceau - past a really big, soot
covered church called St. Pierre de Chaillot - and then all the way down
to
the River Seine via Avenue de President Wilson. At the water, we stopped
where a crowd of people was assembled around a small statue of some kind.
Upon inspection, we found that the statue was an exact replica of the
flame
of the Statue of Liberty, put here as a monument to the ongoing friendship
between the French and the American people. However, it is currently
standing as an informal/unofficial monument to Princess Diana, as it is
directly above the tunnel (that is, it is on the "roof" of the entrance to
the tunnel) where the fatal crash occurred. There is a lot of graffiti on
the flame and the dais on which it stands:

        we love you diana
        diana and dodie - you are together forever now
        the most beautiful princess, go in peace

etc, etc, etc. There are also a number of posters people have glued up,
and
numerous bouquets of flowers people have left there. It was interesting,
and it came as a surprise to us because - well, because we'd had no idea
it
was there, and then all of a sudden, there it was.

We hadn't come to see that, though. Onward we walked (or, some might say,
onward we schlepped), across the river (without stopping to take a look at
"Avenue de President Kennedy"), to the main attraction here - the Eiffel
Tower. This is really an amazing thing to see up close. We decided not to
deal with going up to the top because there are lines and so forth and
we'd
already had one panoramic view of the city today. But looking up from
underneath gives an amazing view of this structurally magnificent tower.
While we were here we took the opportunity to photograph l'Ecole
Militaire,
which is located at the other side of the Parc du Champ de Mars from the
tower. We also took a shot of the Musee du Cinema and the Musee de la
Marine which sit side by side across the river from the tower. These are
beautiful buildings with many columns; you'll need to see the photo for a
better idea of what they look like.

Leaving the tower area, we walked through a small park where there was a
lake with a waterfall, and a few families of ducks hanging around. As
usual, Michael stopped to chat with the ducks (and also to tell Hillary to
"look at the quackers," except he didn't say quackers...). Here we were
again struck by the magnitude of the police presence here in Paris. We
assume this has to do with the World Cup. There are not just local police,
but many many FEDERAL police, who are walking around, patrolling, etc,
accompanied by men in army fatigues holding machine guns. We took a photo
of a few of them while they were not looking our way (the fed was helping
a
tourist with a map, the gunmen were looking away or something). They don't
seem to be bothering anyone, but it is sort of creepy.

We walked along the riverside heading east, back toward the area of the
hotel. Our legs were starting to get kind of tired, so we basically took
the shortest route back here. We stopped in briefly at one of the crystal
shops on the Rue Royale, and also at a pharmacy off the Rue St. Honore to
buy Hillary some more tissues :)

We'd like to point out to those of you who expressed pessimism regarding
the attitude of French people that so far, we've had zero problems. Sure,
Hillary's French sucks, but it seems to be *making an effort* that counts.
Everyone has responded by smiling and trying to be helpful except one guy
who was grouchy to everyone including other French people. Most people do
speak some english, and those who don't are willing to try to deal with
first grade level french without being snobby.

We're finding Paris to be a very beautiful place, with so much to see in
every block that we're wondering if we'll ever even see 1/4 of what we'd
thought we might! However, since this is the tail end of our vacation, the
plan is NOT to cram in every last possible museum and monument, but rather
to relax and enjoy ourselves. If we miss a couple of things, we'll have a
good excuse to come back, yes?

A final note - if anyone would like us to bring back any special french
perfume, cosmetic, lotion, scarf, hat, etc - please let us know NOW, and
tell us exactly what it is, so we can find it for you!

TTFN,

Michael and Hillary

>From izzy@izzy.com Sun Jul  5 08:37:00 1998
Date: Tue, 30 Jun 1998 23:17:01 +0200
From: Michael Israeli <izzy@izzy.com>
Subject: June 30: smelling up Paris

Allo!

Last night after our big nap, we went out to - do not laugh - the Chicago
Pizza Pie Factory, off the Avenue Champs Elysees. Why? Well, we'd had
advance word that it had *excellent* pizza and good atmosphere, and a
nonsmoking section, plus it was almost midnight and we knew it would be
open, so we figured what the heck. But, it was an excellent choice!

We learned some things there. First of all, the security guards here in
Paris are big black guys just like at home, except they say "Bonsoir" and
"Au Revoir" when you go by, instead of just pretending they do not see
you.
Second of all, dogs are allowed in restaurants, even REAL restaurants that
aren't cafes. We were seated in the non fumeur section next to a French
couple with a Yellow Labrador Retriever who was extremely cute (and of
whom
we tried to take a picture, but we may have gotten a picture of her tongue
trying to lick the camera...)

Also we had an experience we're not sure would ever be duplicated in the
USA. Hillary spoke in French to the waitress, telling her we wanted a
pizza
with mushrooms, a coke, and a carafe of red wine. The waitress looked
confused, so Hillary tried again, reading the name of the pizza off the
menu in English. The waitress said, sounding very relieved, "Oh, English,
Ok" with a British accent. Now, can you imagine going into a French
restaurant in the US and trying to speak English to the server, the server
not understanding, and you having to speak in French? Doubtful, right? And
later on, she couldn't understand the man with the dog at the next table
when he spoke very rapidly in his native French. She told him she was
English and asked him to speak more slowly. He said, good naturedly, "Oh,
ok, I weel use frawnglais - I weel speak in zee Englawsh weeth a heavee
frawnch axawnt!" Now, if your waiter didn't understand your English in a
restaurant in the US, how many of you would make a joke of it and reply in
your waiter's native tongue?? Not us, anyway. So again, we have to say
that
in our experience, the whole "French people are language snobs" theorem
has
not been borne out (yet).

Today, we got up early to start soaking up some culture. We started off
with a small problem. Yesterday when we got up, we were informed by the
concierge that they were working on the water heater (well, actually, the
guy said in French to Hillary that they were working on "la machine" but
it
must have been the water heater) and there was no water at all, so we
could
not shower. Today, when we got up, there was water, but only ICE COLD
water. We were told by the breakfast waitress (the only staff person
available at the time) that it most definitely would be fixed
"aujourd'hui,
ce soir." So, no shower again today. Sigh. Hence the subject line.

We headed out with the intention of taking the metro to the Varenne
station
and going to the Rodin Museum, but there was an accident of some kind and
that train was stuck sitting there for some unknown amount of time
(Hillary
couldn't understand the rapid french over the PA) so we took a different
train over to the St. Paul stop. The metro, by the way, is clean and fast,
and very crowded and stuffy, and lacking in air conditioning which it
sorely needs. Some of the stations are ugly and foul, and some of them are
lovely, with museum type exhibits. In some hallways there are musicians
playing for tips, some of them really lame accordion players and some of
them very accomplished string octets. It's interesting. Anyway, we got to
the stop and were in the neighborhood they call the Marais.

We were heading toward the Musee Carnavalet, a museum of the history of
Paris. On the way, we were surprised to pass by an old synagogue with some
orthodoxim standing in front. It was a very nice building, reminding us of
some of the modernisme buildings in Barcelona. We took a couple of photos
of it.

We got to the museum and checked it out pretty thoroughly. Right in front
was a sign from a veterinarian's office, from a few hundred years ago.
Sadly, flash photography was prohibited and so we didn't get a picture of
it. Hillary is very upset about this, but she will eventually get over it.
The rest of the museum contained all kinds of objects and signs and things
from very old Parisian businesses - wineries, metalsmiths, and so forth.
There were several sculptures of cats, that were marked "unknown
significance." There were also a number of rooms made up as replicas of
certain salons from the old days. It was very impressive.

>From there, we again took the metro, this time to the Cite stop on Ile de
la Cite. This tiny island is jam packed with things to see and we saw
them!
We went to the Palais de Justice, the Marche de Fleurs, the Ste Chapelle
Cathedral, the Conciergerie, and of course, the Notre Dame Cathedral. The
flower market was huge and we got a picture of part of it. The Palace of
Justice is the current city courthouse. It's an elegant building with
"Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite" inscribed over the main doors, which is
interesting when one goes around the corner to the Conciergerie, which is
the "anteroom of death" in which the prisoners of the Revolution (like
Marie Antoinette, whose cell we saw) were housed prior to their beheading.
Hmmm. Not a whole lot of Liberte, Egalite, or Fraternite going on there!
Considering the Palais de Justice was in fact the place where the "trials"
were held during the Reign of Terror in 1793-95, we feel there is some
hypocrisy at the heart of the French justice system. BTW, did you know
they
used the guillotine up until 1981??

Anyway. The Ste. Chapelle cathedral was beautiful - it has humongous
stained glass windows. The downstairs, where we entered, was stunning, and
then we went upstairs and Hillary almost passed out from shock because she
couldn't believe it but the upstairs was even better! King Louis IX
commissioned this place in 1245, and it has 6,456 feet of stained glass
windows. Louis got to pray upstairs, his henchmen had to content
themselves
with the downstairs.

While in the area we also checked out the Pont Neuf - the oldest bridge in
Paris, linking the Right Bank (which we also checked out, noticing the
famed booksellers with their old used books and amusing posters) with the
Ile de la Cite. This bridge was built in 1607 by Henri IV (well, by the
people he told to build it, we suppose...)

We looked at the Notre Dame cathedral, and actually saw the Hunchback! We
will show you a picture of him when we get back. Then, we wanted to find a
memorial that was mentioned in our book, so Hillary talked to a security
guard who took pity on us and gave the directions in very slow and
uncomplicated French. We thanked him and went on. On the way to the
memorial we passed through the lovely formal Jardins du St. Joan, from
which we photographed the Cathedral's back side. The gardens contained a
lot of wonderful red and pink flowers, shaped hedges, and a statue of St.
Joan. Behind this garden, and across the street, was the small park
containing the memorial we were looking for. That was the Deportation
Memorial. Right on a bridge over the Seine, there is this little green
park
area, with benches and some flowers, and a plain granite wall, about waist
high, with red writing on it which says:

1940 - For the 200,000 Dead in the Camps - something we can't remember -
1945

It was in french of course, but it was easy for Hillary to translate. When
the photo comes out, perhaps we can read the rest of the inscription. In
any case, it is a memorial to the 200,000 French Jews who were deported
from this region during WWII to die in concentration camps.

Before leaving Ile de la Cite, we walked over the river to check out the
Hotel de Ville. This is an architecturally amazing building, with over 150
statues of famous Frenchmen on it. The square in front of it was a site of
executions in the Middle Ages. Right now, it has some benches, some cool
triangular fountains, and a big weird thing made of flowers (which we
photographed) put there by the school for Florists of Ile de la Cite. The
hotel itself was once the seat of the revolutionary government of
Robespierre and Marat, and was also the site where the Resistance leaders
brought Charles de Gaulle for a welcome home party after the liberation of
Paris, in 1944. Right now, it's the office of the Mayor of Paris.

After checking out the Hotel, we went to a nearby cafe for a quick lunch.
A
funny thing happened there - we sat in the outdoor section, but then the
rain we'd been promised by the CNN weather guy started slowly to come
down,
in a drizzle. The waitress came running out shouting "Pleut, pleut!" which
Hillary knew meant "rain! rain!" but which still sounded really funny, so
we moved into a table which was "inside" but only just, in an area where
there was no wall separating us from the outside. It was great. By the
time
we were done, it wasn't really raining anymore! Phew!

We headed out via the metro to Varenne. Here we visited the Musee Rodin.
This museum is full of stunning sculptures in marble and bronze (the
marble
ones are cooler - it looks as if the people or animals or hands are
reaching or climbing out of the marble from which they are carved), as
well
as paintings from Rodin's personal collection, by Van Gogh (two really
cool
ones by him!), Monet, Renoir, and other lesser known artists. The museum
is
surrounded by formal french gardens. Tons of roses, flowering and green
hedges, fountains, and many of Rodin's best known sculptures within the
beautiful outdoor garden setting. It was really really something.

After that, we were tired, so we wanted to go back to the hotel, but first
we stopped back at the Champs Elysees to visit the Office de Tourisme,
where we booked a bus tour for Thursday (our last real day here) and
picked
up some info about transportation to the airport. Then we came back to the
hotel.

Upon our arrival back here, we asked about the water, but unfortunately it
still isn't fixed. The very nice girl at the reception desk said we could
use her shower at home, but unfortunately she's still working and we're
going out later, so that wouldn't work too well. We're managing nicely by
sponging ourselves off in the sink :) but we will talk to the manager
tomorrow if it isn't taken care of by then.

We obtained a list of restaurants that are supposed to be good before we
came to Paris, and we wanted to make a reservation at one. Hillary called
up (Michael dialed for her - the phone system here is beyond Hillary) and
asked them if they spoke English, but "seulement un petit peu, madame."
So,
she communicated in French, that we wanted a table for two people this
evening at 8:30, and not only did the woman understand her, but she
congratulated her on her french! This may be the high point of Hillary's
trip :) - well, ok, maybe not, but still, it was a confidence booster.

That's all for now.
---

Hi again. When we got to the restaurant and Hillary told them we had a
reservation under the name Israeli, they found us on the list and seated
us
immediately, so apparently they did understand the first grade french
after
all! Woo!

We went to a restaurant called Phillippe Detourbe, on the recommendation
of
some random Belgian guy named Jack, on the Internet. It was in fact quite
good, and we're really glad we went. They had a fixed menu degustation for
220 FF; after explaining it to us they asked if it sounded ok - Hillary
knew that Michael was too polite to say anything so she told them that he
didn't really like fish - so they replaced his fish courses with a green
salad and a squab dish (which he said he wasn't sure he would like but he
ended up liking it!)

All of the food was wonderful, especially (says Hillary) the dessert,
which
was strawberries in a red wine sauce with vanilla-perfumed whipped cream
and coconut cake. Also of note: they had a wine guy who came to talk to us
about wine, and we asked him if France did or did not, in fact, produce
any
sweet wines (because of that obnoxious waiter in Guadeloupe who said "all
French wines are dry!"). He told us that yes, France makes many sweet
wines, perhaps most notably the Sauternes, and that the waiter in
Guadeloupe didn't sound like a very good waiter at all. He said he would
pour us a glass of sweet wine with our dessert, which he did, and it was
very good! So, we should all go back to Guadeloupe, find that waiter, and
kick his ass.

Unfortunately, when we'd completed the repast, we found ourselves in a
quandary. We'd failed to arrange for a contingency plan in the case of
more
rain. Yes, for the first time, we found ourselves caught in some really
wet
rain, with no raincoats or umbrellas. So, we dashed between the awnings to
the metro, and made it back without getting *completely* soaked, but just
barely.

When we got back, Hillary was feeling a bit grouchy due to the wetness and
chilliness and the fact that she had banged her knee on some pole on the
way back and had a bruise - bottom line, she *really* wanted a hot shower!
She asked the night guy (whose English is not that great) if the l'eau
chaude was fixed yet, and if not, when? He said that it would be fixed in
time for us to have a shower tomorrow morning - but he also said that no,
no one is working on it tonight, not til tomorrow - so we are not holding
out many hopes for a shower tomorrow AM. But, the guy was nice and all, so
we can't really be annoyed with him.

Tomorrow is Louvre day! We also hope to have time to stop by the Pasteur
Institute - we were near there tonight when we went out to dinner, but due
to the rain, we were unable to stop by and check it out. Beyond that,
maybe
we'll do some shopping or something - who knows. We'll let you know!

Love,

Michael & Hillary



>From izzy@izzy.com Sun Jul  5 08:37:00 1998
Date: Wed, 01 Jul 1998 17:30:41 +0200
From: Michael Israeli <izzy@izzy.com>
Subject: July 1: we're clean!!

You will be pleased to hear, we're sure, that we have FINALLY gotten to
take showers! But let's do this in order, shall we?

Today, Hillary got up early because the hotel staff had promised her a
meeting with the manager at 8 am. So, she waited from 8 til almost 9 am,
but he didn't show up - they said he was "stuck in traffic" even though
some other people who were coming to check in had just remarked on how
little traffic there was in Paris today! But please realize - on the
whole,
the hotel staff were very kind, and very sympathetic, and very agreeable -
but they had no power to do anything, and kept referring us to the
manager,
who was never around! Since it seemed like another managerial no-show,
Hillary woke Michael up, and we had breakfast, and just before 10 AM, as
we
were preparing to leave, in walked Monsieur Le Manageur :)

This is actually a good story, because we'd been kind of worried about
having to leave Paris without meeting a stereotypical French Asshole, and
now we do not have to worry about that anymore!! The manager started to
tell Hillary that there was no way the water could be fixed today, that he
was sorry but this is the way things are, that surely she could understand
how it is when a water heater gets old, etc etc - and Hillary said (very
politely!!!) "Yes, of course I understand. But, this is my third day
without a shower, and regardless of the problem with the water here, I
think you need to arrange for us to have shower facilities." His response
to this was to take her over to the area where some dude was working on
the
pipes and start in again about how this work takes time, and they cannot
turn off the water to fix it during certain hours, and blah blah blah in
incomprehensible franglais. Hillary again told him "yes, I understand, and
I'm sorry, but the thing is, we must have showers today, so please tell me
what you can do for us!" So the guy said, "ok, we can move you to another
of our hotels. It is very close. I will arrange it for you, and when you
come back from your sightseeing this afternoon, it will be all set. Ok?"

Now, you may be thinking "that doesn't sound too much like an asshole to
me." But, there's more - to come later, in its place. After all that, we
set out for a journey via the Metro to Le Louvre. Now, it's simply not
possible to describe this place, so we will not try. It is of course a
very
large, very beautiful building, with the oddly placed glass pyramids by
I.M. Pei smack dab in the middle of the courtyard. We entered with
absolutely no wait - in fact, no one even checked our tickets - and
started
to explore. To make a very long story short, our favorite parts were some
of the really beautiful ancient Greek statues (but NOT the Aphrodite/Venus
de Milo, with which Michael was particularly unimpressed, saying "but
these
others over here are prettier, AND they have arms!"), some of the "Large
format French Paintings" in the Denon gallery, the absolutely unbelievable
reproductions of Napoleon's apartments, the *really* exquisite Apollo
gallery (a richly decorated, extremely large hallway housing a number of
precious objets d'art including collections of crystal, jewelled jaspar
cups and so forth, and the crown jewels - and you can't forget to look up!
there are frescoes on the ceiling that are great!), and the Medici Gallery
(another very big room, this one filled with huge canvases done by our old
friend, Peter Paul Rubens). Hillary also liked the room just past the
Medici Gallery, which contained two large canvasses full of many different
animals :)

While in the Louvre we also stopped at the Cafe Richelieu, for un Coca
Cola
et un Coca Cola Light. We sat out on the patio, with a wonderful view into
the pyramid-containing courtyard. Michael noticed that the pigeons of the
region have an unfair advantage over the erstwhile tourist - the pigeons
are allowed to fly right onto the many statues which adorn this huge
palace, whereas the tourists are always kept at arm's length! What's up
with that, anyway???

So we left the Louvre, refreshed by our sodas and with high hopes for the
rest of the day. We had had our eye on a particular item in a shop we'd
passed the other day, so we thought we would go look to see if it was
still
there. Also, we wanted to buy a duffel bag because if we were going to
change hotels, we would need a spare bag - we've collected a lot of
stuff!!

We took the Metro to the Opera stop - this gave us a chance to get another
look at the beautiful National Academy of Music, which we'd only seen in
the dark before. It really is a great building, and it is really too bad
that the French do not have the Scandinavian tendency to keep their
beautiful old buildings CLEAN! The french buildings are all covered with
grime and soot (kind of like us, after three days with no shower, but we
digress...). In any case, it took us a minute to organize ourselves and
while we were figuring out where we were, we spotted a restaurant someone
had recommended to us - the Cafe de la Paix/La Brasserie. We went in there
and had an excellent lunch. Hillary had a heck of a time translating the
menu, because the words for various fancy french food items are not part
of
high school french classes NOR for some reason were many of them in her
phrasebook - but, we figured it out, and we got some excellent food. We're
going to miss the French goat cheese, that's for sure.
Since our waitress seemed to speak rudimentary English, we tried to ask
her
if she knew where we could get a duffel bag - but it seems that there is
no
translation for "duffel bag" - and when we tried to ask her in English if
she knew where we could get one, she said "je suis desolee, mais je ne
comprends pas!" So (and those of you who do speak french should get a kick
out of this!) Hillary said, "D'accord. J'ai un valise, mais nous voudrions
un autre valise, mais n'est pas cher." and the waitress immediately gave
us
directions to a shop which sold cheap suitcases, down in the metro station
:). Unfortunately, we didn't want a cheap suitcase. We wanted a duffel
bag!
So the search continued.

We wandered through the district somewhat aimlessly, noticing a lot of
charming hotels, residences, brasseries, and patisseries (but despite
Mila's recommendation, we're trying not to enter every patisserie in sight
- we don't want to go over the passenger weight allowance on our flight
home!). Finally we found the shop we'd seen before, and we went in to make
our purchase. The proprietress spoke English, and she confirmed for us
that
no one in France would understand what a "duffel bag" was, and seemed very
pessimistic about our being able to find one. Nonetheless, we continued
on.
We finally ended up in some cheesy tourist shop on Rue de Rivoli, where we
got a small square pseudo duffel bag, it's black canvas with the word
"PARIS" emblazoned in gold embroidery on the side :)

Then we went back to the Residence Concorde, packed up, said goodbye to
the
very nice woman at the desk, and went where she'd told us to go - next
door, to the four star Hotel Cambon. BUT - when we told the concierge who
we were and why we were there, she had no idea what we were talking about!
She called the Residence Concorde, and the woman at the desk there told
her
what the manager had said, which was that we were to move to the Hotel
Cambon. Obviously, someone screwed up. So, the Residence Concorde woman
called in to her manager - but got his answering machine again (this had
been the problem before, when we'd wanted to talk to him about the shower
problem on the second day). Then she tried calling her "reservation
office"
whatever that is - and they told her we were booked into a different hotel
- the Hotel Daunou Opera, a few blocks away - normally a 10 minute walk.

Well, this wouldn't be a huge tragedy or anything, but we had a lot of
luggage, it was hot, and we were tired and frustrated. So Hillary went
back
over to the Residence Concorde (right next door) to see if they would pay
for a taxi for us. The woman there was so nice! She was cursing her
manager, calling him irresponsible, etc. She tried calling him again to no
avail, and eventually she gave us some money out of the drawer without
authorization because she figured we deserved it. So we got a cab (which
ended up costing more than she'd given us because he ripped us off, but
that's another story) and got to the other hotel.

Here, we have a nice room very similar to the other room, but arranged a
bit differently and with no air conditioning. Hillary inquired about the
air conditioning, because we had had air conditioning at the other hotel -
and they put her on the phone with the manager (she didn't ask them to,
they just did it) who (now really showing his true colors) insisted that
we
had not had air conditioning in the other hotel! Hillary said "Ok, fine,
nevermind, thanks for your time" because she figured there was no point
getting into a "yes we did, no you didn't" thing with him - but he kept
saying "there is no air conditioning there!" and finally she said "I am
hanging up now, thank you very much" and hung up. What a creepo he is! If
they had moved us the first day, it probably would have been better, but
we
are happy now that it's all arranged and we are well-scrubbed and clean :)
(also we called the airport shuttle service to give them our new address!)
The very nice woman from the Residence Concorde even called us a few
minutes ago to make sure we were all settled in well, and that everything
was ok, which it is.

Not being the type of people to let a little setback like this get us
down,
we're preparing for an evening out on the town. We're not sure what we'll
do, but hopefully it will be good and we'll let you know about it in our
next missive :). Also, tomorrow will be a bus tour of Paris, and a cruise
on the Seine. Woo Hoo!

Love,

Michael and Hillary

>From izzy@izzy.com Sun Jul  5 08:37:00 1998
Date: Thu, 02 Jul 1998 17:28:20 +0200
From: Michael Israeli <izzy@izzy.com>
Subject: July 1 & 2nd: the end is near

Greetings, travel fans!

When we last met, our heroes had showered and scrubbed and were preparing
for a night on the town. We're sure you're all panting with desire to know
what happened, so here's the  lowdown:

First, we headed out via the metro to the Pasteur stop, so that Hillary
could see the acclaimed Pasteur institute. The Institute is made up of a
number of buildings, but two of them, which sit directly across the street
from each other, are the original buildings - brick with white columns,
and
with inscriptions reading "Institut Pasteur" over the doorway. We
photographed them, so we could prove we were there :)
In case any of you are wondering, the Institut Pasteur is the research
institute where Team France, in a nose to nose photo finish with Team USA,
initially isolated the virus which causes AIDS, which they called HTLV at
the time. In front of the main building is a bust of Louis Pasteur
himself,
who saved the world from TB by bringing us pasteurization for milk, and
more recently (although he probably doesn't know it) from salmonella with
the advent of pastuerized eggs.

As we were standing there, considering trying to sneak onto the campus of
the Institute past the sleepy looking security guard, it started
drizzling,
so we hightailed it back to the metro for the next leg of our night out.

We went back to the area near our (new) hotel - the Madeleine station,
which happens to be the station we went to the first time we rode the
metro, but that was a mistake, b/c we should have gone to the Concorde
station that time. Anyway, we went there and walked up the Avenue until we
got to a small street called Rue Caumartin. Then, we took a left (jason -
we hope this is detailed enough for you! :)). When we got to #21 (which,
by
the way, was difficult to discern at first - the numbering system here is
weird, not in order, and often even more hard to figure out due to the
omnipresent construction work/scaffolding) we went into Les Bacchantes, a
wine bar of which we'd heard good things.

The friendly gentleman who seated us didn't speak english (except for the
phrase "excuse me") but nonetheless, we managed to order and have a
pleasant time. We had five different wines, all good, and all $5 or less.
First, Hillary had a glass of a muscadet, while Michael had a white
Bordeaux; then Michael had a different muscadet while Hillary had a rose';
then we shared a really good glass of pinot noir. Along with the wine, we
had a plate of assorted cheeses, which was served with a basket of this
really yummy, fresh, thinly sliced, brown bread, which is ubiquitous here.
All of this cost us about $25, by the way! We have decided that we like
muscadet, which is a white wine produced in the Loire valley. The
muscadets
we have had have all been bursting with flavor. If only Michael would stop
calling them "Moose Cadets," everything would be fine.

While we were enjoying ourselves there, Michael found that he particularly
liked one of the cheeses on the plate, but we couldn't figure out what
kind
it was, so Hillary asked the server what it was called. He told us what it
was (though we've now forgotten) and then the gentleman at the next table
leaned over excitedly to tell us (in French) that yes, this was in fact a
very good cheese, very famous, and very french, and that the name of it
was
the name of the region from which it came, which was in the center of
France. We think it starts with a C. Anyone know?

Our original plan had called for going to the above wine bar, and figuring
out where to have dinner while enjoying our wine. However, the bread and
cheese was so filling and yummy that we didn't think dinner would be
possible! So, we figured "don't mess with a good thing" and we headed off
to another wine bar :)

This required walking a bit, which was good, because our stomachs were
heavy. We headed back in the direction of that shop we stopped at earlier
today, but further down that street, and eventually we got into a nifty
little area with many nice looking restaurants, a fruit/grocery shop, etc.
At one point, we passed one of those "On this site in year X" historical
signs that you see all over the place. It marked something called "Passage
de ---" (we forget what it was, exactly), that appeared to be some kind of
alleyway which had been covered over at some point, and which was lined
with various shops. Hillary wanted to stop and spend a couple of minutes
figuring out what the sign said, since it was obviously something
important, but Michael said "Oh, come on - it's just another old French
hallway" and Hillary was laughing so hard at that that she allowed herself
to be dragged on until we had gone so far past it, it wasn't worth it to
go
back. In this area was located Willie's Wine Bar - a wine bar/bistro owned
by a British expat. After a quick consultation with our map and guidebook,
we found it.

We went in and sat at the bar and ordered dessert and a glass of sweet
muscat. While perusing the wine list we noticed that one of the top 10
most
expensive wines on there was a Beringer Chardonnay, from California! Go
figure. Anyway, we had quite possibly THE WORLD'S BEST creme brulee at
this
place, along with a puff pastry shell covered with caramelized apricots in
vanilla sauce, which was also very good. One thing we've noticed - the
apricots around here are huge compared to the ones at home. The fruit
markets have apricots almost the size of avocados! Plus, the flavor of the
apricots (we bought a fresh one at a fruit market the other day) is MUCH
more intense than the flavor of the apricots at home. We never knew
apricots could be so
apricot-y!

This reminds us - we have walked through a few areas where there have been
markets with fruit for sale. The fragrance of the fresh berries, peaches,
apricots, melons, etc is overwhelming as you walk by. Either the fruit
here
produces more odorant molecules, or american fruit is chemically treated
to
prevent their release, or something. Hillary wanted to stand in one of the
fruit stores and just inhale the aroma for a while, but Michael thought we
should continue on because he was hungry :)

OH! That reminds us - don't ask us why - we forgot to tell you something
about Amsterdam (maybe we're reminded because both Amsterdam and apricot
start with an A?)

Amsterdam is *seriously* lacking in ATMs. There are very long lines at all
the available ATMs, and it is a very long walk between ATMs. It sucks.

Anyway, back to Paris. We ate our dessert, chatted up the guy next to us
at
the bar who spoke to us in English after he heard us speaking English, and
chatted up the bartender, who was a British woman who was pissed off about
England's failure to advance in the World Cup. Then we took off.

On the way back to the hotel (which is where we headed next, because we
must get up very early for tomorrow's bus tour) Michael expounded on the
silliness of the French language. He finds it very upsetting that they do
not pronounce the last letter of each word. In his words, "if they aren't
going to pronounce it, why do they put it there?" Hillary has tried to
explain that they put the last letter there to ensure that the letter
before it is in fact pronounced; also that if they kept taking off letters
that aren't pronounced, while still following the rule about not
pronouncing the last letter, soon you would have no letters at all; but
Michael isn't buying it. He greatly prefers Spanish, where (almost)
everything is pronounced, and you can brush up on your vocab by watching
Sesame Street. :)

That's all for now, gotta sleep!
----

We woke up this morning, had breakfast at our new hotel (which has better
orange juice, but worse coffee), and headed over to Rue de Rivoli which is
where the tour buses leave from.  After waiting for a bit, we boarded the
tour bus and began the tour.

This was one of those tours where they give you a headset so you can hear
the information in your language of choice. Our first information area was
the Place de Concorde, which as you know we'd visited several times
already. However, we learned some new things here this time! The Egyptian
obelisk standing in the center is 3300 years old and is inscribed with
really interesting heiroglyphics. It is the oldest monument in Paris and
used to be part of some Temple we couldn't catch the name of because the
tape we were listening to had a lame-ass music soundtrack in the
background
that suddenly got really loud :). Also in this place, there are statues
signifying various cities in France, surrounding the traffic circle.

Then we drove down the Avenue Champs Elysees, which we prefer to call
Benjamin Franklin Parkway because of the flags with which it is lined.
Today some workers were setting up bleachers along the sidewalks, so from
the bus it wasn't really possible to see into the gardens we'd walked
through before. We did, however, get an excellent view from the center of
the Rond Point, which is the intersection with all the cool flowerbeds and
fountains we mentioned before, where the Avenue de Franklin Roosevelt
crosses the Ave Champs Elysees.

While driving down the A.C.E, we heard some commentary regarding the
numerous shops and cafes and such lining the commercial part of it, west
of
the Rond Point. The tape mentioned a cafe with red awnings called
Fouquet's
- which is apparently a place where many movie stars and famous people
tend
to hang out. When we looked out the window to see it, we realized that it
was the same place we'd stopped the other day to have a couple of $12.00
beers. No wonder! We also have been informed that Art Buchwald, writing
for
the international Herald Tribune 20 years ago, wrote "so, shall we have
the
asparagus, or shall we send Heimy to college?" about a meal at Fouquet's.

As we approached the Arc de Triomphe, we were informed that at one point,
city plans called for a gigantic elephant with water spouting from its
trunk instead of the more refined arch which currently stands there. The
model for the elephant was even built, and is housed in one of the many
museums around here. It kind of gave us pause, to imagine this giant
elephant standing there...

We continued onward, south, down Avenue Kleber. This is a very chichi,
exclusive area, where many countries have their embassies. We noticed a
pizza place called "Speed Rabbit" which guaranteed to deliver your Pizza
Americaine to your door in under treinte minutes. :) This avenue
terminates
at the Place Trocadero, a green area with a statue in the middle of it
("some guy on a horse"), located behind the Palais de Chaillot - which is
the building we remarked upon the other day, which we saw across the
river,
from the Eiffel tower. It contains the museum of cinema, and the naval
history museum. The Palais de Chaillot is really cool up close - it has a
lot of gold statues lining its courtyard.

We then went along Avenue de President Wilson, past the modern art museum,
through Place de l'Alma, to the Baton-Mouche at the base of the Pont de
l'Alma. This is where we got of the bus and boarded the boat for the
cruise
on the Seine.

The boat ride was fun, although it was very overcast and a bit chilly, we
still sat on the upper deck to get the best view of everything. We cruised
all the way down past St. Louis en l'Ile, the smaller island just past the
Ile de la Cite. From our boat-top vantage point, we were able to get some
good photos of Notre Dame, the Musee D'Orsay (which used to be a train
station), and some of the 17th century buildings which are now exclusive
homes on St. Louis en l'Ile.

After the boat thing, we got back on the bus and drove over to the Eiffel
tower, where we were given passes to cut in line and head immediately up
to
the first platform. The views from up there were really awesome, so we
took
some more photos from up there. Also, while up there, Hillary convinced
Michael that crepes are not crap, and got him to try one. He reluctantly
admitted he liked it :)

We went back down after we finished checking everything out, and we
crossed
the river on the Pont d'Iena, which was teeming with junk vendors trying
to
sell us useless pieces of junk for 5 FF each. Just across the bridge was
the Palais de Chaillot - but set up in front of it was a HUGE "parc du
Football" sponsored by Adidas and France Telecom. There were a number of
information booths and boutiques set up in tents along either side of the
grand fountain there. We didn't go in there, but walked around the side,
where there was a pretty green area with some nice flower beds, where
Hillary stopped to sit down for a minute because we were going up a very
steep hill :)

When we got to Trocadero Place on the other side, we hopped into the metro
and headed to station Richelieu - Druout. This station was mere seconds
from the Hard Rock Cafe, where we stopped for a couple of juicy american
style cheeseburgers, and Michael made a cameo appearance on the closed
circuit TV (they showed him heading into a room under a sign reading
"TOILETTES")

>From there, we walked hither and yon, looking at buildings and shops and
chatting about nothing in particular. Michael remarked that it would be
really bad if he were to get lost on his own in France, because the only
French phrases he knows are "s'il vous plait," "ou sont les toilettes,"
and
"voulez-vous couchez avec moi ce soir?" We went on past the Bourse, which
was covered with pigeons, and to the Place du Victoires. From there, we
took the wrong road entirely, and at just about the time we realized our
mistake, it slowly began to drizzle. We figured out where we were going
and
got there, and when we came out of the shop it really began to steadily,
but lightly, rain. So we headed quickly back to the hotel, for a nap, and
to download today's information out of our brains and into the computer
before it is lost forever.

Other confusing things about France: if you aren't allowed to stop using
"vous" and start using "tu" until the other person tutoies you, how does
anyone ever get to use the tu form? And, why do people think that it is ok
to park their cars on the sidewalk? Also, how come people allow their dogs
to leave little piles of stuff everywhere in sight??? We're told that the
dogs in Paris produce *11 tons* of excrement daily - and we are not
surprised to hear it. But we think someone should have the job of cleaning
it up!!!

Since we leave tomorrow from the hotel at 5 am (bleah), we will require an
early night tonight. This will probably (but not definitely) be our final
email - we'll be home tomorrow!

love,

h. & m.

>From izzy@izzy.com Sun Jul  5 08:37:00 1998
Date: Thu, 02 Jul 1998 22:20:52 +0200
From: Michael Israeli <izzy@izzy.com>
Subject: July 2, 10 PM: Thanks for the mammaries

As we were hanging out in our hotel room this afternoon after we last
wrote
to you, and doing some pre-packing packing, the weather here in Gay Paree
changed from overcast and somewhat chilly to sunny and warm. The streets
beckoned. We resisted. They beckoned some more. We turned our backs to
them. Then it started getting warm in here so we gave in and headed out
for
one last roam around the city.

It's a good thing, too, because we hit on some great things! We started
out
for our final stroll carrying only one small map and a phrasebook for
emergencies. This alone was something new for us - usually, we carry
around
all relevant travel materials such as guidebook pages, menu translators,
big maps, little maps, etc, in what we like to call "the Bag of
Knowledge,"
also known as Hillary's black pocketbook that her mom gave her last month.
This time, we were "on our own" as it were. It gave things a whole new
feeling.

We chose a random direction and started walking. We passed some
architecturally interesting buildings, some cute little shops, and some
stuffy little poodles - hey, by the way, for some reason the French are
really into SMALL dogs. Mini poodles, lhasa apsos, you name it, if it is a
small dog, they have it. Anyway, eventually we found ourselves in a square
(actually, a circle) with two pretty fountains and La Comedie Francaise
building. We took a photo of one of the fountains because it looked nice,
and of La Comedie Francaise because Hillary had to read so much Moliere
and
French theatrical history in college that she felt it was only fair.

Then as we walked past this area, we found ourselves at the northeast side
of the Louvre. We stopped here for a minute to take in the nice view from
across the street, then we crossed over to the Louvre side of the street
to
photograph the cool art deco sign marking the Louvre metro stop there. We
also turned back to get a good look at the building across the street from
the Louvre - obviously some kind of government building, with army type
guards and a big French flag, and lots of columns and stuff.

We headed into the courtyard of the Louvre, and walked around the pyramid
fountain, checking it out from various angles. The fountains were lit up
and it looked very beautiful. We also got to appreciate more of the
architectural detail of the building from this perspective. The columns
have all these intricate carvings on them, it's really amazing.

We then headed out of the courtyard to the east, toward the Jardins
Tulieres. Marking the boundary of the Jardin is a large arch, sort of a
mini Arc de Triomphe, although still very large, with statues of horsemen
on the top, and pink columns on either side. It's very pretty and we
photographed it, and then we got up close to read the inscription, which
Hillary thinks said something like "the army went on a campaign on the
continent, and kicked ass in some city called [we forget the name] in a
remarkably short time, and we built this to commemorate the victory."

Then we walked down to the waterfront, via the Jardins Tuileres - we got
to
see the whole west section of the Jardin which we had skipped earlier -
this was a very nice area, with sculpted hedges and marble statues of
women
and animals; plus another section planted with rows of wildflowers and
more
statues and stuff.

After checking out the view of the river and noticing the sun starting to
set, we walked back toward Rue de Rivoli, also stopping to take a final
look at the Place de Concorde, which looked great in the setting sunlight.
We walked out to Rue de Rivoli via the amusement park section of the
Jardin, where we were in fact amused by a giant inflatable chicken and a
huge gorilla. This amusement area, when viewed from back by the bank of
the
Seine, actually looked really cool, since all the rides had colored lights
on them and stuff. Up close, it was just another tacky little amusement
park, with kids running around screaming (including one American 12 year
old who turned to his group of American 12 year old friends and grabbed
his
pelvic area and shouted "suck this!" Yes, we are proud of our American
heritage...)

Feeling kind of tired, but suspecting it would be wise to eat something
since we get up at 4, leave here at 5, and who knows what will happen once
we get on the plane, we decided to look for somewhere to eat. We headed in
the general direction of the hotel and what do you know - there is a
really
nifty looking Vietnamese place right across the street from here! We went
in there and ordered some chicken soup and Vietnamese spring rolls, Coca
Cola, and Vittel. It was excellent. While we were there, there was another
couple sitting and having dinner in the corner of the room. At one point,
the girl leaned over and the guy first stuck his hand down her shirt, then
practically stuck his whole face in there. They left shortly after that.
(Hence our subject line :)) We left shortly after they did, and now, we're
back in the room, surveying the damage, and planning the packing.

So, thanks for listening to our travel tales. We hope you have enjoyed
them. This is definitely the final installment, so for those of you who
have been simply deleting these unread, STOP DOING THAT, any further mail
from izzy@izzy.com is REAL mail, not travel BS.

Oh. Hey. Wait. If you were deleting them unread, then you are not reading
this, are you? Oh well. We know where to find you, ALL of you, and if we
want to talk to you, dammit, we will.

See you on the flip side,

Hillary and Michael