Foiled again

Day 20
Saturday June 4

Today, we got up early. We wanted to go to the Catacombs, hailed as Paris' most eerie attraction. I wonder at the morbidity of our choices--multiple cemeteries, Normandy, and now the Catacombs, an underground labyrinth brimming with bones and skulls of Parisians past. When they ran out of room  in the city limits during the plague, they'd pile the bodies here. Now, the tunnels have been cleaned up a little, but they chose to leave all the skeletal remains of those that found their final resting place here.

Buuuut we didn't see it. We got there around 2:30, and the line was around the block. We trudged to the end and prepared ourselves for a scintillating eternity in line. Did I mention it was 98 degrees outside (insert boy band joke here). After a few minutes a docent informed us that the line would take 2 hours to get through, and the last admission for the Catacombs was at 4pm. In other words, we are late, and we should probably give up.

So we did. Diana consulted her trusty guidebook, and we discovered that the Montparnasse cemetery was just around the corner. Off we went! (again with the morbid decisions)...but Baudelaire is buried here, and Tzara, and Sarte/DeBeauvoir. Who can turn that down? Not us. Duh. It took a little maneuvering to find our people once inside, but we did it! Baudelaire is one of France's great poets, and he's the sexiest of the surrealists. He loved women and opiates and absinthe. We figured it was important to pay our respects. We found the grave covered with scraps of paper with handwritten verses from his work from his fans, anchored to the marble slab with rocks. I got there, and I had to wait my turn to approach his tomb. A wrinkly, smiley man was kneeling, prayer style, and writing a verse to leave for Baudelaire. When he finished, he saw me lurking in the background (I'm getting the hang of this cemetery thing), and he clasped his hands, smiled, and reverently whispered "Baudelaire" to me. I returned the gesture, a mutual respect and camaraderie passing between us for our friend.

Then we found Sartre and DeBeauvoir's grave--they're buried together. And while their philosophies may be a little peevish to me at times, I must admit--their shared grave is lovely. Its simple and clean, and there are only a few lipstick marks by their names.

Having had our fill of death for the time being, we headed to St. Michele (the center of the city next to Notre Dame) for gelato at Amarino's. Legendary for its ice cream, I didn't know quite what to expect, especially because we changed trains twice and wandered around windy streets to find the place. Let me tell you though: SO WORTH IT. I got ciaccolato and amarena. After my first bite, I could have died happy right then and there. Blah blah blah, best ice cream ever raving, but it must be done.

Baudelaire

Silly and satisfied, we decided to trek around the area a little bit. There we happened across Cluny La Sorbonne, the French university. Side note: did you know its FREE to go to college here? ugh. jealous. Anyway, in our travels, we saw a massive dome on the horizon, so naturally we had to see what that was, right? Turns out its the Pantheon. Who knew? We discovered that we were surprisingly close to the Pub St. Hilarie that we went to a couple weeks ago, and we also oriented ourselves to the Seine and the falafel restaurant that we'd been to within three days of us being here. I swear this city is so small. I feel like every time I go somewhere new, I find that I'm ridiculously close to somewhere I've already been. Awesome. Anyway, once we figured out that the falafel place was close, naturally we decided we would have to go there. Maybe Johnny Depp would be there this time. So we started walking...an hour later we realized that, while we were close, we weren't so sure of how to get there, and perhaps we hadn't taken the most efficient route...kept walking...found it! but it was closed...womp womp.

My contribution: see "Evivrez Vous" by Baudelaire

Heaven

We were very disappointed...then we saw a sign for Musee Carnavalet, and we realized that the falafel restaurant that we'd been to so long ago is only a few streets over from the places we'd discovered on our own countless times around the Bastille. Shut up, Paris! Okay so we figured we could make it home...wrong again. We were walking, and walking, and walking, and its a thousand degrees outside, and we're getting a little angsty because we're starving, and home just keeps not showing up. So we decide we need to pull a Pulp Fiction and get a royale with cheese--aka a McDonald's cheeseburger... I am a little ashamed, but this was an emergency. We'd been roaming around by foot for about 6 hours at this point, and we all know what happens to our blood sugar levels (and thus our friendliness levels) when that happens....

It helped. The rest is history.

The (surprise) Pantheon

I admit it--in the land of fancy cheese and foi gras and wine and baguette, I ate a cheeseburger. I would feel guilty, but it was really good, and they put ice in my drink (no one does that here). Plus, the french LOVE cheeseburgers. Whatever.




Voila, Day 19