In which I regret not updating my blog more often this trip

I completely forgot that this blog even existed... I am now going to try to cram 4 days of events into one post.

On Tuesday we slept in a bit, then rented some bikes and went to rue Cler, a neat open air little market area. We shopped a bit and had lunch at Le Petit Cler, a cool little restaurant. It turned out that Glen stayed an extra night, since his flight was overbooked. They gave him 300€ (!) and a hotel room with all meals for the privilege of staying in Paris one more night. So we met up with him at about 5 and headed over to the Kingdom Hall. I thought I had already said this in a post, but I can't find it-- I absolutely detest public transportation. So I insisted that we take a taxi... It would havbe been so sweaty and gross in the metro...

The meeting was good, they have 3 MTS grads in the Paris East congregation and two of them had parts. Most of the congregation was away for vacation, along with the rest of Paris. Even the CBOE was gone... Apparently he needed a break after organizing a huge department during the Int'l Convention. Still, the congregation was lively and we had a good time meeting everyone before and after the meeting.

One cool thing that happened during the meeting-- I ran into Virginie and Didier Niel... The last time that I saw them was probably 7 or 8 years ago, in Toronto! I thought that I would have run into them during the convention, but I didn't, and I kinda forgot about the possibility of meeting them in Paris. So it was pretty cool to bump into them at the meeting. It was actually a coincidence, since they live about 30 minutes west of Paris and technically the Paris West congregation is closer. But they are planning (with the blessing of the elders) to join Paris East starting Sept 1, and they were visiting. Anyways, it was great to see them, and we hope to spend some time with them next week (they're busy with her dad this week).

After the meeting we took Chloé (a pioneer sister who was actually interviewed on the international convention program-- a celebrity!) home, since she lives just a few mins walk from our flat. We all went for dinner/dessert first, at a cruddy little restaurant close to our flat. That was it for Tuesday.

Wednesday we slept in late, wandered around a bit while trying to buy a cell phone (we didn't end up getting one), bought ingredients for boeuf bourgignon, then met up with Paula and Ralph at the Notre Dame at 3 pm for a bike tour. The bike tour was by Bike About Tours, and was amazing. It was about 4 hours long (with a little 20 min break for snacks in between), and he took us around some neat little spots, many of which are not any other tour route. Our tour guide was David, an ex-Canadian from Calgary who has lived in Paris for the past 3 years. He was really knowledgeable about the city and we were unable to determine if he is gay or not.

I ended up getting separated from the group right near the end of the tour, at the Louvre. We had passed through the original square and biked past a couple that were singing opera in one of the outdoor hallways (a man and a woman). It was honestly one of the most beautiful things I have ever heard in my life... The cover to their sheet music said "Mendelssohn", and I've been searching fruitlessly for the name of the piece on the internet. Anyways, we biked past, but it was so beautiful I just had to turn around and keep listening. By the time I turned around to look for the rest of the group, they were gone. I circled around the fountain to see if they would come back, but after about 15 mins I figured they weren't coming back, so I headed over to the Bike About office (where we had started) and found the rest of the group.

We got a sheet from Bike About with a bunch of restaurant selections, and we had actually gone to a couple already. We picked out another one and headed over; a Southwestern French restaurant called Chez Papa. It was fantastic... Very hearty food and everything tasted amazing. We bid Glen goodbye and then headed home.

Thursday was a packed day.... Joel and I woke up early and scoured the area for a café that was open. We found one and ordered a cappuccino and café au lait. We both took one sip from our drinks, looked at each other, and after about a 1.5 second hesistation, I said "Wanna find another place?" and before I finished asking Joel already said yes. It was honestly that bad. Unfortunately we still had to pay the full 8 €. We kept searching and it was getting late, but we finally found a place that had decent drinks and was open. As we were having our coffees, we heard "Hi!" from across the street-- it was Chloé, on her way to work! That turned out to be really fortuitous, as I will explain later. Anyways, we chatted for a bit and invited her to come with us to a jazz club that night, and she said yes and headed off to work.

We then headed off to the Louvre (by métro.. ugh) and made it there by 9:30ish. We did the tour using the brochure "Bible in Hand" which is produced by the France branch. That took a gruelling 4 hours... We broke it up into two parts, though, and left for lunch around 1 pm. During the tour we bumped into a bunch of Witnesses wearing badges. We met a cool family from Italy, and they hung out with us on the tour for a little bit.

For lunch we walked in the blazing Parisien wilderness for 40 years and finally made it to a restaurant suggested by Bike About, called Au Pere Louis or something like that. It was actually really good. After lunch we went to the Georges Pompidou museum (new art) and went up to the top floor, where they have a restaurant for cold drinks and to take in the awesome view. Then we went back to the Louvre for round 2. We got to see the Mona Lisa, and were just about done with the "Bible in Hand" tour when the Louvre personnel told us that it was closing! There was one really nice lady that let us quickly see 3 statues, even though she had just told us it was closed for the day. In the end, we managed to catch all but one exhibit... Not too shabby!

We were pretty tired out, but when we got home we decided to cook up the boeuf bourgignon. It was actually lots of fun-- Ralph filmed the whole thing and we did a mock cooking show, with Paula's help in the cooking department. It was getting later and later and we hadn't heard from Chloé yet, so we called her. Turned out she had misunderstood and was waiting for us at the jazz club, with her friend... Good thing it was close by. So she came over and met us after we had finished eating. But the dumb thing about Paris is this whole vacation thing. What is the deal??? Everyone leaves the city at the exact same time, so if you come July/August the city is DEAD. The jazz club didn't have any live music during vacation time... ARGH... So we just went out for coffee to a café that ended up having a piano dude. Not bad. At the end of the night he came over to us (we were sitting right next to him) and asked for 'money for the music'. I hate that... Anyways, before I get into rant mode...

Chloé's friend is named Kathleen. Cool sister, has travelled all over the world and just got back from living in Mali for a while. Works in a bakery, and we were supposed to visit her today, but we forgot... Oops.

So the reason it was fortuitous that we met Chloé Thursday morning-- after coffee Thursday night, we walked her home, since it was late and Montmatre isn't the nicest place at night. In the course of conversation, she offered Paula and Ralph her apartment while she was away for vacation.... Paula didn't want her to think that we had taken her out just to ingratiate ourselves to her and get her to offer us her apartment, so she said we'd call her, kind of implying no. But later on, we thought about it and realized it was the perfect solution to our problem... We had only booked our flat until Friday night, but Ralph & Paula leave Sunday morning. So we need a place to sleep Saturday night, and somewhere to put our stuff Saturday. So today we called Chloé and made arrangements to get her key from a nearby sister (Chloé was actually just about to get on the train to leave for the south of France!).

That brings us to today (Friday). Today we slept in and then went out to do the very last of our shopping. I did a ton of shopping and am now almost out of money :( I bought a bunch of shirts and ties and almost all the rest of my gifts for the folks back home. Joel and I were walking past a little store and saw a stack of licence plates in the window and stopped to check them out. The door to the store was closed, but there was a sign that said "Buzz", so we hit the buzzer. A man came out with a bit of a puzzled look on his face. The puzzled look didn't go away when we told him we wanted to buy a licence plate. He looked back at his wife who was peeking out from the back. We explained they were for gifts. I asked him how much for one, and he said 10 €. I asked him how much for two, and he said 15 €! Great deal! Especially since Miriam and Priscilla had said they bought just a little motorcycle plate for something like 15 €... I should let them know... We paid and left the store, but we ended up going back and buying 4 more for 30 €. I think that they're leftovers, though, since it seems like they're a little bit messed up. Anyways, who cares, they're great gifts either way.

We went up to Sacre Coeur to check out the gift shops, and Joel got a street artist to make him a cool drawing of a picture I took of the Space Invader graffiti. Looks awesome.

We came home and finished arranging things for tomorrow's move to Chloé's apartment and had supper. We're gonna have to pack up now (I have a bit more left to do) and leave at around 8:30 tomorrow. Hope I can wake up in time!

Good night!