Bonjour Paris and the Royal Wedding

It's a very very risky thing to do but I did it anyways..haha! I guess that's the thrill of it. A week before the deadline of my dissertation, I've decided to hop off to Paris for a short break with one of my friends from Singapore, Leo. I had actually planned to finish everything before I fly off but that didn't go as well as I planned. At the time of boarding the train to London, I still have my introduction and conclusion plus bits of pieces of the chapter of reform which has not been settled. Since I won't have a laptop with me on the trip, the only time I can proceed back with the work is during the 29th when I come back. To compensate for that, I've brought along my revision notes to study so that I can have headstart to exams preparations.

The journey started off with a train ride from Leeds to London at 11am in the morning. We reached London King Cross at around 1pm and it's my first time stepping foot in London too! 7 months in England and I've never entered London before..lol. We had planned to visit Madame Tussaud's first since I have a 2 for 1 coupon. However, when we reached there, we found out that the queue is super long and since we have to leave for London Luton airport by 4pm+, it does seem unwise to queue up for it since we would have less time to go around. In the end, we just settled to walking around Westminster and Big Ben before boarding the train to the airport. It seems that all budget airlines operate at the outskirts at Luton airport and not Heathrow. By the time all the air tickets and transiting trains prices come together, it's actually better just to take the Eurostar train from London.

We reached Charles de Gaulle airport at close to 11pm Paris time and we had to take another train down to the city center. More money is spilled again. One of the first thing I realised when I reached the Paris Metros are that they are quite dirty, old and rather unmaintained. By the time we settled into the hotel it was already 1am. The room's not too bad for a 2-star hotel and I'm impressed that they have a flat screen TV for a low budget hotel. I watched a little French TV before going to sleep. On the next day, we started by walking to the Pantheon. We had breakfast at one of the French cafes before continuing our walk to St. Michael's square to get a free tour of the city. A morning walk around the streets of Paris is refreshing. The buildings look beautiful and their traditional architecture style is maitained. The free tour lasted for 3 hours and afterthat we went on our own way to the Arc De Triomphe which is actually now the center of a giant roundabout. There's an eternal flame for the Unknown soldier to commemorate all those who have fallen for the French Empire. Next up is the highlight of the day which is to head to Eiffel Tower and it took us quite some time before we reached the monumental site of the Paris icon. When I gazed upon the Eiffel tower with my own eyes, a part of me felt a sense of thankfulness and gratitude to God for bringing me this far. I would never have imagined such an opportunity 5 years ago.

As a result of the intense phototaking, our camera batteries were close to zero and we decided to return back to our rooms to recharge the batteries because there's still the night camera shots to consider. We had dinner in one of the kebab stalls and we proceeded to go around Paris at night to take night shots. I'm rather impressed with the night life in Paris. The cafes are still opened at night and people are actually having proper meals and proper conversations. This is unlike the streets of England where you see partying, clubbing, binge drinking and drunkards sprawling all over the city and roads. It's nice to walk somewhere at night where it is drunkfest free. Anyways, The longest walk by far is from the Louvre to Eiffel Tower. On the map, it looks 15 minutes but actually it's almost 1hr of walking. We were so exhausted from walking that we just opted to take a taxi back to the hotel.

On the next day, the weather was not so fantastic. Gloomy, cold and cloudy, it didn't seem to look like spring at all. Nevertheless, we made our way to the Notre Dame first as we wanted to see how it looked like inside. It' a grand Catholic Gothic cathedral and at the doors are decorated with the statues of the saints and I'm amused to see one where St. Peter is depicted holding a giant key. Ahh, I guess that's where he is guarding the Pearly gates. The queue is long but it took just 5 minutes to for it to clear up before it's our turn to enter. Inside the Notre-Dame were hundreds of visitors but somehow the church is so big that there's still plenty of room space to move around. And the surprise find over there was the statue of Joan of Arc, one of my favourite historical figures! We spent around 30-45 minutes in there and I got myself one commemorative coin for 2 Euros. We had intended to go inside the Louvre but seeing how long the queue was and how short of a time we have, Leo declined to enter while I'm ok with missing it since I'm coming back with Mama anyways in July. We continued going around Paris randomly and when we chanced upon a Jewish museum, we entered to have a look around. Since the weather turned for the worse with drizzling, we also stopped short of walking to the Basilica. We went to another kebab stall for dinner to take a rest from the still aching legs and we proceeded straight on to take the train to the airport. That concludes the Paris leg and it's a really short but important scouting trip to ensure that my next trip there is smoother.

A few pointers that I have from Paris is this:
a) People there will speak French to you eventhough they can see that you are Asian. Just start pointing and use sign language if things are desperate
b) Gotta be self-sufficient and rely alot on maps. You'll be surprised how far the maps can bring you around
c) If you're on a tight budget, go for McD and Kebabs. McD hamburger is available at 1 Euro each and water is free.
d) EU-country students can enter free in almost every museum in Paris but your parents will not have the same freebies
e) Don't sign some weird petitions that people ask you to on the streets of Paris

Despite it being a short trip, I can definitely see why Paris has its charm and is called the City of Lights. I'll definitely consider this as a honeymoon place in the future ;)

So, we're back in England after the flight. At the immigration gate, I handed my passport to the British immigration officer and she seemed confused for a while that I was granted a one-year visa. She asked me what course I'm studying and I said "Law in the Uni of Leeds". And afterthat, she just gave the biggest wide-eyed stare at me in disbelief. Abandoning all sense of British proprietrieness, she asked ,"Is your English level up to standard?" I was amused at her question/suspicion but as I'm tired, I just muttered a "Yes". If I had been more energetic, I would have shot back ,"It's perfectly alright Mad'm". Gahhhhh..anyways, we put up for the night in the house of one of Leo's Singaporean friends in London.

The next morning, it rise and shine early as I get ready for the biggest day in the British calendar this year. I happened to be in the right place and right time and it's the Royal Wedding! How often are the chances that you're an International student and the year when a royal wedding happens falls with the same year of your studies! The last time celebrations were as this big was in 1981 when Princess D got married. I had intended to at least stand by the procession route but it seems that the police had already cordoned off the area. People have been camping there since last night, so I have to settle with watching it from the big screen with hundreds of others at Trafalgar square. It was certainly a momentous occassion as free Union Jack flags are handed out. From the place where I'm standing, I could see Westminster Abbey in the horizon and coincidentally, the tourism Malaysia office is nearby, so the Malaysian flag was actually up at Trafalgar square with the Union Jack during the wedding procession. We went for lunch later at one of the Chinese restaurants and I'm surprised to see the big portion of food that London restaurants serve. While we were at the restaurant, we watched from the TV the infamous kiss of the royal couple at the balcony of the Buckingham palace. The evening was spent walking to sightsee London such as the Royal courts and alongside the Thames River. I also had dinner with another Singaporean friend of Leo's. This dinner place serves Japanese food like the Sg food court and at 4.50 pounds, the portion is quite huge too. We were back at King Cross on time at 9.30pm for the train back to Leeds.

The giant screen and crowd at Trafalgar Square

Overall, it's a tale of two capital cities and I had a fun time going around the few days. Special thanks to Leo for planning everything and freeing me up the time to study. This will not be the last time I'm travelling those two places as I'm intending to return there to properly enjoy the places after my academics are done.