Wow, for such a metropolitan city, reliable Internet was amazingly hard to come by in Paris. wish I could have posted regularly while I was out there.
It's odd, I really didn't think that my country was interesting or at all cool while I was home, but now that I am abroad, immersed in all these interesting customs and cultures, I have never been more proud to be an American. All these cultures have really taught me to be proud of where I come from. Not that I think America is superior, but its a beautiful thing to be proud of where you come from. Then again, it could just be because I like to act like I think America is perfect when I'm joking with people from other countries. I accidentally cut in front of some people going into Notre Dame, and when my Brazilian friend pointed it out I just said, "It's OK, I'm American. These colors don't run."
Paris really was an amazing city, but I was really happy to leave. I really don't think that Paris is really for me. Fernando was kind of getting on my nerves too. He was complaining all the time, slow, high maintenance, and weird, but he's a really good guy and extremely well intentioned. Hanging out with him has really taught me a lot of patience, but I have to admit that Paris would have been much more cold, lonely, and confusing without him.
I got to see a lot om amazing things while I was there: the Louvre, Pompadou, Sacre Coeur, Notre Dame, Rodin's Garden, etc. Seeing the Mona Lisa in person was totally surreal. I caught a lot of really lucky breaks too. For one, the louvre was free on Friday nights, so I saved money there. They were performing mass at both Sacre Coeur and Notre Dame while I was visiting both of those places, so each time I got in for free and I got to witness the rituals that they have been performing there for hundreds of years. I was actually pretty drunk at the Notre Dame mass, so that one was a lot more fun, I just hope that I didn't disturb anyone. My favorite part of Paris was this "Parade" that they threw on Saturday. I don't know why they were doing it, but they drove dozens of floats/trucks around the streets of Paris, each one blasting techno music with its own DJ. I swear that every Parisian under 30 years old showed up for it -- the streets were literally wall to wall packed with people following the floats and dancing on top of every flat surface that they could find. It was really an amazing site. Unfortunately, Fernando insisted that he had to check his bus ticket at that exact moment, so I had to leave after about 30 minutes. He complained about the crowd the whole time, and the bus station was closed when we got there, so he was fine checking it on Sunday instead. That was really irritating as you can imagine, but I suppose that I am really lucky because I would have never experienced that in the first place if it wasn't for him.
The only thing that really bothers me about him is how much he smothers me, always talking and always saying things like "Oh Dani, I can't stand to spend one hour away from you. I'm going to cry when we leave. I'm going to change my name to 'Fernando Buck Christopher.'" But I've been managing to find other people to hang out with us during the day and he is a lot more pleasant to be around then because it takes a lot of the pressure off of me. But as soon as they leave, he is always trying to hug me and being too touchy and just talking too damn much.
