Improv at its best: Paris Again.

Well you know, life surprises you, plans change, you find discounted ticket to Paris, you have 4 days off work, one of your friends says she'll receive you with arms wide open and even has plans for you already... what do you do? If your answer was "Go to Paris", you're right!
I had the incredible luck to go to this gorgeous city for the second time since my stay here, and it was a very different, but still electrifying experience. Being far more North than Nice (duh) it was a good 8 or 9 degrees colder than my sunny abode. I was smart enough to buy a scarf, hat and gloves before getting on the train, and I made good use of them!
Paris in the winter is still as charming as when I visited under the warm September sun. I think a lot of its charm has to do with the impending Christmas holidays. The city is dressed to the nines in decorations and lights, making it a completely euphoric experience for the eyes to go out at night. Champs Elysees are a sight, as is the famous Galerie de LaFayette, (somewhat equivalent to Bloomingdale's in New York, and The Bay in Canada). The latter, which has 4 stores all across from each other, pretty much occupying the whole block, leaves no penny unspent when it comes to prettifying its facade and the interior. You can see the pics on my Facebook... but my camera did not do it justice, as it's not very good at taking night time pictures.
Well, when I arrived on Thursday night, we went out to a chic club next to the Arc de Triomph, and we met up with Diana's boyfriend, as well as two of his friends from Spain, who were visiting. The club was not very pretentious, which was nice, and it had 2 rooms, one playing techno and the other playing a little bit of everythign. We stayed in the second one for the most part, where we danced the night away until 3:00 and beat off a particularly aggressive breed of Parisian man, who would do "n'importe quoi" to dance with us, even though we were surrounded by 3 other guys. Anyway, we had a blast, got home close to 4am, and poor Diana roughed it out next morning to go to work at 8:30.
I slept in a little longer, and then met her in the business district of Paris, the very modern, very sober La Defense. It's a little surprising to get off the metro from the Paris I know, filled with classical architecture, into a plaza full of skyscrapers, aluminum and glass. It was an even more pronounced difference with the grey winter sky as the background. Here is where Diana works, and we met up to splurge on Sushi. I say splurge because sushi here is very expensive.. to give you an idea, I had a California roll, 6 pieces of sushi and a miso soup for 20 Euros (about 34 dollars). But, I hadn't had sushi in 3 months, and since I was on "vacation" I decided to just go for it. It was heavenly!
After, Diana had to go back to work, so I spent the afternoon by myself. First, I went to the Christmas market at the Defense. It was a paradoxical place, because the market were all little wood houses, very rustic and welcoming. Yet, it was placed among giant skyscrapers and next to the Arc de la Defense, which is grey and cold. But the market was incredible... very cozy, festive, and full of surprises at every turn. After having some very delicious Hot Wine (a mix of spices, oranges and red wine... oooooh, so ridiculously good) when I was strolling along, I took the metro to the Musee d'Orsay.

The Musee d'Orsay is the Impressionist Museum, home to Monet, Manet, Degas, and Picasso amongst others. It's a lot less intimidating than the Louvre, and I was able to cover it in about 2 hours. I was very tired from our gallavanting until 4am the night before, so I went back home, we had a quiet dinner, a nap.. and then went out again. This time, we just had some crepes on the street, went to Hard Rock Cafe, and had a drink at a Cafe. Still, we were out until 2am. Don't ask me how that happened!
The next morning, Nicolas, Diana's boyfriend was taking his friends on a little city tour of places I hadn't been to, so I came along. We visited the Cour St. Emilion, which used to be an industrial area, and it's turned into a cool little street with all these cafes and restaurants. Then, we headed to the Jardins de Luxembourg. It was pretty cold, and there werern't very many flowers, but it was beautiful nonetheless. After that, a short visit to Notre Dame to see the Christmas Tree, and then to have late lunch with Diana.
We ate at a traditional French Basque restaurant.. the food was really rich, and I was full until the next day, but it was definitely worth it. After that, the garcons had to go, so Diana and I took off to have some girly time parading around the Champs Elysees at night, enjoying the Christmas lights, and doing window shopping at Sephora, Esprit, and others. It was magical, with all the people, the lights and.. yes, one more glass of Hot Wine.. heheh.

It was a lovely weekend, all of it. It was nice to get out of town, see different people, and do different things. It really filled me with some energy that I very much needed, and I'm re-fuelled to attack December and all its challenges! You think Christmas is chaotic? Try it when you have kids (well, someone else's, but still). We have about 4 different craft projects planned, Christmas baking, tree trimming, gift wrapping.... it's going to be so much fun to live this holiday through the eyes of kids again! And speaking of Christmas... don't forget to send me lovely Christmas cards and gifts through the mail! Until next week!