Two years ago, my brother studied abroad in England and my family came to visit him. I was 18 and had barely traveled outside of New Jersey. In fact, that trip to England was my very first time on a plane. Needless to say I was very excited to visit my brother and leave the country for the first time. While we had a wonderful time in England, there was one discrepancy that seemed to complicate our trip. My brother who, god bless his soul, is often a bit forgetful, booked a trip to Paris with his friends on the weekend we would be visiting.
My parents were not exactly thrilled to find out that after traveling 3,000 miles they would only see their son for a few days before he left on his trip. While we were in London with him, I just kept thinking about how badly I wanted to come along with him and his friends. I wanted to ask if I could come but didn't want to intrude. After he left I regretted so much that I didn't say anything or tell anyone I wanted to go. The only way to keep myself from truly being devastated by this missed opportunity was to tell myself that I would go to Paris when I studied abroad. This experience taught me a very important lesson: seize every opportunity you can to see the world or challenge yourself. Never pass up an experience if you have the means to say yes. Because by saying yes you are an active participant in life instead of an idle bystander. Every since I have gotten to Ireland I have said yes to as many opportunities as possible. Embrace the early wake up call or crappy airport food because every second of your journey is a gift. That being said, I do feel as if I need to preface that not every aspect of you travels will be exciting and glamorous but it is always worth it in the end. Now back to Paris. So I was originally supposed to go to Killarney with a group of students in my program but the trip was cancelled because they weren't able to get enough students to go. A day or two later I was sitting with two of my other friends in a cafe on campus when we started talking about the cancelled trip and somehow Paris came up. The next thing we knew we were on our laptops booking flights to Paris for the weekend. I could not be more excited to finally go to the beautiful city I had missed out on two years earlier. Paris held up to expectations. It was scenic and sophisticated and the rich history that surrounded us was absolutely incredible. We visited the Louvre and the Musee D'orsay, both of which we got into for free with our student ID cards and went inside Notre Dame. While all of these spots were amazing in their own respect, one of the places I enjoyed the most was somewhere far away from the tourist attractions, 20 meters below to be exact. My friends and I took a trip to the dark side when we visited the French Catacombs. The French Catacombs were originally built as an underground quarry but began being used as a burial for the dead when the cemeteries above ground posed a huge health problem and places to bury people was running slim. Over the course of 600 years, an estimated 6 million people have their remains in the Catacombs. When I heard we were going to the Catacombs I expected some dark underground stone tunnels and maybe spotting a few old bones but the sight I saw was literally jaw dropping. Femurs and heads are stacked making giant walls throughout the Catacombs to create a visual mausoleum (if you're thinking oh my god that sounds so creepy, you're completely right.) The Catacombs were haunting and astounding all at once. It is definitely a side of Paris majority of people don't see when they visit and despite the creepiness, it is worth a visit if you're there. Okay so that's enough freaky stories for now. Now on to food. This was one of the things I was most excited for when I came to France and in a matter of two days, I ate my way through my Parisian bucket list. My most daring and adventurous meal was on my last night when I decided to try Escargot. When my meal arrived I stared, perplexed down the shell of the snail. How on earth was I going to eat this? I tried getting the snail out with my fork but to no avail. After fumbling for a few minutes my friend decided to consult google. It turns out you are supposed to have a snail fork which was a utensil I did not know existed until that exact moment. Once we asked our waiter for said snail fork I was off to the races. The Escargot was actually super delicious and my daring decision ended up paying off. Throughout our trip my friends and I ran into a problem we had yet to face in the places we had visited so far: The Language Barrier. Our previous excursions had all been to English speaking countries and Paris was the first time we had to face the difficulty of the language barrier. Being in a non English speaking country makes you aware of how difficult it truly is to adjust to a new language. I would find myself accidentally ordering something completely in English without even realizing it. You don't realize how innate and instinctive language is until you are in a place where you are not meant to speak your native tongue. Being in France made me think of how fortunate I am to have my first language be so commonly used in other countries. Speaking English and having at least one person in a restaurant in almost any country be able to speak your language to you is a remarkable privilege. How many restaurants in America would be able to have someone help a customer in something other than English? Learning another language is hard so if you see someone struggling with English or accidentally speaking in say Spanish, be patient and kind to them. They are trying their hardest and should be commended for being bilingual. The last thing I have to talk about is of course, the Eiffel Tower. Most monuments you see you look at and go "yeah that pretty much exactly how it looks in the pictures." The Eiffel Tower is one of the few monuments I have seen that pictures simply do not do justice. When the Eiffel Tower lights up at night it truly is magical. It is a place certainly worth seeing with your own eyes.
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AuthorI'm Angelisa. I am studying at NUI Galway for the semester and writing about my experience. Archives
June 2017
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