Paris - First Impressions

27 May, 2012
Our first impressions were rather disappointing. I don't know if it was the city or if it was the worst travel experience that we have had in our lives. We had a cancelled flight which was easy to figure out from my previous post, but then I had the most bizarre flight experience in the new connecting flight to Heathrow, which was 2 hours late. N and I did not get seats next to each other and the flight attended shouted at us for requesting for it....it was ironical that he was of Indian descent....I wonder if he would have spoken like that if we were white skinned. Anyhow, I am digressing again.

We missed our connecting flight to Paris but were rescheduled for the next flight which was 4 hours away. That just meant that we just lost one whole day of planned activities in Paris. We kept going because we didn't want to ruin this trip....even though things didn't seem to work in our favor at all. Finally we reached Paris at 8pm, 13 hours after we were supposed to!! No it was not over yet. We soon realized that one of our two bags is now lost in transit....it only gets better you know:). But the wonderful French attendant from Air France took our blues away, even at least for a while. French people are one of the most helpful people we have met in our life....whether you know their language or not. Every person we came in contact with gave us that expression, but more on that later.

We finally reached our hotel in Champs Elysées at 10 in the night. The hotel was at a great location....right there in the middle of the chaos. We didn't let the day damper our spirits...we decided to take the walk up to Arc de Triomphe. I didn't dig Champs Elysées to tell you the absolute truth. Strip malls are losing their charm as I get older. Michigan avenue is way better...but at this point, I was not really focusing on the history of these places at all. Arc de Triomphe was beautiful but didn't really blow my mind away. But to think that Napoleon once marched on this road gives you chills....because its amazing how these things have been preserved after almost a 400 years. I remember eating a burger at the only place we could find and thinking....god I hope Paris doesn't disappoint us!
And it did not....