The Wanderful Life of Jasmine : The magical city of Paris

While Europeans dream to visit New York one day, I think most Americans dream to visit Paris one day.

The first time I visited Paris was with my 1st Belgian host family. You could imagine how ecstatic I was when I found out we were going to Paris for a few days during fall break. At about 2 months into my exchange, I still couldn't believe that I was in Europe in the first place. Everything felt so surreal.

As the time came, we packed our bags, loaded the car, and headed off to Paris! The amazing thing about Belgium is that because of its size, you can practically drive out of the country within just a couple of hours. I believe the road trip to Paris was about 3-4 hours. That's basically like driving from OKC to Dallas...

The road trip definitely did not go as smoothly as planned. My poor host mom got a bad case of car sickness and we had to abruptly pull over to the side of the highway as she hurled. An hour later, we finally got back on the road and headed to Paris. When we arrived at our hotel, which happened to be walking distance from the Arc de Triomph, my host mom informed us that she was going to stay the hotel for a while to recover.

My host father, host brother, and I went out to to stroll down the " Avenue des Champs-Elysees." As I walked down the street with my host family, I couldn't help but hum the song "Champs-Elysees" by Joe Dassin in my head. After visiting a couple of the cool shops on this avenue, my host dad suggested we visit the "Cathedrale Notre Dame." There was a ridiculously long line in front of the cathedral when we arrived, so we ended up just admiring the outside before leaving. My host mom felt better after resting and called us up to meet with her at a famous cafe called "Fauchon." She wasn't quite there yet when we arrived, so my host dad told me I could go stroll around by myself while waiting for her. I took up his offer and headed out to explore the streets of Paris. It felt so surreal wandering around Paris at dusk and visiting the market stalls that were set up all along the streets. I still couldn't believe I was actually there.
The next day, my host family took me to see all the "must see" places in Paris. We visited the Place de la Concorde, Musee du Louvre, Jardin des Tuileries, Eiffle Tower, La Basilique du Sacred Coeur, and Montmartre.

I was so grateful that I had a chance to go to Paris with my amazing host family but found myself wanting to return there a second time to thoroughly explore the city.

Luckily, my sister came to visit me in Europe and we traveled to many cities together. Paris was the 2nd to last city on our European tour. We flew to Paris from Rome, and had three days in Paris before setting off to London. Amazingly, we arrived in Paris on Bastille day which is the French national holiday. At dusk, we headed out towards the Eiffle Tower and awaited for the firework show. There were hundreds of people sitting in the Champs du Mars in front of the Eiffle Tower and in the streets. As the sky grew dark, music started to play and fireworks bursted into the night sky. It was absolutely magical and the most breathtaking firework show I'd ever seen.

After the firework show ended, people poured into the streets. My sister and I wanted the amazing night to continue and soon found ourselves dancing at a hip Parisian bar/nightclub. We danced and danced the night away...and were the last ones to leave at 6am. Inevitably, we crashed as soon as we got back to our hotel and unfortunately slept most of the following morning and afternoon. That evening and the next day were spent visiting all the touristy places in Paris that I previously visited with my host family. After visiting Mona Lisa in the Louvre and wandering around the Jardin des Tuileries, my sister realized her new phone was gone. We spent the next hour or two frantically retracing steps and scouring the ground for her phone...but it was gone for good. Although she was definitely bummed out, she didn't want to waste our last day in Paris. At night, we planned to return to the Eiffle Tower to go up on it so that we could see Paris from above. However, we lost track of time and left our hotel later than planned. We ran to the Eiffle Tower, and as we breathlessly arrived there, a man informed us that the rides up had stopped for the night. Bummed out, we headed back. The next morning, we took a train to London.

Both of my trips to Paris were incredibly awesome to say the least and I'm yearning to return to this magical city. I still have yet to check off "Ascending the Eiffle Tower" on my bucket list which gives me a reason to come back. :)