14th January 2001
First off I would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a happy New Year. I've just been going over my last homepage entries (JULY!!) and must apologise for being so slack with updates! In order to make up for the lack of news, this will be a major update. The only question is where to start...
Well I guess the biggest news is I'm no longer with Planetel. I looked around and noticed that I could be earning far more by working for a UK based company (due to exchange rates and all) so I've managed to get myself a job working as the Webmaster at NEC Europe. I'm based in a department known as CNAD-E (Could they have possibly thought of a worse department name??). Basically we look after NEC's Internet links for all of Europe. It pays well and the department is full of good people so I'm very happy with it. Lately I've been developing the European Intranet site, administrating the 28 odd NEC web servers and basically keeping busy. Originally I was contracted to until the 2nd of February but they have already extended it until the 2nd of April so all is well on that front.
Wedding Bells:
On the 26th Aug 2000 Lucy's sister Clare married her long term boyfriend Darren and I was fortunate enough to be invited, but before I go into that I want to give you a run down of the Bucks weekend (which I was also invited to). You will note there are no pictures accompanying this section of the text (thankfully, I forgot my camera). I was a bit apprehensive about going, as I only knew Darren and one or two of his friends. I was also a little concerned, as I had seen first hand the amazing ability English drinkers possess when it comes to downing a pint. I couldn't afford to be seen as a lightweight. I should explain - over here the bars stop serving alcohol at 10:30-11:00pm (bars closing altogether half an hour after this). So the English basically have a compressed period of time during which to consume all their alcohol for the evening, back home (as most of you know) we could carry on to 3am if we want (even later at some venues).
What this boils down to is Australian's drink over a longer period of time whereas the English drink the same amount much quicker. Unfortunately I needed to adapt - quickly, you're probably expecting to hear a tale of my rigorous training programme that commenced three weeks prior to the bucks-weekend. The truth is I managed to get myself so side tracked in the run up to the weekend that I didn't touch a drop of booze. It was only after my fourth or fifth pint that I realised my mistake. My system (having been starved of alcohol for three of four weeks) just couldn't handle it. Before you start calling me a wus I should point out my predicament...
Darren's best man had decided that we would be playing "pub golf". For the uninitiated, this involves visiting nine different "holes" (ie: pubs) and for each "gulp" you would register one stroke. (ie: sculling the entire pint in one gulp would be a "hole in one"; if you took two gulps to finish the pint it would be a hole in two, etc). Now each "hole" had a "par" and I don't remember it ever being over par 3 on any hole. There were numerous other rules to complicate the matter but I won't delve into them now.
Babies, Babies, Babies:
A lot of babies have been born lately. First of all, my good friends Brad and Brigitte have a new healthy baby boy (born on the 13th December 2000), they've decided to call him Riley - congratulations again guys, hope to see you both soon!! Lucy's friends Kathy and Karl also had a baby girl this year - Rebecca, and just last week Jacky and Ralph gave birth to a baby girl - Anna. Congrats everyone!
Winter Sun:
Since July I've managed to have two trips outside of the UK, the first was for a week and we were lucky enough to go to Gran Canaria (in the Canary Islands) which was fantastic. I didn't know what to expect as Lucy arranged all travel through her company (they're a large travel company over here) as it turned out we managed to get a very generous staff discount! Due to the fact that we were travelling as company staff we were forced to switch hotels mid-week. This turned out to be great as we got to stay at two different (and expensive) hotels that were on different parts of the island. We therefore managed to see much more of the island than we would have if we had just stayed in one hotel.
The new climate was a welcome break from the dreary weather in the UK, not a single drop of rain!! The trip even paid off as we also managed to snag ourselves a digital video camera (all these photos were captured on it). The purchase of this camera is an interesting story, basically we didn't intend on buying one, but being me I couldn't resist asking when I walked past a camera shop (there are millions of these over the island). The man told me a ridiculously low price (about £390) and ushered me into his shop.
Suddenly he became concerned that the camera wouldn't be right for me, I'm not an idiot and was right onto his tactic. Very quickly he attempted to distract me by plugging the camera into a small TV screen he had on the desk, while he did this he turned the brightness control on the camera down with his other hand (I was looking right at his hand as he did it). He then tried to explain to me that the camera was not good for indoor work as I could now see on the TV screen. I asked if I could have a look thorough the viewfinder (so that I could hold the camera and put the brightness back up) but he wouldn't let me. Before I could do anything he put the camera away and pulled out a JVC camera that (as it happens) I had been looking at back in the UK.
He told me he was prepared to sell it to me for £800 pounds, still a good price, but more than I was prepared to pay and I told him "no-thanks" and turned to leave. "£700, this is my cheapest price!" he blurted out. Still not interested I headed towards the door; the funny thing was by the time I was opening the door his "cheapest price" had dropped back to "£390". I was intrigued as to how much I could get it for and turned to speak to him again. Lucy on the other hand wasn't having any of it and pulled at my arm to leave. Seeing this he immediately threw in a travel bag.
"Ok, £390 pounds then" I said, he took my credit card and swiped it though, (I triple checked the docket before signing). He then tried to sell me every possible attachment (lens filters, spare battery packs, video lights, videotapes) all at unbelievably high prices (for example, for a digital videotape he was asking for £80 pounds, over here you can get five for £30). Every time I responded "no". He then (to my amazement) started screaming at us, "You're a greedy man, you greedy people" he was hissing. I was laughing and packing the video unit (after removing all the attachments he had madly screwed on) into the box. He then snatched the video bag away telling us "you cannot have this, it costs "£30". Lucy got stuck straight into him, saying "You can't do that, you've sold us that already!!" I personally didn't care, the bag wasn't what I was interested in (I later brought one for £8 at another shop).
We stopped off and had a quick beer. Deciding to play it safe, we moved all money from that account over to Lucy's personal account (always pays to be safe). So there it is, we purchased a camera that works perfectly, retails in the UK for around £900-£1200 and has more manuals than we need for only £390! Not a bad days shopping if I do say so myself!!
It was only about an hour later we stopped off at a cash machine to get some money that we had our second adventure. When we had finished with the machine a man approached us; he presented us with free scratchy cards, I won nothing but Lucy won the grand prize (I can't remember what it was, something about a holiday, car and/or video recorder). All we had to do was jump in a taxi with him and go to the centre - right.
We told him we were very busy but would consider it tomorrow (only to be polite), he told us he is there all day, every day (presumably he's never managed to get someone in his taxi) and that we should keep our lucky ticket for tomorrow when we come back. We walked up the street and were laughing about it when a younger guy approached offering us the same type of tickets, we scratched them and Lucy lost - but this time I won!! I wasn't all that excited (after all collectively we had now won two grand prizes) but the guy was over the moon.
Sensing we weren't taking the bait they flashed a card in our face, pointing out that the logo on the card also appeared on most taxi's!? Lucy felt she should point out that the expiry date alongside the logo was, in fact, from last year. They tried to tell us that the cards never expire and the date under the word "expiry" actually is the date the card was issued. Strange system eh?.
They told us we had to claim the prize today, as it was the last day of the promotion. I then told them Lucy had just five minutes ago won the grand prize down the street and that we were told we could claim it tomorrow. They immediately got huffy and snatched back my wining ticket before storming off. Again Lucy and I could only laugh as we continued down the street. We saw more people handing out tickets at the next intersection. Unfortunately we weren't offered one as they were busy jumping up and down and hugging each other while a bemused couple looked on.
These were the only real negative things that happened on the trip, the rest was fantastic. We sat on the beach reading, sunbathed by the pool, went out for dinner, and generally had one of the most relaxing holidays I can remember. Lucy asked me if I would go back again and I said yes - but only with a larger group of people, it's not the place you could visit again and again by yourselves. The time we were there was absolutely fantastic but I think I would have been climbing the walls if I stayed much longer.
Bon Anniversaire:
Not long after this trip my Birthday arrived, I had no idea what Lucy had planned but was surprised to be woken at 4am to open my presents. When I opened them I found a Lonely Planet guide to Paris and two tickets for the EuroStar (train that runs from London to Brussels/Paris). So I found myself at 7am at Waterloo station getting on the train to Paris for a weekend with my girlfriend.
The journey to Paris only took three hours, once we arrived at Gare du Nord station we were suprised to find how easy it all was, no passport checks, no customs clearing, we just stepped off the train as if we were at any London tube station. We walked from the station to Rue d'Amsterdam where our hotel was located, dumped our stuff and headed out to explore Paris.
We made it to the second of the three levels before we couldn't go any further. You can see the entire city from the tower and there were boards to show the various landmarks which made for about 30 minutes of video footage. By this time it was starting to get dark so we decided to walk up to the Arc de Triomphe (after walking down all the stairs of the tower). When we arrived there was a big Remembrance Service being held to commemorate the end of the Second World War. The Arc is also the shrine to the Unknown Soldier where the eternal flame burns. The body of a soldier whose name is unknown was buried here after being recovered from the battlefields in Northern France, it must bring a lot of comfort to those families who lost relatives in the war, to think that their son could be the one buried in the heart of Paris. The procession of servicemen and military bands in all their uniforms was very impressive, there were also some French politicians there but we didn't recognise any!!
The next day we started off with the Sacre Coeur, a huge white Catholic basilica which is set on top of a hill. It is stunning in the sunshine as you can see from the photos. We were very lucky with the weather all weekend. The Basilica was built as an act of contrition after the humiliating Franco-Prussian war of 1870-1871. Construction began in 1873, but the Basilica was not consecrated until 1919. Nearby is Montmatre which is the artists quarter. There is a tiny little square full of brilliant pavement artists painting portraits for all the tourists. I tried to persuade Lucy to have hers done but she wouldn't, even though her mum and sister have both had theirs done in the past - just one of the many reasons I intend to go back!
These pictures of the Sacre Coeur don't do it justice, it's so bright it almost hurts your eyes.
We walked down the red light district - but only to see the Moulin Rouge! This is a famous old nightclub known for its 'scantily clad' chorus girls who do the can-can. Unfortunately none of these girls were on display so we set off to the Louvre. The walk up to the Louvre is through the Jardin des Tuileries (gardens) which were laid out in the mid-1600s. This was originally the most fashionable spot in Paris to parade around with the latest fashions. I felt like I was contributing by wearing my Urban Legend jacket!
The Louvre is a huge art gallery which houses the Mona Lisa but it used to be a royal palace and is very impressive. As I walked up, I couldn't help feeling sorry for any foreign royal visiting for the first time. I don't think any royal palaces of the time would have been anywhere near as impressive - it would have been very humbling.
Next on our whistle stop tour of Paris was Notre Dame and the Ile de la Cite. This is a small island in the middle of the Seine. I was suprised and somewhat disappointed to learn that the hunchback does not and has not lived there. He was a fictional character created by Victor Hugo - the name Quasimodo comes from a Latin inscription in the inside of the cathedral. The church is impressive and very gothic compared to the Sacre Coeur with lots of ugly and quite scary gargoyles on the outside which made up for my disappointment. After this we had a coffee in little French cafe before heading back to the station and England.
I thought Paris was fantastic, you've probably heard the saying that France is wonderful except for the French and I can only second that opinion. The waiters were rude, only foreigners were helpful but the city was magical. I would love to return with an invading force and liberate it from the peasants!!
Visits from Friends:
I've had two different friends visit me from back home, the first being Tony who was over in Brussels for work and managed to score a weekend in the UK. We only managed a quick tour of London and a movie before he had to head off, still is was great to catch up with him and he brought me up to date with the goings on back home - even managed to hear a very interesting story about a conversation between a friend of his and someone I thought was a friend of mine. Pays to know what people are saying about you B-).
Two weeks after Tony left I received a phone call from Fabian who told me he was heading over to the UK as well. He was going to be over for three days and more importantly New Years. Unfortunately for Fabian (and everyone in London) the government decided that it was not going to have any function in the city for New Years Eve and the transport system (always on the lookout for opportunities to cause disruption) decided no trains would run after 9pm. So a big party in the city was off the books so we decided to head for the local pub instead.
Sounds pathetic right? Actually it was pretty cool, by the end of the night Lucy and I headed home and left Fabian with the keys to our house and the company of TWO women. As you might have guessed Fabian didn't turn up the next morning. I wasn't worried as I assumed he was having the time of his life, the afternoon arrived and I started to get a little concerned, it was not like Fabian to be out that late [I'm sounding like his mother...], by mid-afternoon I went down to the pub and asked the owner if;
a) he remembered Fabian and
b) he left the pub with the two women.
Fortunately, he did remember Fabian chatting to him as he left, the pub owner was able to tell me that Fabian was from Melbourne, Australia, he was visiting friends and even the date he was flying back to Oz. Given that this was the first time Fabs had ever set foot in the pub I was impressed!! The owner also confirmed that Fabian had left in the company of the two women. - Lucky sod.
Evening arrived and I was really quite concerned, we were supposed to have spent the day touring London and Fabs still hadn't turned up, not even a phone call. I was back on my way to the pub (just about ready to start looking in dumpsters etc) when a car pulled up, Fabs jumped out, two girls started waving and blowing kisses and the car took off. I sat there looking stunned, as for Fabian, he looked pretty happy with himself. I won't go into the story of what happened as it's his story and he should explain it.. You wouldn't believe me anyway. Lets just say I'm sure Fabian really enjoyed his brief stay and the UK.
Well that's about it for now, sorry about this being too long, I know it goes on a bit but some people really wanted to know what I was doing, I'll try and keep the updates brief and frequent in the future.
Well I guess the biggest news is I'm no longer with Planetel. I looked around and noticed that I could be earning far more by working for a UK based company (due to exchange rates and all) so I've managed to get myself a job working as the Webmaster at NEC Europe. I'm based in a department known as CNAD-E (Could they have possibly thought of a worse department name??). Basically we look after NEC's Internet links for all of Europe. It pays well and the department is full of good people so I'm very happy with it. Lately I've been developing the European Intranet site, administrating the 28 odd NEC web servers and basically keeping busy. Originally I was contracted to until the 2nd of February but they have already extended it until the 2nd of April so all is well on that front.
Wedding Bells:
On the 26th Aug 2000 Lucy's sister Clare married her long term boyfriend Darren and I was fortunate enough to be invited, but before I go into that I want to give you a run down of the Bucks weekend (which I was also invited to). You will note there are no pictures accompanying this section of the text (thankfully, I forgot my camera). I was a bit apprehensive about going, as I only knew Darren and one or two of his friends. I was also a little concerned, as I had seen first hand the amazing ability English drinkers possess when it comes to downing a pint. I couldn't afford to be seen as a lightweight. I should explain - over here the bars stop serving alcohol at 10:30-11:00pm (bars closing altogether half an hour after this). So the English basically have a compressed period of time during which to consume all their alcohol for the evening, back home (as most of you know) we could carry on to 3am if we want (even later at some venues).
What this boils down to is Australian's drink over a longer period of time whereas the English drink the same amount much quicker. Unfortunately I needed to adapt - quickly, you're probably expecting to hear a tale of my rigorous training programme that commenced three weeks prior to the bucks-weekend. The truth is I managed to get myself so side tracked in the run up to the weekend that I didn't touch a drop of booze. It was only after my fourth or fifth pint that I realised my mistake. My system (having been starved of alcohol for three of four weeks) just couldn't handle it. Before you start calling me a wus I should point out my predicament...
Darren's best man had decided that we would be playing "pub golf". For the uninitiated, this involves visiting nine different "holes" (ie: pubs) and for each "gulp" you would register one stroke. (ie: sculling the entire pint in one gulp would be a "hole in one"; if you took two gulps to finish the pint it would be a hole in two, etc). Now each "hole" had a "par" and I don't remember it ever being over par 3 on any hole. There were numerous other rules to complicate the matter but I won't delve into them now.
| Before we "teed off" we had had a few "warm up" drinks, thus making the experience all the more painful. So now I found myself on hole 4, knowing full well I had to complete a further five holes before the end of the game. I was feeling as sick as a dog. However, National pride kicked in (I didn't want to let down all the Australian Drinkers during what I considered an "international" game of pub golf) and I managed to complete the remaining four holes without major incident. Actually there was a strange one on the seventh hole involving the removal of my underwear - but my mother may be reading this so I'll skip it. As for the actual wedding, Lucy was chief bridesmaid and looked amazing (her mum made the bridesmaid dresses). I can honestly say I can't remember ever having so much fun at a wedding - whilst not being in the physical wedding party! The wedding was at the All Saints Church in Stamford and the reception was at the impressive Stoke-Rochford hall (pictured below). The reception was absolutely classic, the wedding speeches right on the money and I had an absolutely fantastic time, thats the problem with weddings though, you can only do them once.. |  Out the front of the All Saints Church in Stamford. |
 the photo only shows half the building - it's huge!!! |  |
Babies, Babies, Babies:
A lot of babies have been born lately. First of all, my good friends Brad and Brigitte have a new healthy baby boy (born on the 13th December 2000), they've decided to call him Riley - congratulations again guys, hope to see you both soon!! Lucy's friends Kathy and Karl also had a baby girl this year - Rebecca, and just last week Jacky and Ralph gave birth to a baby girl - Anna. Congrats everyone!
Winter Sun:
Since July I've managed to have two trips outside of the UK, the first was for a week and we were lucky enough to go to Gran Canaria (in the Canary Islands) which was fantastic. I didn't know what to expect as Lucy arranged all travel through her company (they're a large travel company over here) as it turned out we managed to get a very generous staff discount! Due to the fact that we were travelling as company staff we were forced to switch hotels mid-week. This turned out to be great as we got to stay at two different (and expensive) hotels that were on different parts of the island. We therefore managed to see much more of the island than we would have if we had just stayed in one hotel.
 | The first hotel was great; we stayed a place called the "Santa Barbara Bungalows". I didn't realise until we got in that we were staying in a bungalow, as it turned out ours had two bedrooms, a kitchen, medium-sized lounge area, shower/toilet, veranda and a fenced front/back garden. I was really impressed with this place as there wasn't all that many kids running around and they had four swimming pools not to mention their own pub!! I suspect we had the better of the bungalows as the others didn't look as impressive from the outside. |
The new climate was a welcome break from the dreary weather in the UK, not a single drop of rain!! The trip even paid off as we also managed to snag ourselves a digital video camera (all these photos were captured on it). The purchase of this camera is an interesting story, basically we didn't intend on buying one, but being me I couldn't resist asking when I walked past a camera shop (there are millions of these over the island). The man told me a ridiculously low price (about £390) and ushered me into his shop.
Suddenly he became concerned that the camera wouldn't be right for me, I'm not an idiot and was right onto his tactic. Very quickly he attempted to distract me by plugging the camera into a small TV screen he had on the desk, while he did this he turned the brightness control on the camera down with his other hand (I was looking right at his hand as he did it). He then tried to explain to me that the camera was not good for indoor work as I could now see on the TV screen. I asked if I could have a look thorough the viewfinder (so that I could hold the camera and put the brightness back up) but he wouldn't let me. Before I could do anything he put the camera away and pulled out a JVC camera that (as it happens) I had been looking at back in the UK.
He told me he was prepared to sell it to me for £800 pounds, still a good price, but more than I was prepared to pay and I told him "no-thanks" and turned to leave. "£700, this is my cheapest price!" he blurted out. Still not interested I headed towards the door; the funny thing was by the time I was opening the door his "cheapest price" had dropped back to "£390". I was intrigued as to how much I could get it for and turned to speak to him again. Lucy on the other hand wasn't having any of it and pulled at my arm to leave. Seeing this he immediately threw in a travel bag.
"Ok, £390 pounds then" I said, he took my credit card and swiped it though, (I triple checked the docket before signing). He then tried to sell me every possible attachment (lens filters, spare battery packs, video lights, videotapes) all at unbelievably high prices (for example, for a digital videotape he was asking for £80 pounds, over here you can get five for £30). Every time I responded "no". He then (to my amazement) started screaming at us, "You're a greedy man, you greedy people" he was hissing. I was laughing and packing the video unit (after removing all the attachments he had madly screwed on) into the box. He then snatched the video bag away telling us "you cannot have this, it costs "£30". Lucy got stuck straight into him, saying "You can't do that, you've sold us that already!!" I personally didn't care, the bag wasn't what I was interested in (I later brought one for £8 at another shop).
| During this time the other assistant had shut the door to the shop, which I found very funny. If he didn't let us out I was quite prepared to shove him though the glass door (I'm told Spaniards don't weigh much). Fortunately, I think the assistant had the same thought as he opened the door pretty quickly when I approached and we were away - with our new digital JVC video camera. Only later did I realise what Lucy had done. She had managed to pack away not only the manual for our camera but every manual on the desk!! |  |
We stopped off and had a quick beer. Deciding to play it safe, we moved all money from that account over to Lucy's personal account (always pays to be safe). So there it is, we purchased a camera that works perfectly, retails in the UK for around £900-£1200 and has more manuals than we need for only £390! Not a bad days shopping if I do say so myself!!
It was only about an hour later we stopped off at a cash machine to get some money that we had our second adventure. When we had finished with the machine a man approached us; he presented us with free scratchy cards, I won nothing but Lucy won the grand prize (I can't remember what it was, something about a holiday, car and/or video recorder). All we had to do was jump in a taxi with him and go to the centre - right.
We told him we were very busy but would consider it tomorrow (only to be polite), he told us he is there all day, every day (presumably he's never managed to get someone in his taxi) and that we should keep our lucky ticket for tomorrow when we come back. We walked up the street and were laughing about it when a younger guy approached offering us the same type of tickets, we scratched them and Lucy lost - but this time I won!! I wasn't all that excited (after all collectively we had now won two grand prizes) but the guy was over the moon.
 If I look in pain it's due to the fact that I'm walking over the dunes and they were very hot. |
All we had to do was go with him in a taxi to their offices and claim our grand prize. We suggested he give us the address and we would go ourselves, but he calmly explained that it was very difficult to find and he would need to guide us. Ha! Lucy said that she was quite competent with a map and I would be able to find any destination with a street name and number to which he replied that it was not on any maps as it was brand new. He clearly had that one covered. He then pulled his mate over and told him we one the grand prize. His mate was more excited than he was. I would of loved to seen it from the outside, the two promoters on the sidewalk jumping around hugging each other while we (the winners of the prize) looked on in bemusement. |
Sensing we weren't taking the bait they flashed a card in our face, pointing out that the logo on the card also appeared on most taxi's!? Lucy felt she should point out that the expiry date alongside the logo was, in fact, from last year. They tried to tell us that the cards never expire and the date under the word "expiry" actually is the date the card was issued. Strange system eh?.
They told us we had to claim the prize today, as it was the last day of the promotion. I then told them Lucy had just five minutes ago won the grand prize down the street and that we were told we could claim it tomorrow. They immediately got huffy and snatched back my wining ticket before storming off. Again Lucy and I could only laugh as we continued down the street. We saw more people handing out tickets at the next intersection. Unfortunately we weren't offered one as they were busy jumping up and down and hugging each other while a bemused couple looked on.
| It seems that in Gran Canaria you can't walk three steps in a shopping centre without someone trying to grab your attention, it's either "come into my restaurant" or "can you buy this". You end up getting so used to it that you don't give it another thought. The other interesting thing is the number of stray cats on the island, when you're having dinner there's normally ten to fifteen cats hanging around. I didn't mind a bit as I'm a bit of a cat lover, but it breaks your heart to see Burmese cats that would be worth an absolute mint back home scavenging around for food while you eat. |  |
These were the only real negative things that happened on the trip, the rest was fantastic. We sat on the beach reading, sunbathed by the pool, went out for dinner, and generally had one of the most relaxing holidays I can remember. Lucy asked me if I would go back again and I said yes - but only with a larger group of people, it's not the place you could visit again and again by yourselves. The time we were there was absolutely fantastic but I think I would have been climbing the walls if I stayed much longer.
Bon Anniversaire:
Not long after this trip my Birthday arrived, I had no idea what Lucy had planned but was surprised to be woken at 4am to open my presents. When I opened them I found a Lonely Planet guide to Paris and two tickets for the EuroStar (train that runs from London to Brussels/Paris). So I found myself at 7am at Waterloo station getting on the train to Paris for a weekend with my girlfriend.
The journey to Paris only took three hours, once we arrived at Gare du Nord station we were suprised to find how easy it all was, no passport checks, no customs clearing, we just stepped off the train as if we were at any London tube station. We walked from the station to Rue d'Amsterdam where our hotel was located, dumped our stuff and headed out to explore Paris.
 |
We headed off towards Place de la Concorde on the way passing La Madeleine a huge church consecrated in 1842. The next stop was the Place de la Concorde (having nothing to do with the airplane by the same name). My newly aquired copy of the Lonely Planet to Paris mentioned: |
"Place de la Concorde was laid out between 1755 and 1775. The 3300-year-old pink granite obelisk in the middle was given to France in 1831. In 1793, Louis XVI's head was lopped off by guillotine set up in the north-west corner of the square. During the next two years, another guillotine - this one near the enterance to the Jardin des Tuileries - was used to behead 1343 more people, including Marie-Antoinette and, six months later, the Revolutionary Leader Danton. Shortly thereafter, Robespierre lost his head here too. The square was given its present name after the Reign or Terror had come to an end in the hope that it would be a place of peace and harmony."Sounds funny doesn't it, 1344 people get beheaded in an area to the cheers of a crowd, they've finally put an end to it, how do they wipe the slate clean? Easy, just change the name of the place.
| We crossed the River Seine over one of Paris' many fantastic bridges and walked towards the Cour d'Honneur this is the building where Napoleon's remains are kept. From there it was a short walk to the Eiffel Tower which is amazing. I've seen this a thousand times in photographs and documentry's so I was expecting not to be all that impressed, however, when I rounded the corner and saw it for the first time it completely blew me away. It's massive! Apparently it was built in 1889 for a world fair, they fully intended to pull it down after the fair but it was saved as the French people thought it would make a good radio antenna!! The queues to travel up in the elevator were massive so Lucy and I decided to walk up the stairs ourselves - bad move. I can't remember the number of stairs but I felt I had just run a marathon! |  |
We made it to the second of the three levels before we couldn't go any further. You can see the entire city from the tower and there were boards to show the various landmarks which made for about 30 minutes of video footage. By this time it was starting to get dark so we decided to walk up to the Arc de Triomphe (after walking down all the stairs of the tower). When we arrived there was a big Remembrance Service being held to commemorate the end of the Second World War. The Arc is also the shrine to the Unknown Soldier where the eternal flame burns. The body of a soldier whose name is unknown was buried here after being recovered from the battlefields in Northern France, it must bring a lot of comfort to those families who lost relatives in the war, to think that their son could be the one buried in the heart of Paris. The procession of servicemen and military bands in all their uniforms was very impressive, there were also some French politicians there but we didn't recognise any!!
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The only problem with the position of the Arc is that there is one of the biggest roundabouts in Europe surrounding it. French drivers are not known for their road sense and Lucy and I spent about 20 minutes watching the mayhem. It makes for a great rest stop! We had dinner on the Champs Elysees and then made our way (with very aching feet) back to the hotel. |
The next day we started off with the Sacre Coeur, a huge white Catholic basilica which is set on top of a hill. It is stunning in the sunshine as you can see from the photos. We were very lucky with the weather all weekend. The Basilica was built as an act of contrition after the humiliating Franco-Prussian war of 1870-1871. Construction began in 1873, but the Basilica was not consecrated until 1919. Nearby is Montmatre which is the artists quarter. There is a tiny little square full of brilliant pavement artists painting portraits for all the tourists. I tried to persuade Lucy to have hers done but she wouldn't, even though her mum and sister have both had theirs done in the past - just one of the many reasons I intend to go back!
These pictures of the Sacre Coeur don't do it justice, it's so bright it almost hurts your eyes.
We walked down the red light district - but only to see the Moulin Rouge! This is a famous old nightclub known for its 'scantily clad' chorus girls who do the can-can. Unfortunately none of these girls were on display so we set off to the Louvre. The walk up to the Louvre is through the Jardin des Tuileries (gardens) which were laid out in the mid-1600s. This was originally the most fashionable spot in Paris to parade around with the latest fashions. I felt like I was contributing by wearing my Urban Legend jacket!
The Louvre is a huge art gallery which houses the Mona Lisa but it used to be a royal palace and is very impressive. As I walked up, I couldn't help feeling sorry for any foreign royal visiting for the first time. I don't think any royal palaces of the time would have been anywhere near as impressive - it would have been very humbling.
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Next on our whistle stop tour of Paris was Notre Dame and the Ile de la Cite. This is a small island in the middle of the Seine. I was suprised and somewhat disappointed to learn that the hunchback does not and has not lived there. He was a fictional character created by Victor Hugo - the name Quasimodo comes from a Latin inscription in the inside of the cathedral. The church is impressive and very gothic compared to the Sacre Coeur with lots of ugly and quite scary gargoyles on the outside which made up for my disappointment. After this we had a coffee in little French cafe before heading back to the station and England.
I thought Paris was fantastic, you've probably heard the saying that France is wonderful except for the French and I can only second that opinion. The waiters were rude, only foreigners were helpful but the city was magical. I would love to return with an invading force and liberate it from the peasants!!
Visits from Friends:
I've had two different friends visit me from back home, the first being Tony who was over in Brussels for work and managed to score a weekend in the UK. We only managed a quick tour of London and a movie before he had to head off, still is was great to catch up with him and he brought me up to date with the goings on back home - even managed to hear a very interesting story about a conversation between a friend of his and someone I thought was a friend of mine. Pays to know what people are saying about you B-).
Two weeks after Tony left I received a phone call from Fabian who told me he was heading over to the UK as well. He was going to be over for three days and more importantly New Years. Unfortunately for Fabian (and everyone in London) the government decided that it was not going to have any function in the city for New Years Eve and the transport system (always on the lookout for opportunities to cause disruption) decided no trains would run after 9pm. So a big party in the city was off the books so we decided to head for the local pub instead.
Sounds pathetic right? Actually it was pretty cool, by the end of the night Lucy and I headed home and left Fabian with the keys to our house and the company of TWO women. As you might have guessed Fabian didn't turn up the next morning. I wasn't worried as I assumed he was having the time of his life, the afternoon arrived and I started to get a little concerned, it was not like Fabian to be out that late [I'm sounding like his mother...], by mid-afternoon I went down to the pub and asked the owner if;
a) he remembered Fabian and
b) he left the pub with the two women.
Fortunately, he did remember Fabian chatting to him as he left, the pub owner was able to tell me that Fabian was from Melbourne, Australia, he was visiting friends and even the date he was flying back to Oz. Given that this was the first time Fabs had ever set foot in the pub I was impressed!! The owner also confirmed that Fabian had left in the company of the two women. - Lucky sod.
Evening arrived and I was really quite concerned, we were supposed to have spent the day touring London and Fabs still hadn't turned up, not even a phone call. I was back on my way to the pub (just about ready to start looking in dumpsters etc) when a car pulled up, Fabs jumped out, two girls started waving and blowing kisses and the car took off. I sat there looking stunned, as for Fabian, he looked pretty happy with himself. I won't go into the story of what happened as it's his story and he should explain it.. You wouldn't believe me anyway. Lets just say I'm sure Fabian really enjoyed his brief stay and the UK.
Well that's about it for now, sorry about this being too long, I know it goes on a bit but some people really wanted to know what I was doing, I'll try and keep the updates brief and frequent in the future.