Did I pick this song solely because it contains the lines "Beautiful girl, you're a gorgeous Eiffel / Beautiful girl, I would never trifle"?
Why yes. Yes I did.
Sorry, Sabrina, I stole your line for my title. :)
I was waiting outside the Trocadéro Metro station for Sabrina and Nayantara. We were going to just go all out and take cheesy pictures of the Eiffel Tower. I arrived early (I feel like I'm the only person in Europe who does that) and sat outside reading Ulysses, which is pretty much the most pretentious thing you can do in public.
Side note: My professor now wants me to write an essay entitled "Ulysses is my Flat Stanley." Not entirely sure if he was kidding. No, I mean, he is. But I wish he wasn't!
They arrived and I pretended I knew everything, then I told them to look to the left as we came up the side and we all ooh-ed and ahhh-ed. Then our vanity took over.
Haha, people don't usually like people in the background of their photos, but I think they're hilarious. Especially when they look like that girl to the left.
I know, I'm shaming her, I should feel awful. Yeah, yeah. Keep reading.
Nayantara has never been to Paris before, so we insisted she touch the Eiffel Tower.
Now, this was kind of a problem at first because you stand back to take the picture and you're like, "Yeah, this definitely is not to scale." Then you realize instead of having your subject move, you just move yourself. Or you both move. But it doesn't work if you just stand there and bark out orders, because it's not like the person in the picture has any idea what in the blue hell they're doing.
So I had to settle my inner pretentious wannabe photographer and take a jumping shot. Now, my camera has a cool burst mode, and you can basically view the string of photos as a GIF by tilting the camera back and forth: I like to think of it more like flipping through notebook pages and seeing a stick figure walk. Like that. It's cool. So I thought, I guess now I need to make a GIF. Now I've graduated from looking up obscure GIFs to making my own. This cannot be a good path to go down.
My first attempt did not go well... I tried harder with Sabrina's and Nayantara's. We all know this is not as embarrassing as it gets on the Internet. (Thankfully, there's so much to see that I doubt anyone will even try.)
By the way, Nayantara, I am sorry I completely fail at using my own camera's burst mode. :(
Okay, I fixed it. Yay! Though it looks just like all the China 11 jump photos, where they all manage to jump in a cool manner and I'm not sure what I was doing here. Jumping is hard. :/
THEN Sabrina and I failed to jump at the same time.
Yeah, after that, we were going to try to take a photo of the three of us. Then these assholes--who weren't even _____ tourists, mind you--were like, "Can you PLEASE move?" And when you ask with an enunciated "please," that is not polite. And like I've said before, it is not polite to ask someone to move. I've never asked an asshole to move in my life--because I did precisely what anyone would do. I just took another damn picture where I pleased.
I think what people fail to realize about Trocadéro is that you can literally stand and take a photo anywhere and see the Eiffel Tower in the back. It's not like we were in the one "special" place. We were just in a place. To drive this point home, we had even moved from our places in the first few photos because people began swarming that area.
Doesn't anyone understand spatial perspective? Or tilting a camera up? Troglodytes.
On a sad-and-not-mad note, I was sad to see Sabrina and Nayantara go. However, it turns out we will both be in Amsterdam on Sunday--so we intend to meet up. Hopefully we'll be able to find some WiFi to plan, because I've found telepathy does not work. Or, you know, lack of useful cell phone data plans.
Well yeah, I did my laundry, but then I remembered that the laundromat closes at 9 pm... Which is in 15 minutes. Urgh. I also don't want to leave my room. This is just sad. But I did pack! I prefer packing one suitcase--I know that will shock everyone, but if you saw me on the first day struggling to simply wheel three giant bags over a curb, then you'd understand my position. Plus I am not nearly organized enough with my clothes to compartmentalize everything like some people I know... (Not looking at you, MOM.)
Hopefully next time I'll be writing from Amsterdam!
Doei!
(P.S. I just found this article. I can barely remember to shake someone's hands. I can't keep up with these choreographed cultural niceties. I doubt I'd be able to reach anyone's cheeks anyway. It's quite a different view from down here.)
(P.P.S. Speaking of being vertically challenged, being in the Conciergerie was the first time I was actually in danger of hitting a ceiling because it was simply too low. Do French people not grow? Then again, this was a prison.)
(Hi. Me again. I know some of you are thinking, Amsterdam? What's Willard thinking of doing there? Well, honestly, watch this video, and I'm precisely that person who would go to Amsterdam to ride a boat and not explore the "REAL" reasons to visit Amsterdam. My professor seriously warned me not to walk in the Red Light District not because I'd just be really uncomfortable but because I might get solicited. Greattttttt. This is the only instance when wearing a cone of shame might be more beneficial than embarrassing.)
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