A Day in the Rain and the Madeleine

Tuesday, May 31

Another day in class, another day of rain and rising river levels, another day of exploring Paris. Life is mostly good. Today's walk lead us to la Place de la Madeleine. The metro station there smells really bad in case you were wondering. Though it comes from sulfur wafting from the underground water beneath the station. The station itself is the newest and nicest I've been too. The walk went well. I'm over the rain. Lot's of school work and a test that I need to complete. Sorry, not much to write today. 

Pastry of the day: a vanilla Macaron. It was good,  but not as good as the violet one I had from Pierre.

This is a picture of the Seine. It's been raining so much, that the water level has raised very high. Look how close the water is to the bridge. It's already covering the stairs.

This is Shakespeare and Company: an old bookstore near Notre Dame. It's pretty cool. The downstairs area is like a normal store, but upstairs there is a reading room where you can just grab a book from the shelf and read it to your heart's content, then put it back. There's also a piano that you can play. This is how bookstores should be. The vibe was so cool and chill.

This is the Madaleine. It's a beautiful, neo-classical church that was turned secular by Napoleon before it was completed which is why it is a mixture of Catholicism and pagan mythology. The building was turned back into a church by Louis XVIII. It has a great view of le Place de la Concorde. There was a session of Mass going on, so we didn't stay long.

This is a random old metro entrance by the church. I got so distracted looking at it that I stepped into a large puddle and got even more soaked then I already was from the rain. I might have started scolding the metro out load for distracting me. Yes, i'm one of those people. ;)

This is a really good dessert place, Laduree,similar to Pierres. Expensive of course. I tried two small macarons: Rose Petal and Marie Antoinette. They were interesting, but not my favorite. Violet still wins.

This is the smallest church we've seen so far. This one room is all there is. Still pretty. This chapel began as a convent founded in 1622 by Cardinal Rochefoucauld. During the revolution it was used as a store room. During the empire  the church became the principle ward in the first arrondissment until the Madeleine's completion in 1842.

This is le musee Parfum: a museum about a famous perfume in France. It's actually really interesting. This particular one is le Fragunard. It's been run by a family since the forties. I was most definitely assaulted by lots of smells, but most of them were good, so it's all ok. I learned that apparently smelling your own skin clears out your head in between whiffs. It worked, so I'm a believer.

McKenna and I cooked dinner tonight for our host family. She got super messy, but we had a blast and dinner was a huge success! What a relief. We were nervous that it wouldn't be, but they asked for the recipe! Go us! We cooked chicken, broccoli, rice, and chocolate chip cookies; recipes from McKenna's mother.