Plans are made to be changed

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Trip Start Jul 25, 2008 Trip End Jul 29, 2008 Next
Entry

  Paris, France
Friday, July 25, 2008

A friend of mine's favourite saying is, "You want to make God laugh? Tell Him your plans...". Ahhh, the best laid plans of mice and men... etc. etc.

The theme here is, you will have guessed, "planning". A surprising amount of swift, decisive, and very effective planning went into my five-day escapade to Europe, amongst the chaos of a large project in progress at work. In fact, in the course of two evenings, I had booked a flight - on points, booked a hotel - on Expedia, and bought train tickets - on line.

The plan - and it's an action-packed one, let me tell you! - was as follows:

1) July 24th - fly from Toronto to Paris, on the 8:20pm flight, arriving at 9:30am Paris-time

2) July 25th - from Charles-de-Gaulle airport, take the 11:09 TGV to the lovely town of Arras, arriving in time for lunch

3) Take the 2pm shuttle from Arras to Vimy Ridge, and spend a couple of hours paying homage to the Canadian soldiers who gave their lives in World War I; conduct research for eventual novel

4) Return to Paris in the evening, stay at hotel near the Opera Garnier

5) July 26th - catch the 8am train from Gare du Nord, destination: Brussels

6) Spend the day visiting a new city, and adding another country to the list; moules-frites, chocolate and beer are on the agenda; return to Paris in the evening

7) July 27th - get up early, get the adrenalin going, and find THE best spot near Place de la Concorde to watch the final stage of the Tour de France!!! Save a spot early, wait, do some more waiting, don't move for fear of losing the spot (implication: arrive well provisioned, and opt for mild dehydration instead of over-consumption of liquids...); then - when cyclists arrive and the crowd goes wild, get incredibly excited, feel the adrenalin pumping big time, and savour the moment...

8) July 28th - start to wind down - hang out in Paris, take in a museum or two, do a little shopping...

9) July 29th - head back to CDG airport, head home, go wrap up the day at the office.

That's the plan, Stan... Correction: that WAS the plan.

So - I'm writing this sitting on the Roissy-Bus on the way from Charles de Gaulle to Paris, on Friday, July 24th. Spot the plot flaw? Go back to #2 above - I'm supposed to be on the shuttle to Vimy right now. What happened? A butterfly flapped its wings in Singapore, and a few hours later, a plane suffered a mechanical issue on the ground in Toronto, and another plane flew in from Vancouver to take us to Paris, but by then, it was midnight. Oh well - no point getting upset about it.

Plan B is to spend the afternoon in the city, perhaps get some shopping in earlier, visit St-Germain-des-Prés (oddly, I've never been...). Not complaining. Will find a nice café, relax, wrap up some work, write some more, and generally bask in the Frenchness all around me. It's sunny and hot out here - a beautiful summer day, albeit a bit urban-sticky-steamy-yucky. But it's Paris-urban-sticky-steamy-yucky, the best of its kind in the world, on par with New York and Tokyo on hot sticky days.

The flight, you ask? Aside from being over 2 hours late, it appears that there might have been a special 25-for-1 deal on infant airfare recently - oh, wait, babies fly for free! Around my assigned seat, there were four - count them, FOUR - screaming infants and toddlers. Before take-off, the flight attendant came to see, called me by name, and offered to move me twelve rows down, two seats to myself, no infants nearby. Smart decision... Old plane, so no individual entertainment - but no matter, I slept and I read a bit, watched a movie on iPod. All in all - rather uneventful.

We landed, a few people started getting off, then, no movement. Apologies over the PA system, there's a problem with the ramp, thank you for your patience while we open the other door. A few meters and two minutes later, walking into the airport, another traffic jam. We see the doors, but they're closed. A hundred people are massed against the glass door, in a very hot glassed-in hallway. We must have looked like an interesting human experiment for the spectators on the other side. Not much point complaining - the doors will open when... they've been unjammed. Finally, we're through. Passport control is a JOKE. A cursory glance at best at the passport, no questions asked, no stamp, no nothing - there is no record that I am in France or the EU, save of course the fact that Air Canada has a record of me being on board the flight.

Since I'd already missed the train (and I remembered from the schedule that there was not a later train), I decided to come straight into Paris. Based on the time (1:30pm), I figured I would be at the hotel by about 3pm.

I inevitably took a wrong turn getting off the Roissy-Bus at the Opera and walked around a bit too much, but I found Hotel Albion on Notre-Dame-de-Lorette. I checked in (all pre-paid via Expedia), only to find out that the only room not cleaned yet is mine. Again - no point getting upset about it. So now - here I am, sitting at a little brasserie just up the street, writing, eating and drinking, listening to an idiot talking very loudly at the next table, and then calling his friend "enfoiré" on the phone. Ah Paris, it's so romantic!

The photos and video are as real-time as things get... The ink on the screen is still wet.

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Lovely building	Down the street	Up the street	Notre Dame de Lorette
Paris corner	Flowered corner	Windows into the world	Paris architecture
Flower boxes	Sitting on the sidewalk

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