Mattie was one of 17 Wingate students who participated in the Fall
2006 Wingate-In-London program. The group of juniors and seniors
lived together in flats and studied art, history, theatre and
English literature with one Wingate faculty member and British
adjuncts. Mattie grew up in a small town in North Carolina not too
far from Wingate. She enjoys reading, watching movies, hanging out
with friends and family, and art (especially photography).
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| Weekend in Paris |
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Posted by:
Mattie on 10/2/06 |
This past weekend was quite
amazing! Five of us headed off to Paris. We left very early
on Thursday morning at about three and took a night bus to
Waterloo station to ride the Eurostar train through the
Chunnel. It just so happens that we got on the wrong bus and
ended up quite a ways from the station and had to walk the rest
of the way, so we were walking over the Thames and by Big Ben at
about four in the morning. It was beautiful, though it was so early! Don’t worry though – we got to our train on time
and were off to Paris.
We arrived there about 9:30 a.m. but
couldn’t check into the hostel till 2 o’clock, so we decided to
go to the Louvre. Hopping on the bus was an adventure in itself
but I won’t get into that. When we arrived we couldn’t find the
entrance but walked all the way around and finally saw the
famous glass pyramid that is the entrance to the museum. Of
course there was much picture- taking along the way. We were
able to see the Mona Lisa and many other works of art. There
was Greek, medieval, Egyptian art and oh so much more. We spent
the better part of the day there but decided to see the Eiffel
Tower before we went back to the hostel. Well this was one of
the many times that we got lost. We could see the top of the
Tower but couldn’t find it. So, we took pictures there and
decided to go back the next night.
The hostel experience was
like nothing else I have been through. We arrived there and
were told that the key to our room was out and that if we went
to our room then our roommate would let us in….as we marched up
the stairs we talked about what kind of random person would be
in our room. Well he indeed wound up being a very nice guy from
Germany, his name was Robbie. (But we nicknamed him Obby). He
was living in the hostel till he could find an apartment in the
city because he was starting school there.
The next day we got
up and all tried to take showers in the tub that didn’t have a
shower curtain and only had a shower nozzle in the tub faucet. After five people water was all over that tiny bathroom! I
think that after a while all that water just added to the stink
of the place….hehehe! After breakfast we went to Notre Dame and
climbed all 422 steps to the top of the tower. The view was
AMAZING! You could see all of Paris from there. We went up in
stages because I don’t think that my little legs could have done
them all at once. The gargoyles were strange but beautiful at
the same time and were everywhere on the roof.
After we came
down we grabbed some lunch from a sandwich vendor and walked
around the shopping district. I know that all of us girls loved
it but the lone guy got stuck in an H&M for about four hours and
we didn’t even buy anything. That evening we went back to the Eiffel Tower but this time we
found it and were there at just the right time of the evening
because we got to see the light display. The Tower looked like
there were thousands of cameras going off all at different
times. It was almost better than the 4th of July. We bought a bottle of wine and had a glass under the Eiffel
Tower at midnight….oh so romantic. The next day we were back
home to London, well our home-away-from-home at Royal Oak. As I
type this I need to be writing a paper for English but I think
that this is just a little more fun.
Well g’night all of you
there back in Wingate Land! Hope that you have sweet dreams of
Paris!!