ChisMiss: France with My Sister: 27 October

Pont Alexandre III

My sister's a lawyer and her firm has these annual trips to some European country, and this time around it was France again (the original plan was Germany in August, but half of the firm missed the flight because of the floods, so the "unlucky half" were sent to Paris instead). So of course, I met up with my Ate!! We hadn't seen each other for almost two months. The plan was to meet her in Paris Sunday, then we both go to Le Mont St-Michel Monday, I go to Versailles with her officemate Jenny Tuesday, then I leave Paris Wednesday.

I couldn't stay at the hotel that my sister's firm was staying in, so we just got an airbnb. The apartment was a maisonette, and we got the bottom half, so it was pretty private. The room was cute and clean. The host, however, was not very nice. It was a rude old French lady.

A funny thing that happened was, when I was first trying to go inside the apartment, a lady was helping me get in (there were like 5 checkpoints where you either had to scan your key or input a code to get further inside). When she got in the elevator, I wanted to stay behind because I was gonna call my sister to ask which room number the airbnb was in. The lady asked something, either in English or French, I'm still not sure to this day, but I already had my mind set to say "Non" because I was sure she was asking me if I was gonna go inside the elevator. So she spoke, I said non, then she was gone. When I finally knew the room number, I went to the room, and guess who opened the door. Of course it was the lady!! Haha! She was like...wtf...I asked you downstairs if you were Miles's sister and you said no. I was like...uhm...yeah...I'm weird, sorry. Hay.

So, I was finally alone with my sister. And I was finally able to get my hands on what I really went to Paris for--to pick up my pasalubongs! I brought my grandma grocery trolley with me from Lille to transport all the goods my sister had brought, it was pretty embarrassing.

Relief goods

Then we hurried to the center of the city to meet with my sister's work buddies. Rendezvous was @ Notre Dame Cathedral (which I have been to twice now, but still haven't seen the inside because the line is always too long).

Notre Dame, view from Pont de l'Archevêché

I was surrounded by U.P. graduate lawyers that were in love with the Before Sunrise movies (a.k.a. nerds. COOL nerds. Hi guys!) so of course we went to Shakespeare and Co. I wanted to go there last time when I went with Solène to Notre Dame, but she said the books were gonna be in French. But, of course the books were in English-- it's Shakespeare!! :P

The nerds: [L-R] Kathy, Arianne, my sister Gem/"Miles," Ava

Together, we all walked around the Latin Quarter and looked for a cheap place to have lunch.

Target reached

My sister and I weren't satisfied with our gyros and fries because we shared a plate, so we had crêpes! You will see in the picture below that I'm the one in front of the salesperson/chef. It's because my sister always ordered me to speak to the locals because she's too shy to speak in French. My French skills were put to the test on the days I was in France with my sister. :P

I had bananas & nutella, my sis had eggs & pepper

I ended up finishing both. Lalala

Then, we separated with the other lawyers, and my sister and I wandered around Paris some more.

My sister loves taking pictures and having her picture taken. Below you will see what I'm talking about, in our pictures at Jardin du Luxembourg and the Panthéon.

Kimy

Ate

Ate and Kimy

Kimy

Ate

Kimy

Ate

Notice anything? :P Jarne told me once when he went to Italy, there were always these Asian girls who took turns taking pictures of one another doing almost the exact same pose in front of the exact same landmark or thing. Sound familiar? Haha!

Last stop for the day was Pont Alexandre III, where Adele shot her music video for 'Someone Like You' :P It was the only place left that I really wanted to see in Paris, so I was dead set on going. So when we got there, it was a photo shoot galore!!!!