New Years Eve at the Eiffel Tower
So we spent New Years eve at the Eiffel Tower….it was beautiful but strangely the fireworks lasted only about two minutes (budget cuts in the City of Lights perhaps?). They did light up the tower a beautiful blue and had some funky lights going up and down (reminded me of the thrill running up Chris Matthews leg :) - sorry lame political joke!!!)
The crowd was raucous and totally drunk. We took the Metro from our place towards the Arc D'Triomphe and the subway car was getting more and more crowded…They started singing football songs in the car and stamping their feet and I was getting a bit jittery as visions of British soccer hooligans flashed through my head. We got to the station at the Arc (Charles De Gaulle - Etoile) and that’s when we saw the full extent of the crowds and kinda decided it was not worth it so we took the train back to Bir-Hakeim which is the stop for the Eiffel Tower and got off there and watched the show from there.
Prior to going out for the evening we attended vespers and caught a bit of mass at Notre Dame…It really is a magnificent building and the vespers were just gorgeous….sung by a Chinese girl who was probably 5 ft 5 inches in her heels but her voice (mezzo soprano) filled the building (I'm guessing the knave is at least a 100 - 125 meters long)…..anyway the vespers were so beautiful we want to go back for matins tomorrow if we wake up on time:)
The mass was celebrated by a priest from Africa and all the attendees were tourists with cameras (except for the first two rows in a 300 row church). The Catholic church in the US imports priests from Kerala and the French import it from their old African colonies it seems. The guy looked about 21 years old. Clearly the Catholic Church is having trouble with the membership drives both in the pews and in the pulpit in France just like every where else.
Paris is surprisingly full of Indians and Sri Lankans (we had dinner at a Greek Restaurant run entirely by desis :). They all speak French and almost no English which was a bit shocking. I'm assuming that hearing the brothers mangle their beautiful language must cause the good professors at the Sorbonne or La Societe Francaise to probably want to attack them with their croque monsieurs
The crowd was raucous and totally drunk. We took the Metro from our place towards the Arc D'Triomphe and the subway car was getting more and more crowded…They started singing football songs in the car and stamping their feet and I was getting a bit jittery as visions of British soccer hooligans flashed through my head. We got to the station at the Arc (Charles De Gaulle - Etoile) and that’s when we saw the full extent of the crowds and kinda decided it was not worth it so we took the train back to Bir-Hakeim which is the stop for the Eiffel Tower and got off there and watched the show from there.
Prior to going out for the evening we attended vespers and caught a bit of mass at Notre Dame…It really is a magnificent building and the vespers were just gorgeous….sung by a Chinese girl who was probably 5 ft 5 inches in her heels but her voice (mezzo soprano) filled the building (I'm guessing the knave is at least a 100 - 125 meters long)…..anyway the vespers were so beautiful we want to go back for matins tomorrow if we wake up on time:)
The mass was celebrated by a priest from Africa and all the attendees were tourists with cameras (except for the first two rows in a 300 row church). The Catholic church in the US imports priests from Kerala and the French import it from their old African colonies it seems. The guy looked about 21 years old. Clearly the Catholic Church is having trouble with the membership drives both in the pews and in the pulpit in France just like every where else.
Paris is surprisingly full of Indians and Sri Lankans (we had dinner at a Greek Restaurant run entirely by desis :). They all speak French and almost no English which was a bit shocking. I'm assuming that hearing the brothers mangle their beautiful language must cause the good professors at the Sorbonne or La Societe Francaise to probably want to attack them with their croque monsieurs
posted by Sanjay @ 7:54 PM
4 Comments:
Nice Pic. Sanjay
so you are too busy with your honeymoon..have fun!
your wife is as cute as you are...
who is this?
Sanjay, I 've been reading your blog since 2005,and to date I 've never missed one.
Sheela
Uncle Sanjay I read it it's really intresting.
Joey Thomas
Post a Comment
<< Home