In which we encounter Pope Madness and spend our first weekend in Paris

(Written 13 September 2008)

I haven’t yet written up the whole Musee d’Orsay expedition (which was very cool. Rooms full of Monet and Van Gogh, who is my favorite artist, but more on that later), but before that I had to mention what happened last night. In case you didn’t know, the Pope is in Paris. He’s only here for two days, and it’s this whole big thing here. We were thinking of going to see his procession through the Quartier Latin last night, but didn’t get around to it. So instead, last night, we went wandering around looking for a bar or something to do, and instead we stumbled into Pope Madness in front of Notre Dame. There were volunteers in bright orange shirts handing out lumieres, the French Catholic equivalent of Boy Scouts (some complete with uniforms) wandering around behind a leader carrying a marker on a pole, and thousands of pilgrims with camping backpacks and bedrolls on their backs, preparing to camp out on the streets of Paris in order to see the Pope the next day. It was unbelievable. I also got some pictures of Notre Dame lit up in honor of a mass being held while we were there (at least, I think it was a mass, considering it was being shown on two huge screens in the front, and it was a mix of French and Latin, but the sound system wasn’t clear enough for me to decipher what it was over the noise of the crowd):

At first they came out blurry because I can't hold my hands still enough, but then I figured out how to make them grainy instead. You can also see a good bit of the crowd (they say there were 160,000 people there):

And this one, because I think it came out kind of cool:

And, of course, the flyer we were handed for a Catholic youth group, with a photo of beer on the front, which entertained me so much I took a picture of it (but the stupid site won't load it the right way up, so I'm sorry about that):

Ten minutes after we left, we passed breakdancers in the street, performing for a gathering crowd to what sounded like a series of recordings of the free sound clips on iTunes. The awkward abrupt nature of this “mix” offended the WBRU prodder in me, but the dancing was very cool. Or what I could see of it was: I couldn’t get any pictures because of the crowd.

Eventually we met up with a few other friends at a bar called The Frog and the Princess, on rue Princesse, a little sidestreet full of pubs, all of which somehow use the word “princess” in their names. A word of advice: if you go out in Paris, leave at about 1:30 or before if you aren’t within easy walking distance of where you’re staying. We stayed until the bar closed at 2, but the metro closes at 2 as well, and with the crowds and tired taxi drivers (not to mention our group of 8), we couldn’t get a taxi, let alone the two we’d need. So we had to walk home. It took us very nearly an hour, with nary a bathroom in sight. I was unbelievably glad I had worn my sneakers. (The other option, of course, is to go to a discotheque and stay until the close at 6, when the metro starts running again.)

Next, Musee d’Orsay and the Arc de Triomphe, I promise.