From Paris With Love
Summary: A honeymoon in the City Of Lights, taken from the diary of the bride.
Notes: Answer to the Summer Competition on "Criminal Minds Weekly Prompts". We could choose a character and a destination and got an activity, an element and a word assigned. My chosen character is Jennifer Jareau and her holiday destination is Paris, France. Assigned to me were "Sightseeing" (activity), "getting sick" (element) and "excitement" (word). One basic rule of the competition was to use at least two of three prompts. Since I've been to Paris already twice in my life, the places she will visit are all real. Title comes from a movie, starring John Travolta and Jonathan Rhys-Meyers. Oh, and in this story, JJ is not married to Will. And she is not writing a traditional diary, she does it on her tablet PC, alternating with a small tape recorder.
Disclaimer: The show? Not mine. The characters in this story? Also not mine. The songs and movies I used for title and/or inspiration? Same old, same old. And for the multitude of sights in one of the most beautiful cities in the world? Don't even go there… Wait! One thing is mine – my imagination.
July 3rd, 2014
Dear Diary,
can you imagine that? I've dreamed my whole life about spending my honeymoon in Paris, and guess what? We just exited the airport "Charles de Gaulle" in… Paris! We, that's just Aaron and me. Henry is with Penelope and Spencer for the time being, getting spoiled rotten, the same happening to Jack who tagged along to the two most unique godparents walking this Earth. And yes, I finally had the "balls" and dropped Will, after he dropped the biggest rock on Earth on me by cheating on me not even two years after exchanging the vows. Well, his loss, Aaron's win. But I already filled pages over pages of your "ancestors" about that, so let's forget it for a while and go back to the reality, which is actually here in Paris. Sure, I've been here back then when Emily was on the run, but that was almost a back-to-back flight with a pit stop in a café. So, I have to admit I'm so excited with being here in this absolutely beautiful city, that I almost got sick when we were in the air. Thanks to my husband and his oh-so-well hidden talents, it didn't happen, but the whole airplane was pretty close to get a whiff of it. Well, for today, we plan on just relaxing in our hotel room, but from tomorrow on, we gonna do a really really big sightseeing tour through the whole city. It's sheer incredible how many sights and interesting places one single town can have, but I think we could spend a lifetime here and would never cease to find new spots to discover closely. Ok, gotta go for today, since we're at the hotel… oh my God, it's soo beautiful… but I'll be back tomorrow evening, telling about our first day in Paris.
July 4th, 2014
Dear Diary,
what a day! I'm not sure if it is the fact that we have sunshine and warm temperatures, or the wonderful multitude of food the French Cuisine has to offer (note to myself: I have to get at least one cookbook on this topic). Or is it simply because of me, being crazy in love with my husband, enjoying even the simplest aspects of life as waking up in his arms? Well, anyway, today was spent mostly in "tackling" the first batch of sights. Starting from our hotel, we strolled along the banks of the Seine, ending up first at the Place du Trocadéro, which is, pure coincidentally, right opposite the city's most famous landmark, the Eiffel Tower. I mean, I have seen a lot of beautiful places in my life, as well as a lot of pictures of this tower, but standing so close to it (and we even got closer as we crossed the river), seeing it not only as a landmark and most remarkable sight for the city, but also as a victory of technique and architecture skills (as it was built for the World Fair back in 1889, and was named at the time simply as the "300-meter-tower"), I have to admit that the sight is overwhelming. Beautiful or breathtaking doesn't even start describing the tower, which is now way over 300 meters high, having an antenna adding in height. Wanna know a secret? Even Aaron, the man who doesn't even blink at the most gruesome crime scenes, was in awe for the sight. Next on our list was the Musée d'Orsay, located right on the banks of the Seine. And although the city has about a dozen different museums, showing all different kinds of art, this one is very special. It's mostly due to the fact the building wasn't specifically built to be used as a museum. In its first "life", it served as one of the city's main train stations, but when the number of passengers got too big to handle, it was closed and later turned into the museum it is today, paying much attention to its building substances. Now, the Musée d'Orsay hosts a wide range of paintings, including the worlds most unique collection of French Impressionists, as well as statues and is one of the most visited sights in town. Continuing our walk, we came to the next big museum, which is housed in the former palace of the French kings and queens, the Palais de Louvre. Known mostly because of one painting, which is nothing less than the world-famous "Mona Lisa" by Leonardo da Vinci, the Musée du Louvre hosts a wide variety of different types of art, from statues to paintings, coming from all over the world and from all different times. They are divided into the several wings of the palace, which are connected in the glass pyramid, serving as the main entrance as well. After seeing a lot more sights, including the Obelisk of Luxor on Place de la Concorde (which is, compared to the one we have back in Washington, really small), the statue of Jeanne d'Arc or the Jardins de Luxembourg, a beautiful garden with a very calming atmosphere, used by both tourists and inhabitants to have a break in the bustling city, we ended up in a little café only a few hundred meters away from the next iconic landmark of Paris, the Arc de Triomphe. Built by Napoleon for his soldiers, it is actually the point Paris still revolves around. While watching the traffic going literally in circles around it, Aaron and I were having a very romantic dinner with some over-the-top delicious dishes I didn't catch the names of. Or maybe I did and the taste and smell of the food erased them from my brain, who knows? Anyway, when we got back to the hotel (this time with a cab), I was pretty tired, but not too tired as not to do a little "revanche" on my husband for this wonderful day.
July 6th, 2014
Dear Diary,
It's me again. Yesterday, when I thought you couldn't top the day we had before in any way, we had a lengthily boat cruise on the Seine. On that cruise Aaron and I learned about all the sights you can see from the water via audiotape, including such special places like the Pont Neuf, which is the name of the oldest bridge of Paris, the world-famous school, the Sorbonne, le Tour d'Horloge, one of the oldest buildings in town, the Pont Alexandre III., dedicated to the last Russian czar by his French friends, sporting the trademark gold trims of the time it was built, or one of the city's two most beautiful churches, the cathedral of Notre-Dame, which is by the way even more bigger when you see it in real than it seems to be on pictures. For mere seconds, I was thinking that I would run into Quasimodo, the legendary Hunchback of Notre-Dame after the next column. But much to my dismay (and Aaron's amusement), it didn't happen. Well, darling, that's Disney to blame for. Anyway, I still have trouble to really believe I'm here, in this wonderful town, with the love of my life. Having him on my side makes every single sight we see even more beautiful than it already is, mostly because I have someone to share it with. Ok, back to today's activities. After having a wonderful breakfast, we took a cab to one of the many arrondisements (that's how they call a city district here in France). Aaron wouldn't answer my questions to which one we were heading so it was quite a surprise to me when we exited the cab and stood at the steps of the Basilique du Sacré-Cœur on Montmartre, also known as the center of art in its entire multitude. Right beneath the church, a whole market place was filled with painters, doing portraits of tourists for a small fee. Of course, we couldn't resist and had not only two single portraits of us done, but also one with both of us on, which is already having a special place in our new house.