It’s been a while since I wrote in my journal, so bear with me if I forget a few details. Right now, I’m sitting in a park in Barcelona feeling quite sick, but I suppose we’ll get there in time…
Last Sunday, Sam, Younghee, Eunhee, and I agreed to meet at the Louvre again at 1:00. I arrived a few minutes early because I didn’t want to appear to be perpetually late. Sam soon found me, and we started to wait together for the girls. This time, they were the ones who were an hour late. Turns out, they had some trouble moving from the hotel to the B&B where they planned to stay for a while. However, they did say that the B&B was nice, and the owner had beds available for 18 Euro/night including breakfast, internet, etc. It sounded too good to be true, so I said I’d check it out.
We got in line for the Louvre and bought two tickets for 10 Euro from a couple that was done for the day. This saved us 4 Euro per ticket and them 5 Euro per ticket. After getting over our skepticism and realizing that the tickets really did work, we decided that the man selling them was a genius like Simon.
First, we went to see the Mona Lisa (of course). From the vantage point that the Louvre provided, though – three feet away with a hundred people snapping pictures – I couldn’t appreciate it or see why it is so famous. Many other paintings in the same room are just as striking, but received little or no attention (for example, in the back left behind the Mona Lisa is one of the Passion of Christ from a unique viewpoint. The painting looks down on Jesus carrying the cross, with people crowding all around him, while Jesus looks plaintively up at the viewer.).
At this point, we were all starving, so we decided to eat lunch. After crossing the Seine River, we found ourselves in a maze of art galleries and no cheap restaurants… The only things we could find were pizza and bad-looking Chinese. Since the pizza store closed right as we tried to go inside, we were stuck with Chinese. Still, it’s always fun to practice my Chinese, particularly when the server doesn’t even bat an eye at my pronunciation
Finally, we went back to the Louvre until closing. Afterwards, Sam went to his hotel to get ready for MISTI interviews on Monday, and I followed Younghee and Eunhee to the B&B.
Earlier, they had mentioned that it was a Korean-style B&B, and I’m not quite sure what I thought that meant, but I certainly didn’t understand that it was going to be in a Korean man’s house with 25 other people who hardly spoke any English. Still, at 18 Euro per night and a unique experience, how could I say no? Mr. Lee (the owner) gave us some beer to drink (for free!) and I said I’d be back on Monday.
