The Loooooouvre

Mmmmm the museum known throughout the World as having one of the most prestigious collections of art and antiques known to mankind. If you've never been to the Louvre, it's a museum. And for me, when I hear the word museum in English, I think of American museums that are displays usually situated in ordinary buildings. The Louvre is far from this. It is a former CASTLE that has been transformed into a museum. Kings of France have lived in this 'museum'. it was converted in the 19th Century to a museum by one of the kings and was probably one of the best decisions of his Monarchial career.

The Louvre is massive. Of course, you might have seen or heard of the Da Vinci Code and seen the pyramids both above and within the Louvre. Really and interesting stroke of architecture, and if I knew anything about architecture I would comment more on it... but I don't, so let's move one.

Inside the Louvre where the exhibits are displayed are huge vaulted ceilings that are more ornate and intricate than anything I've ever seen. And it seemed to get better and better as we went along until it kind of peaked in this long room that had antiques and pictures of old kings and architects in it.

And of course, among the other extremely famous pieces of art in the Louvre is the Mona Lisa, known in French as La Joconde. Though our tour guide and group seemed to skip over the Mona Lisa without taking pictures, I had to stay, and Katy stayed too, to take a few photos. I tried to do my best Joconde impression, but she has it down. What is so fascinating to me about the Mona Lisa is how extraordinarily ordinary it is. It baffles me. You can see how huge this picture on the right is... why not that one? There are tons of other paintings that could be just as important, but none of these paintings has had such a long complicated history as the Mona Lisa. She's been stolen, stabbed, and restored, and though it would seem like destruction to a painting would devalue it, this one appreciates in value. It's amazing.

Anyways, that was during the later part of the day. During the early part of the day, we had a history lesson (which really wasn't the best idea with a bunch of jet lagged college students in the middle of the late morning). Not naming names, but a certain someone was definitely nodding her head down, would look up at the teacher once in a while and nod her head yes then drift again, and would once in a while pick up her pen like she was writing, and would all asleep with her pen in her hand. Heh heh. Been there, done that, and it's even more obvious than just passing out.

After the history lesson we decided to walk back instead of taking Le Metro which is the train that goes underground through Paris (ie the subway). We got lost a bit and finally figured out where we needed to be and in the process of getting there, we walked through a cemetery. You can see for yourself in the pictures that this was no ordinary cemetery, and I'm sure there were some very famous people buried there, but we of course didn't know anyone specifically who was. But that was a very interesting place nonetheless.

Seems that is all I have to post about now. The day today has been much better than yesterday. Hopefully, soon I will get to post a little bit about the 'food scene' here so you can get an idea of what we can eat and what they offer on the streets.

A bientot

Justin

PS there are now pictures of for the Eiffel Tower post, as well as a nice video.