After being stuck in the apartment with the flu for two days I decided to venture out today. I started by walking to the metro per the directions that my Airbnb host left for me. When I came to the apartment by a different route I wasn’t too thrilled with the neighborhood, there were a lot more homeless type of people on the street than I expected. The apartment however is in an older building that has been updated which is normal for Paris. So I walked to a different metro line to go to the Eiffel Tower and bought my ticket. My first clue that it was not going to be pleasant should have been when I reached the platform and there were so many people waiting. I looked at the sign and it said next train 4 minutes. I looked around for a minute to find a place to wait and walked a little farther down the line hoping it would not be crowded on the car I got on. So I get on the metro and of course it is crowded (we are talking 11 am – shouldn’t most of them already be at work?) As soon as the doors closed I realized my next clue – body odor. There is a guy standing with his arm higher than my nose in a nice suit and tie with armpits giving off enough smell to make a skunk jealous. So I try to maneuver to face a different direction which is hard considering we just stopped for the first stop and now I feel like a sardine. So I am no longer under Mr. Nice Suit-Needs Deodorant’s arm but I am plastered to the bar that everyone has to get a hand on even though the only possible time and way to move is when the doors are opened. So I try to get a fix on a new spot to stand however I can’t see anything because this young man is standing directly in front of me with the bar between us and all I can see is the buttons on his shirt. The top of my head does not even reach his chin, he is literally as tall as the metro car, his hair is skimming the ceiling. I wanted yell out ‘I’ll bet the air up there smells better than the armpits down here!’ I guess I could have most likely there was no one else on the train that spoke English and if they did they would only say “a leetle beet”. It took four more stops for most of the people who do not know what deodorant is for to get off. By this time my skin is crawling because I have been pushed, jostled and leaned on to the point that my stomach wants to hurl.
I finally reach my stop and get out to walk the last few blocks to the Eiffel Tower. Since I am feeling a little drained and queasy I decide to stop for lunch first. Although I had been to the Eiffel tower in April I wanted to take some pictures of the tower from the same perspective that I did before Paris had all of the rain in late May and early June…..not that it has stopped raining on a daily basis yet. However, my route to the Eiffel Tower takes a few twists and turns because of the Eurocup Fan base they have set up by it. They have closed off the parks to the tower and there are police everywhere at each block lining a certain perimeter to the fan base. Around these blocks are restaurants filled with Eurocup fans. Some of you may be aware of the problems that certain countries fans have had over the last couple of weeks. There have been fights between the fans of England and Russia. So today as I am walking around to get to the right viewpoint I pass by several fans in red and white shirts. One restaurant in particular on the other side of the street was filled including the tables on the sidewalk with red and white shirts. I had previously passed by three English fans a block before the restaurant on my side of the street. Just as I am half a block past the restaurant I hear a cheer go up and some shouting. I turn around to watch the same three English fans parade through the tables in the restaurant of the fans in red and white shirts with no purpose other than to see if they could start something. Luckily, it was only about 2 pm and the fans in red and white were not going to have their team disqualified because 3 immature English twenty-something year olds wanted to play with fire and get on camera. The cheering and shouting was most likely the red and white fans national anthem.
I finally get to the Eiffel Tower and start to walk along the Seine for the same picture perspective from April. However, before I get past the first bridge I get hit from the side by one of the illegal vendors running from the police. Luckily it was not a hard hit but I almost toppled another couple as I caught my balance. The gentlemen is the one who said its the police so they were nice about me knocking into them and he probably prevented me from falling. I’m thinking the police are chasing these illegal vendors because they are scattering like roaches when a light hits them so I hurry over to the side so I won’t get hit a second time. However, as I watch the illegal vendors jump a couple of bushes and casually start walking away, I see a lone police officer come around the corner strolling like he’s on a Sunday walk by the park. There is no arrest, no detaining just a stroll through the crowd. To be honest, I don’t think this particular dickie do policeman could have caught up to them anyway. There was no way he could have hopped the bushes with the food baby he was carrying around.
I gave up for the day, I figured with surviving smelly armpits on the metro, a potential Eurocup fan clash, and illegal vendors running like jack rabbits for half a block I already hit a trifecta. I went back to the apartment with no new pictures – except for the fan clash England idiots which I won’t post.
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