I spent all of Saturday out of the house since 12 noon. I met up with Katarina and walked around her area, which is Place de St. Placide. We then took the metro to Opera and checked out THE most famous department store in all of Paris: Gallaries Lafayette.
that's the famous opera house. it's gorgeous!
that's Katarina and I being all touristy outside the opera house. There were a ton of tourists and student travellers there.
Anyway, so we head to Gallaries Lafayette really just to see the place and not buy anything. The whole place was huge and absolutely gorgeous. Not surprisingly, it was filled with goods that were way beyond our budget. However, the strange thing is that the whole department store was filled with herds (not groups, not hoards but herds) of Chinese people. Everywhere around me, I heard groups people talking in Cantonese, Shanghainese, Mandarin and Taiwanese. It was as if I was back in Hong Kong times square. I loved pretending not to understand anything and just looking aloof and Parisian!
"oh my god, look at this! This Dior is so cheap!" ... "it's cheaper than it is in China" ... "we have to buy all of them" ... "hey, look at this Louis Vuitton, it's gorgeous" ... "yeah these French people are really good at design.. you can't get a Chinese person to make these things!" ... "that was so last season, i'm getting three of these bags" ... "omg, your friends will be so jealous!"
That's the famous dome inside the Gallaries Lafayette. I'm not sure what the history of this department store is but I suppose it has always been trendy and upscale. (Tres chic!)
So after Lafayette, I met up with Nikolas for dinner because Katarina had to go back to the dorms for meal time. I met up with him at Place d'Italie, which is where he lives and also very near the Paris Chinatown. He had a craving for Chinese food so I had to give in and finally walked with him to find a good place. There were A LOT of vietnamese places but very few Chinese places. Every other store was pho something or the other. (I must remember to come back to try the pho!)
Anyway, so Nikolas and I find this tiny little Chinese restaurant filled with Asian people. Always a good sign for authentic food. The restaurant was miniscule and probably couldn't fit more than 20 people on each floor - and there were only two of them. The best indicator was that when I poke my head through the door, all i heard was Cantonese! Yes! Definately a sign of authenticity. So Nikolas and I sat down on the second floor and ordered the specialty of the house, which happened to be white braised chicken, some choy sum and rice. He also tried Tsing Dao beer (the Swedes love their beer). It was really good food and acutally quite like the food back in the Dai Pai Dongs in good ol' 852.
However, the strangest part of the meal was that we were surrounded by people who all looked asian but spoke only French. I suppose I shouldn't be shocked or anything but I was truly bizzare. Not only that but, we were also surrounded by poeple who were mixed. Yesss!!! One family had a mother that was asian and a father that was french. The teenage kid looked nothing like the parents. Another family had a mother that looked mixed herself and the kids looked even more mixed - it was hard to tell the races. I just loved sitting in a Chinese restaurant with a Swede in Paris! Awesome!
All the mixed people in the room piqued our interest and during dinner Nikolas and I had intense conversations about what mixes looked good and what didn't. He claimed that the best mixes are black and asian. Though I countered his argument by citing Tiger Woods as the exception to the rule. His funniest line was: "yeah, the British are really bad mixes. I really feel for them, you know. I mean, once in a while you meet a really good-looking British guy.. but then I feel bad for him because there is no one good-looking to marry. So the kids just end up y'know the same as everyone else. It's just too bad."
After dinner, we got a msg from Hanna saying that she wanted to meet up for drinks at China club at 11pm. A friend of her's was visiting from Sweden and they had spent the day in Montmare (from the movie Amilie). We decided to kill the time by going to Favela Chic, which is a Brazillian Samba place near Place de la Republic. It was nice though I don't think the dancing got going until at least midnight. We had to leave at 10:30 to head to China Club.
China Club is probably one of the trendiest, hippest and expensive places in Paris. It's decorated in 1930s Shanghai Style while enclosed in an old Parisian building near Place de la Bastille. Here are some pics from China Club:
Thats' Nikolas
That's Hanna looking like a tragic Parisian
and me!
At about 12:45, we decided to leave to catch the last metro home. I left with Nikolas, Sophie (the swedish friend visiting) and her sister (who is on exchange at Cite University). Hanna decided to stay at China Club a little longer since her home is just around the corner. I went to my platform and was waiting for the metro. There were a lot obnoxious American and British travellers and they were really loud on the platform. Of course, I enjoyed pretending not to understand anything! hee hee hee...
At about 1am, the announcement came on and said that the line had stopped for the night. I was freaked out since I had no money left from the evening. I thought about taking the night bus but I had never taken it before and I had no idea where I could get on. I frantically left the station and called Hanna. Thankfully, she picked up and was still at China bar. I went back and I was really flustered because I thought that the worst case scenario would be that I had to WALK home. That would take me about 2 hours and will probably get home at like 4am! That was a terrible option. Hanna forced a drink on me and we chilled while I calmed down. When China Club closed at 2am, we walked out to Place de la Bastille and tried to catch a cab. This was ridiculously hard as everyone else wsa trying to catch cabs as well. Also, I had no money on me and Hanna could only lend me 20euros. We walked around and to make ourselves feel better we sang songs. Of course I was a bit tipsy after all the drinks and I stumbled into a concrete pilon which really hurt my left knee. But after about an hour of freezing in the cold waiting for a cab, we finally got one. I made sure that 20 euros would be enough for the trip and jetted off. As I was turning the corner, Hanna called and was like "well, we waiting for a long time for this cab but at least it's classy!" I realised that the cab was a mercedes! HAHAHA.. Driving throught Paris at night was unbelieveably gorgeous and romantic especially when we crossed the Seine and drove by the promenade. I got home at 3:30 and the cab ride was only 15euros, which was much less than I anticipated. I woke up today with a nice blue-purple looking bruise the size of an orange on my left knee.
Classes start tomorrow at 8:30am!!! I'm so excited!!!!!!!! | 
