♪ There's still one place I gotta go! ♫

After spending all night (literally...minus two hours) after Les Mis doing write-ups and a test, I was not very awake for our discussion of political parties in France Thursday morning. :/ To make things worse, we were at least 20 minutes late to class! Ugh... Luckily in Nice we won't have to take a metro to class every morning. That will be nice (no pun intended).

After class we went to Champs de Mars where Paris finished her journals and I took a nap and tried not to get burned. lol. I don't think I succeeded on my arms, but oh well. Hopefully I won't still be a little pink by the time I get home.

We had to go back to the Institute building to do interviews with Dr. Le Bras to make sure we did all of our walks and stuff.

After that, Paris and I hopped on a metro with Beth to go to the catacombs, which unfortunately were closed due to flooding. :P So we had to ride the cursed metro all the way back to the center of town. (It was a long ride, because the catacombs are at the very end of line four.) Then Paris and I went to Invalides to see Napoleon's tomb.

At Invalides, I showed the guy who sold tickets that I was a student in France and showed him my international student card (which usually gets us either free or reduced price tickets). He told me they didn't accept that card, and I had to actually be a student in the European Union to get reduced price. So he made me pay the whole price! I paid nine euros to see Napoleon! Ugh. I was so frustrated.

You see, it just depends on the person selling tickets whether you get in free, I've decided. (I knew I should have gone to the woman whose line opened up at the same time the guy's did.) I've exchanged stories with people from my group, and sometimes Paris and I will get in free to a museum and others have to pay reduced price or vice versa. (And sometimes other people get in free and we have to pay full price!!! >:P ) So I just cross my fingers every time I go to the ticket seller and make sure I emphasize, "etudiante en France".

Paris and I weren't going to go see the rest of the army museum, because I figured they wouldn't have much there that I haven't seen in the Tower of London. lol. And while it's cool, all weapons and armor from a certain time period looks the same to me. I guess if we were planning on going to the whole museum, the nine euros wouldn't have been so bad. But we were only going to the chapel where Napoleon's tomb was. :P

The chapel was pretty impressive, though. Not gonna lie. (Although, I don't think it was nine euros impressive...) That little guy sure had a big ego! lol. And a big effect on France. His tomb was massive! Imagine a regular wooden casket, simple but still elegant, blown up to ten times a regular casket size! That thing had to weigh a ton! And it was funny, because right when you walk in, you can't see it. There's a huge circle cut into the ground floor of the chapel right in the center, and there's a railing all around it. You can't see the tomb until you go up to the railing and see the huge thing. I was so confused at first, because I thought, "The guy had a major ego. Wouldn't he have made it so you could see his tomb without going into a little side chapel?" Then I saw the tomb. lol. He didn't even have his name on it! Anywhere! lol. I guess his nephew figured everybody would know him. The names of all the battles he won were tiled into the floor around the tomb, though. And if you went into the crypt so you were on the same level as the tomb, bas relief sculpture of Napoleon dressed as Ceasar covered every wall. It was pretty crazy.

After seeing Napoleon, we went home and crashed. lol. We were both so exhausted! Paris more than I was, probably, because she got one hour of sleep and no nap. But while we were resting at home, we got a text saying a bunch of people from the group were going up the Eiffel Tour! We couldn't turn that one down, and c'etait formidable!

First off, we decided to take the stairs! I thought there would be a lot more stairs. lol. I thought I would be tired beyond the point of being able to move, but I actually wasn't. lol. Mostly because thre weren't as many as expected. However, it is an accomplishment that everybody in the group climbed the stairs from the ground to the second level of the Eiffel Tower. Then we had to take the elevator to the very top (for an extra five euros).

The view from the top is absolutely amazing! And it was so gorgeous at night time, with all the city lit up and the lights reflecting on the Seine. And the Eiffel Tower sparkles every hour! Isn't that cool? You can't see it from the top, but if you're standing at the bottom or just looking at it from across the city, it's awesome. :)