Saturday 10 March 2007

Paris first-timer


An unglamourous photo of Paris: someone's got to show it as it really is!


Yes, shocking that it is, I'd never been to Paris until recently. It all goes back to a diplomatic stand-off between France and a certain country about French nuclear testing in the Pacific (something sobering to think about while enjoying French culture). This meant some visa-restrictions that caused trouble for 17 year old girls to enter Paris without parental permission. Maybe they were trying to cast aspersions on what the girls were planning to do in Paris. The only other place where I've seem restrictions on underage girls travelling was from Burma to Thailand.

Anyway, Paris for the newbie. This Paris metro interactive website is incredibly cool and what's more, will actually help you reach your destination, if you know where you want to go that is, which is not necessarily the case for the tourist (see above for some suggestions).

http://www.ratp.info/orienter/cv/cv_en/carteparis.php


French-deaf? Well, I don't know if I can say this website helped me, but it was a lot of fun:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/languages/french/lj/


Actually the French people spoke sounded completely different to what the charming Hakim speaks in the bbc videos, couldn't really make head or tail of it. But if you need the basics - like how to pick up a gay guy in a cafe - you'll find the phrases in the online bbc course.

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