Fête de la Musique

For a city with a "Who's Who" list of churches and cathedrals, Paris sure knows how to celebrate a Pagan holiday.  Yesterday was the summer solstice and the Parisians thoroughly welcomed the new season with a huge city-wide party.  Fête de la Musique was a free-for-all for musicians and dancers in Paris to spend the entire day, with the most sunlight, to play, dance, and enjoy free music on the streets.  I have never experienced anything like it.

During the daytime it was mostly metro performers and the odd acoustic guitar on the street corner, but the night was something else entirely.  Oh, and speaking of the metro, I experienced my first Metro strike yesterday as well.  Apparently you haven't experienced 'real' Paris until you've had to deal with a Metro strike.  I find this funny because 1) it was a pain in the butt to get anywhere and 2) it was only a strike on my line.  The train's came about 10 minutes apart and only went to next station where I had to stand in a huge line just to get on a different train that took me practically around the city to go what would be 3 short stops on my original line.  It was a lovely experience.

During the day I set out to enjoy a musical Paris.  After grammar class, Kaley had one last phonetics class so I decided to walk around the Latin Quarter and find a cafe to get some much needed caffeine.  Well, I ended up just wandering along the Seine.  I walked out onto Pont Neuf.  It was really gloomy and kind of rainy so it was almost peaceful sitting out in an island in the middle of the Seine.  I kept on walking for a while and finally decided to stop at a cafe not far from the Musee d'Orsay.  It was really cute and, as it turns out, very expensive.  I was shocked to see that my cappuccino cost almost 7£.  Recovering from my initial shock, I looked at the menu to scope out the other prices and saw a little blurb written on the front.  Le Cafe Frégate was apparently the inspiration for Dumas when he was writing The Three Musketeers.  Well that was unexpected...I know it's a pretty cool historical place and just next door to Volatire's home, but 7£ for a cup of coffee?  No thank you.

I continued walking down to the Musee d'Orsay where I sat for about 10 minutes and listened to a jazz quartet.  They were playing some of my favorites and all four of the musicians were smoking while playing their instruments.  It was so French!  What was even more French though was the sign on the front of the Musee d'Orsay.  It said (and I quote) "We may not open today".  No definitive statement, no explanation, just French...  Disappointed about the d'Orsay, I was still determined to find some kind of landmark or museum to visit.  I trekked some more down along the Seine to the Invalides.  I walked around there for a moment but decided that I didn't want to spend even more money to see Napoleon's tomb, at least not today anyway.  I walked back to the Seine, across Pont Alexandre, and over to the Champs-Élysées where I caught a fully functional Metro to the Opera house.  I decided then that this would be my main visit of the day.  The Opera was gorgeous.  Unfortunately, the auditorium was closed because of a rehearsal, but being the creeper that I am, I found a tiny open window on a door that showed all the ballerinas practicing.  It was beyond cool.  I think that is my one wish in life.  I want to be a ballerina more than anything.  Watching Black Swan kind of put this dream of mine into perspective though.  Oddly enough, the soundtrack and dvd for Black Swan were being sold in the gift shop of the Opera Garnier.  I was shocked to see these mementos but not the Phantom of the Opera.  My dreams were crushed.  As if I hadn't walked around that entire building humming the soundtrack to one of my favorite musicals set in that very place...Well, now I'm glad that I didn't reenact Masquerade on the famed staircase...

After the Opera house I took the long train home (literally) and met up with Kaley to go back out to experience the true fête.  We got to Saint Michel about 7:30 and it was already a madhouse.  People and music everywhere.  We stopped in front of the Fountain Saint Michel for a while and watched some break dancers dance to some African music.  It was too cool.  For the next 6 or so hours we hopped from street to street, band to band.  It was amazing.  We danced, made friends, drank, and had a blast.  After a while, I got it in my head that I was going to be truly Parisian.  While dancing and listening to music I went out of my comfort zone and started talking to random people.  Of course, the Parisians do this by walking up to strangers and asking for a cigarette.  I'm not kidding.  You'll just be sitting at a cafe, in a metro station, or walking on the street and people will come up and ask if you have a smoke and stay and chat for a while.  My attempt was hilarious.  While I was practicing my French, my wingman Kaley was giving out fake names to men and pretending she was British.  It was a blast.  The clouds lifted and it was light until almost 11 pm and warm for the entire night.  Something just came over the city that was unlike anything I'd ever seen.  Everyone was singing and dancing, some even dancing in the beautiful Fountain St. Michel.  I can barely even describe how amazing and crazy it was.  Take the most insane frat party you've ever been to, multiply it by 150 million, and then apply it to millions of people in one of the most exciting cities in the entire world.  Like I said, crazy fun.

Going back to Saint Michel-Notre Dame the next morning (a few short hours later) was shocking.  Everything was cleaned up and it looked like nothing had happened.  It was raining again, like it does every morning, and it was almost sad.  Back to real life, class, and the crazy traffic on Île-de-Cité on a Wednesday morning.  If it clears up though, we were all thinking of making our own fête at the top of the Eiffel Tower. 
Tomorrow is our farewell dinner from CEA.  When did that happen?  The Global Campus-Gay Paris kids all leave at the end of the week, so I guess it's only fitting to have it then.  I'm hitting the one week mark til my vacation and I'm excited but sad that this is all coming to a close.  On the bright side though, I hit up about 3 things on my Paris bucket-list yesterday.  Now if I can only keep up the momentum and keep on dancing through Paris this next week, then I will be a very happy girl.