Exploring Paris!

After being a few days into this new time zone, I'm starting to feel much better about Paris and our new routine. We had a delicious dinner at Le Grand Colbert last night. It was ahhh-mazing. Started out with a starter course of fresh cantalope, followed by the main course of salmon with bernaise sauce. This was followed by a delicious dessert of Rum Baba which is sort of a cake soaked in rum...and apparently you top it with a shot of rum as well! Delicious! The restaurant and service was amazing, although it looked a lot different from what I had seen of it in 'Something's Gotta Give.' (thanks to some cinematography magic they altered  your perception of the space) Today was our first real day of class, and what a way to start it off by touring Notre Dame and Sainte Chapelle. Notre Dame was amazing on the outside, but even more spectacular on the inside. It also helped that our professor gave us a mini-lecture on site about the history and architecture of the building. We toured the church briefly then we were given a sketching assignment...which we did inside the church! Very cool indeed. This was followed by a delicious lunch-on-the-go of a Nutella and Banana crepes. I will definitely be having more of those! After some more photo opportunities outside Notre Dame, we walked to Sainte Chapelle. Saint Chapelle was built as a private chapel to King Louis IV that actually housed the Crown of Thorns for some time. The chapel was built inside the palace's courtyard in the heart of Paris. I could go into a lot more detail here about the architecture behind it but I will cut it short for you...basically there was a lot of amazing stained-glass windows! Unfortunately the supposed Crown of Thorns is no longer kept here but in a vault underneath Notre Dame. Much smaller in scale than Notre Dame but was surprisingly built in only 5 years...compared to Notre Dame that took 200 years! I had a lot of fun there. After 'class' was done today, my friends and I decided to explore the Luxembourg Gardens. Mom, you would appreciate this one! This is basically like a more awesome and manicured version of central park. The French senate building is located inside the grounds as well. Tons of flowers and sculptures to be seen...along with many palm trees surprisingly. Very cool. Tonight after dinner my friends and I are going to one of the best places to view Paris at night, called Trocadero...stay tuned for pictures! On a side note  I must say I love the Paris metro system. So easy to use and you can go anywhere in the city very quickly. Also on another side note, while we were getting groceries last night on the tram ride back to our apartment we saw a mugging or pick-pocketing take place! All we saw was a lot of commotion as two people got onto the tram, but let me tell you, this awesome French lady would not let this creep take her purse. She was yelling in French at him and cornered him on the tram and sounded like she was calling the police (?). My first time seeing a mugging take place and the lady came out on top! Props to her. Anyways, tomorrow for class we are doing a Paris walking tour seeing the exterior of the Louvre, Jardin des Tuileries, Champs-Elysees, Arc de Triomphe and a lot of other places too. I will be wearing my tennis shoes for that one. Aur Revoir!