Three days in Paris

After good 3 months I am back at blogging. I was preoccupied with international traveling & IDEAS 2006 so couldn’t get time to revert to blogging. The month of November started with a trip to Dubai & Paris This was my second visit to Dubai & first to Paris. We stayed in Dubai for three days, finished our work and took a flight to Paris. Watched lake house, Super Ex Girlfirend & Romancing the stone during 6.5 hr flight.

I heard and read about Paris that it is one of the most exciting places to visit. God gave me the chance to experience it and now I can say that the fashion capital and city of lights is simply awesome and worth visiting. Love n romance in the air of Paris which was simply refreshing for my soar eyes…lolzz. The weather was really cold but I enjoyed it coz we hardly experience such cold here in Karachi.

Paris is divided into twenty arrondissements in the form of a clockwise spiral & we stayed at Holiday Inn in 19th arrondissement. Reached hotel, freshened up n went for lunch at nearby Turkish café. Then headed for Eiffel Tower and went at the top of it, at 1000 ft. The view from the top was one hell of an experience; put a coin in the telescope n saw the bird eye view of Paris. I read some where that Tom cruise proposed Kate Holmes at the top of Eiffel tower….wow what a place to propose!!!! Though it was night but truly it was looking city of lights. Also visited Champs Elysees, known as the most beautiful avenue of the world. The avenue is lined by cinemas, theaters, cafés and restaurants, and luxury specialty shops. Window shopped at Louis Vuitton, MontBlanc, Zara, lacoste, Guerlain, Gap, Celio, Disney Store & other French brands. I did my homework on shopping in Paris so I only shopped from Sephora coz rest was totally out of scene for my tiny pocket. We had dinner at an Indian restaurant & ordered grilled jumbo prawns, biryani, bhaji, muter paneer with chapatti n sweet lassi. Also saw arc de triumph, monument by Napoleon on our way back

Second day we went for our official work and came back in the evening. Our MD left for Pakistan so I n my colleague took a train to Rue de Rivoli for some more shopping. We both are shopoholics and go crazy on our trips. We went there to find our all time fav stores H&M & C&A. We had dinner at Turkish Café and had pizza. All shops got closed till we had our pizza. All dark n deserted so we decided to leave coz we both were lil scared. Took a train n got off to wrong station, went back to the same station n this time got the right train with the help of some native people. The subway system of Paris is very very confusing as there are three lines. So it was great learning experience being alone and managing ourselves in Europe. Also caught glimpse of Notre Dam, situated on the bank of river seine. I learnt few things from French people like a friendly smile; a warm greeting of “bon jour”; a simple “merci”; politeness & an expression of etiquette.

Third day we went to exhibition & conducted our meetings in the first half took a train to our hotel. We decided to explore the street near our hotel. We found Pizza hut on that street n had veggie Pizza. Eating out in Europe is one difficult task coz of haram & halal issue. After stuffing pizza it was time to burn off those calories so went to nearby shops. It seemed like a downtown of Paris.

At night we had a flight to Dubai to Khi. Left hotel and headed for airport (Charles De Gaulle). The taxi took 35 Euros……duhhhh…. that’s why we used to prefer train…heheheh

We checked in and waited at emirates VIP lounge coz my colleague is Gold card member of skywards. We had dinner there. We were so tired so slept in the entire flight of 6.5 hrs. Reached Dubai n took a flight to Khi. So on the whole it was a very good trip.

Hope to get a chance to visit again coz there are plenty of monuments to see like Louvre, Moulin Rouge, Notre Dam, Disney resort, gallery lafayat etc.