Saturday 22nd March

Caught the 8.40am train to Paris this morning. It was a double decker which was very cool, but there was an annoying bar across the window at eye-level so I had to either duck or stretch-up to see out of the window. Not that there was much to see, it was pouring again. There was an english family sitting behind me which was quite funny. They kept having arguments and at one point the Dad said ‘I am the head of the family so you have to listen to me. We are not equal.’ And there was a little french boy who kept walking up and down the corridor and falling over when the train jolted - very cute. At Gare St Lazare, I was met by Anne and Ségolène and we went to meet Didier who Anne said was going to be our taxi driver for the day. First stop was the Petite Palais where we had a look at some art. I think my favourite bit was actually the bannister of the staircase. It was beautiful with flowers and swirls all out of black iron. Drove past the Diana memorial, on top of the underpass where she was killed and then we visited the Musee D’Art Moderne. I really liked this museum. There was an amazing room with a massive illuminated painting by Dufy, which I think was 6 metres tall. It was produced for the 1937 World’s Fair and was originally installed in the Pavillion of Light and describes the history of electricity. We also looked at an exhibit who I can’t remember by but will look it up. Some of it was really weird like words made from photos of poo, sculptures made from toffee and stuffed toys, a toilet cubical, and a very large foot which I think was made of cheese. What I did really like though were some pictures made from plastecine, faces, flowers, patterns. They were very cool and could be something you could display in your house rather than a large cheesy foot. By now the weather had brightened up so after having some lunch in the museum cafe we went on a boat trip down the Seine. It turned out the weather wasn’t so nice after all and we got caught in a hailstorm, so we sat inside most of the time, hopping outside to take photos. At one point (luckily at a point when we were inside) a large wave splashed over all the people who were standing at the front of the boat! After the boat ride we drove around Paris, past the Eiffel Tower, a building all covered in plants, the government buildings, where the President lives and finally the Arc de Triomphe. As we were going around the Arc de Triomphe we drove past a yellow mini parked on the side of the road with a couple snogging inside, and Didier honked the horn. The faces of the two people were hilarious and we didn’t stop laughing for a while! And then on the way out of Paris we drove past a large group of tourists posing for a picture and Anne opened the window and shouted the equivalent of ‘Chheeessseee’ and the tourists all cracked up laughing. We then past a petrol garage which was under a block of flats - I have never seen anything like it, and we had a quick look in the Jasper Conran home shop which was amazing and amazingly expensive! There was such a nice desk.
Back in Orléans we had a gorgeous supper and Ségolène and I went to her friends house to a party. I still can’t get use to how much the french smoke (Ségoléne was not I am pleased to say), even the younguns. When I asked it turns out lots of people party smoke, but don’t normally. I tried speaking some french but they told me not too because they could understand me better in english - great! A guy had bought his violin and was fantastic, the girl whose party it was did a bit of piano and lots of them danced so I got taught a bit of ceroc dancing. And then when one of their friends phoned they threw the phone at me and said ‘speak english’. I sorry to say whoever was on the other end put the phone down when i said ‘hi, how are you?’ All in all it was a slightly mad but a good evening.