It’s my birthday…I can drink alcohol! Not that that mattered here at all. But yes, I am officially 21. Last Friday was my 21st and let me tell you, I had a great weekend. There was some bar action, some monuments, and a shady hotel room involved. All in all I’d say it was quite the success so let’s go back and look at it, shall we?
Friday night we went out to dinner at a Chinese restaurant in town which was super fun. Of course food took forever, but it was yummy minus the fact that Sadie’s noodles were cold. Blah. There were 9 of us. Yay people like me! After, we went to a couple bars in Vieux Lille aka the best part of town. It’s the old part with winding streets and cool hipster bars. First we went to “The Drugstore.” I really like it. We all sat upstairs where more people joined us. Of course there were a bunch of languages going on and it was great. At midnight the entire upstairs (which was mostly us and a few others) sang me Joyeux Anniversaire and then after Happy Birthday. I mean it was pretty sweet to get sung to in two different languages! After another bar (whose name well I have no idea what it was) I went home since I had to be up early to go to…Paris!
At 9am the next morning Emily and I left for Paris! Lauren and Sadie were taking a later train and meeting us there. I was so excited since I had been in France for 2.5 months and had never been to Paris. We got to Paris Nord and headed toward Bastille. We found the Starbucks and I enjoyed my birthday drink from Emily. Yes, she bought me a caramel macchiato and it was amazing. See, we don’t have Starbucks in Lille so that was the first time I had had it since December. After we went to meet up with Lauren and Sadie at Notre Dame.
After touring the inside of Notre Dame we decided we wanted to go to the top. After waiting in line 
for about an hour we were finally let inside. It’s free for EU citizens who are under 25. Well friends, we all have our student IDs from La Catho so guess who got in for free? Oh yes 3 Americans and 1 Canadian. Take that EU. 
We then proceeded to climb 400 stairs. It was VERY tiring, but when we got to the top we realized it was so worth it. Then we climbed more stairs and saw the bell. This inspired all of us to watch Hunchback of Notre Dame though I believe Lauren is the only one that has so far since being back.
After our hike up, we were exhausted and hungry which is never a good combination for the four of us. We got kebabs and hung out by the Hotel de Ville. The pigeons, of course, wanted to be my best friend. I’m glad my friends think it’s fun to watch me squirm in fear of stupid pigeons when they throw fries for them to eat. I don’t know where my fear comes from, but it’s there.
We then took a longer walk then we first thought and found our shady hotel. I mean it wasn’t THAT bad just wasn’t really a Ritz. Didn’t matter, it was cheap and good enough for one night.
All I had want
ed to do on my birthday was see the Eiffel Tower. We jumped on the metro and headed over there. On the walk from the metro stop to the Eiffel Tower, I got a nutella crepe. Amazing. News flash: La Tour Eiffel=just as cool as everyone says. We had many funny moments taking pictures. We couldn’t walk on the grass because it was resting which was super funny. Anyway, we sat and pondered life while getting annoyed at men trying to sell us things and taking in the beauty of the Eiffel Tower.
We then headed over to Champs-Elysees/Arc de Triomphe. While walking down Champs-Elysees I felt like I was in a movie. I’m not sure why, but it all just seemed so surreal. We reached the Arc de Triomphe and let me tell you, it’s a LOT bigger than I thought. Anyway, we could have gone up to the top of it, but after Notre Dame’s stairs we were kind of exhausted. It looked as though it was going to rain so we headed over to the Latin Quarter to get some food/go out to the bars. We got off the metro at the Latin Quarter and it was pouring so we ran to the first restaurant which happened to be a pizza place. It was alright but by now it was pouring and we were exhausted so we headed back to our hotel.
While at the restaurant, Sadie had run to get some alcohol and desserts. We sat in our sweats, drank, ate sweet things and chatted. It was the perfect end to a great 21st birthday.
Sunday we got up and headed to Saint Chappelle. Once again our IDs got us in for free (though it was a little bit more difficult this time). The stained glass windows were amazing and no picture could capture their beauty. After, we headed down to the Louvre. SO big. SO SO SO big. We didn’t go inside because we didn’t have years to waste. Then we went down to Montmartre and saw Sacre Coeur. There I had my second nutella crepe of the trip though it was not as good as the first.
We reached Sacre Coeur and I saw all those stairs and wanted to die. We were all so sore from Notre Dame. Alas
, we climbed and it was worth it. This was our third church in 24 hours so we were feeling pretty holy. We walked around the area a little and found somewhere to get sandwiches. We then set out to find Moulin Rouge. What a bummer. I mean it’s pretty much just a building. Regardless, we took our obligatory pictures and found coffee. We were going to go to Starbucks but it was PACKED so we opted for the coffee place next door which ended up being overpriced. Oh well. We headed back to Paris Nord and got on our train back to Lille. After about 2 minutes I was asleep.
It was a great but exhausting trip. I’m so thankful for all my friends who made my birthday special. From everyone at home that sent me cards/packages to everyone here who bought me a drink/got me a card/sang to me/ and went to Paris with me to celebrate–THANK YOU!
And I’ll end this with a picture of the four of us girls by the Seine. 
