The Paris Trip: epilogue

I really enjoyed the trip and I am particularly glad that I explored the chateaux of the Loire valley. I am really happy that I could be in Paris during the Gay Parade.

Couchsurfing, Hosts and Christophe
This trip would have been incredibly expensive, had it not been for Couchsurfing. Yet again, my experience as a CS guest was great. I stayed comfortably (and for free) for the entire duration of my visit. My hosts were very nice people, and it was great to have met them, particularly Christophe. Although he doesn't speak fluent English, it was great talking to him about so many different things, hanging out with him, shopping with him, strolling with him and his company in general. Renaud is also a nice guy, very different from Christophe, extremely well-read, cultured, knowledgable and in general a nice guy. He is the one with the CS account and all my initial correspondence was with him. As I have noted before, he kinda reminds me of Jürg, my PhD supervisor. Renaud was under extreme work pressure during my visit, and I do wish I had been able to spend more time with him. I hope to see Renaud and Christophe again during my next visit in September.

The Tours bunch were good fun too. I particularly like Helene, who of course speaks the best English amongst the lot, and Fanny was also an extremely nice, friendly and helpful person. Guillaume is funny but language was a bit of a problem. Annika is lovely and very friendly. She and her friend, Annegret had invited me to watch football on my last day in Tours. Since it was pointless to return to Paris that afternoon, I should have stayed back and had fun watching football and cooking pancakes with them. I interacted the least with Sylvia-- I saw very little of her, but then even if she hadn't been so busy, I guess the language barrier would have not allowed much conversation.

Guillaume, my first host in the trip was very nice, thoughtful and helpful too. It would have been nice if we had managed to go to the Notre Dame to climb up its tower together, but my bad planning prevented that. I have to admit though that we somehow didn't quite click.


Prashanth
I had been talking to Prashanth since a couple of months on Gayromeo, and it was really nice to meet up with him in real life. And to meet his friends too. It was fun to chat with him and go out with him for dinner, walks, and of course the Marais. Prashanth, if you are reading this, a big thanks!

It is a pity that we don't know whether or when we'll ever meet again. He and his partner are moving to Hongkong next month and so will not be in Paris during my September visit. They are of course welcome to visit me in Vienna, but he doesn't see it happening in the near future,and after that I have no clue where I'll be. He has invited me to visit them in Hongkong but then again, it is highly unlikely that I'll visit that part of the world.

I hope we keep in touch via email/messenger or through our respective blogs.

What could have been done
I wish I hadn't stupidly wasted my time so much in the second half of my stay in Paris. There are several sights I missed out on, and actually I ended up doing more museums than real Paris. Hopefully I'll get time to do what I missed in September.

General impressions
I liked Paris. I liked its diversity, its colourfulness-- it's racial mixture. The city is of course beautiful and every guidebook will tell you so.

The food is great, and I particularly liked their liberal use of basil-- it tastes so delicious with cheese. But of course eating out is expensive, and it is irritating that one is always expected to order more than one course.

Language does not seem to be a problem in Paris, although it probably would have been in Tours had I stayed longer. So my reason for not visiting Paris for so long was totally unjustified. But of course, if I had visited earlier, that probably would have been before CS, and I might not have taken care to include the Gay Parade.

The 4-day museum pass was of excellent value, especially by including Versailles. Visiting Louvre on two different days was a good idea. Sunanda's tip for Musee Rodin was great. But Musee d'Orsay was my absolute favourite.

The public transport system is excellent, but I didn't manage to take Parisian buses. That would have been a nice way of seeing Paris. Since a lot is within walkable distance, I did not buy a public transport pass, instead bought a bunch of 10 tickets. That was a good idea. I still have 8 left, but I'll use them during the September visit.

What I also really liked about Paris are some of its extremely sensible ways. Traffic and crossing roads, for example. They are neither as chaotic as Italy (or Greece) nor as stupidly rule-following as Switzerland and German and to a large extent Austria. Parisians are very sensible that way. Another thing in this context is that they made the Metro free on (at least the evening/night of) the Fete de la Musique, and also it was free from Place de la Bastille after the Gay Parade. So nice of them.

I had collected information about walking tours in English, and the company offered several interesting and reasonably priced (EUR 10 per tour) ones. However I didn't manage to take any of them, and that is a pity.
I am forgetting to mention all the excellent information I collected from Fodors Travel Forums. There are really a lot of helpful and knowledgable people on there.

The gay thing
It was actually a pity that I didn't really get to meet up with a lot of gay people... I should have contacted and chatted with a few more people on gay websites. Of course I didn't really get a lot of time to get online during my stay in Paris either. I stayed with Christophe and Renaud and I met up with Chris, the Polish guy one evening. The Pride Parade was also a major event I attended. But the main going out in the Marais was courtesy Prashanth.

I liked the idea of having a gay district. The Marais is of course full of tourists but many bars and restaurants that are obviously gay don't have rainbow flags. It is assumed that they are gay.

Surprisingly for such an open-minded city like Paris, one doesn't see same-sex couples holding hands anywhere outside the Marais. That is a bit sad.

The nicest thing I saw in the Gay Parade in Paris was the rather large group of people that belong to an organization called Association Contact Parents Familles Homos Gays Lesbiennes, an organization for dialogue between gay and lesbian people and their parents, families and friends. There was a lovely placard (photo) saying "Mon fils est gay, mon gendre aussi!", I think that means "My son is gay, my son-in-law too!"-- sooooo beautiful! [update 14 July 06-- I have sent the website to Fabien, my French friend in Vienna. He intends to come out to his parents next month, and this organization would be really helpful for him.]
There was also a group calling themselves "Parents et Future Parents Gays et Lesbiens" (Gay and Lesbian Parents and Future Parents). Plus there were groups representing gay sportspersons, hospital employees, airline employees, political parties, etc. These are what a mature Gay Pride Parade should really have.

September...
A couple of weeks after I booked my tickets for Paris, Anton told us that a meeting on our area of research was being organized in Paris, and he wants the whole lab to go. So all these years I haven't managed to visit Paris, and the one year that I resolve to, I get to visit twice. Wonderful!
The September trip will of course be a busy one with the talks and posters, talking to people, developing contacts etc. A dinner will be organized in the Natural History Museum, and there will be an evening boat trip on the Seine. The whole lab will be there. But I also hope to do a bit of sightseeing, and meet some CSers, particularly Christophe and Renaude.

I am really looking forward to visiting Paris again...