Passport to Paris 2020

To say the least, this birthday wasn’t like any other I’ve had before, or how I envisioned it would be. Nonetheless, it was a weekend to never be forgotten. I mean, I went to Paris with my best friend, what more could I ask for?

Still with me? Great, here’s how the trip went down.

About a week before I turned 18, Maria (the best friend, I call her Lole) and I were trying to come up with a celebration destination worth having. We had just started university in a foreign country, so what better plan than to take the party to another one? The blueprints were initially for us to go to Berlin later in February to watch my favourite artist on tour, but that didn’t happen. Fortunately, Paris was the next best thing. A few hours after looking for tickets with a price that didn’t make our pockets cry, we booked and began packing for a weekend of events that, for me, were out of a Marie-Kate and Ashley movie.

Fast-forward to the day we landed in the city, we took a bus straight from the airport that’s route ended right in front of the Arc de Triumph. Luckily, we were staying with my aunt who lived around a 10-minute walk from there, 6 minutes without the luggage and google-map confusion. Once we made it to her little Parisian apartment after the never-ending wrong turns, we had the cutest reunion and unpacked. I found it kind of cool how we were staying in the same room my cousins grew up in, and it had a window that showcased the Eiffel Tower at a distance my poor eyesight was pleased with.

It was starting to get dark, but that didn’t stop us getting ready to go out and see the city before it got too late. Once we made it to the Arc de Triumph, our goal was to make it to the Eiffel Tower without getting too lost. The last time I was there I had just turned 3 or 4 years old, so getting walk around and take in everything lost in the memories only my child form could remember, the night before I made the official transition to adulthood, amazed me for some reason.

After wandering around we finally made it and I realised that there were just as many tourists as there were pigeons, us included. Although we weren’t right under the tower, we were at a perfect distance for taking as many pictures my iCloud storage could handle, safe to say those photos turned out better than expected with a little help of VSCO’s magic. Basic, I know, but I’ve got to credit their filters for being there when editing Instagram pics became the new skill everyone wanted to have.

We ended up making it back to the flat and into bed before 12, then came the flood of the cutest ‘happy birthday’ wishes and video calls from the people that make every birthday worth having another. It was maybe 3am when we decided to call it a night, and I fell asleep having seen the Eiffel tower light up in person and through my window, pretty cool if you ask me.

January 25th, the day when 18 became a reality and not my age on a fake ID. We had gotten a bit cliché the night before and got some croissants with my aunt from the bakery down the road, before having gone wandering around and, well you read that part, no need for me to repeat myself. Back to story – we had breakfast, rushed to get ourselves looking presentable, and each wore one of the three outfits we had packed in our carry-ons. At that time, I knew of the plans throughout the day, but no idea of what Maria had planned for us that night.

La Première Partie: Ladurée, et Champs-Élysées

After waiting in a never-ending line and hearing too many different languages spoken around me at once, we were finally seated. Oh yeah, I’ve left one thing out, Maria made me wear an inflatable birthday-cake hat that she thought was a good idea. Nice to see she finds joy in my public embarrassment, that’s what best friends are for…right? Here’s a fact about me, I really like iced coffee, and I went in there with the intention of having one. It’s sad to say I’d rate it a solid 5.5/10, the desserts we had were a 10 though, without a doubt. Since I kind of created this little rating pattern, the service also scored a 10. Our waiter spotted the obvious and brought out my tarte with a candle and sang the happy birthday song, making the overall experience too good to score.

La Deuxième Partie: Champs-Élysées, et la Fin de la Journée

It was time to hit the shops…with exactly £47 in my bank account. I never said this trip had no budget, and in this case, it was whatever’s left of my university allowance. So, we went with the next best thing, window shopping. Never thought I’d have that much fun walking up and down two parallel streets drowning in people and different stores, but anything’s fun if you’re with the right people. The sun started to set, and we decided to have one last treat before heading back to get ready for the nighttime’s plans, and what better than an overly-priced Nutella crepe from a corner store with a specialty in serving tourists. We sat down on a bench and just observed the people that were walking past, Paris has got some pretty cool street style that I automatically added to my folder of outfit inspirations in my head. I don’t know how but we were still confused on how to get back, I said right and she insisted it was left… she won but I’ll never admit it to her face. To no one’s surprise we made it later than we should have and wasted even more trying to pick what we’re going to wear, as if we had many options.

Now is when things get interesting, which is why I’m going to be ending this post on a cliffhanger.

Want to know more? Let me know!

peace & love,

roo