A Royal Garden, and an Aristocrat's house.

Two walks to update on, not to mention London I guess, but just been lazy plus tired after the traveling. But I need to update these walks or else I will never finish them and forget what they are about. So first we did a walk that started at the Montparnasse station. It's named after the Tour Montparnasse (it means Montparnasse Tower in english), and which is in turn named after a Greek Mountain by poets in Paris. I guess that mountain was believed to have mythical creatures or something. Anyways, most Parisians still don't like it cuz it's too big and just sticks out in the skyline. It is the biggest tower in France, and after it was built they banned skyscrappers so now every tall building is built in the Defénse district that I showed in the other walk. It's modelled after the World Trade Center, and there was supposed to be two towers built as well but because of the ban it never got built. It's a little interesting huh? now that the World Trade Center is gone.

Then we went to Alfred Dreyfus' statue. He was a Jew who was accused wrongly of treason and the French government put him in really harsh conditions for years until he was freed, even a few years after they found out he was innocent. It just showed the anti-semitism they had back then. He was a true patriot and still served his country in WWI after, and this statue was supposed to be placed in the Military museum but kept getting shunted all the way here....where no tourists know about it and the every day citizens could care less. It's kinda sad actually but I thought it was cool my history teacher I believe it was Choates told me a little about him.

Then we went to the Jardin Luxembourg. It's quite beautiful and it's another example of French jardin (garden). It's really rigid and symmetrical and you can't walk on the grass etc... Supposed to be the triumph of reason and culture over the disorder of nature with the firm geography. I thought it was pretty but not like a "fun" park since it's so orderly. I prefer a little chaos, call me an agent of chaos if you will!

It was sooo pretty but still cold. We thought it would be ok that day since it was sunny, but look at the fountain! It's still icing over. I'm definitely going to come back in March/April.

And now for the Aristocrats' walk! It was pretty much two museums that were owned by really rich people in the 18th Century and then converted to a museum. A cool local park was squashed in between but throughout this walk, I kept thinking about the type of house I would like to have and design. Definitely a lot of mirrors, and chandeliers! We weren't allowed to take any pictures inside either houses but it was true luxury! Every room was really extravagantly done! There were paintings in pretty much every room with awesome frames, and they collected some really expensive pieces of art. Also, there was gold in pretty much every room, and lot's of mirrors! I will have lot's of mirrors in my house too! In the musée Jacquemart-andré there was a few rooms dedicated to Italian art, and I think I'd like to have a few rooms dedicated to certain cultures as well. Pretty much every room had gold in it!

I'm more of a minimalist myself but I think I will have one room that will be extravagant like the way they did it. Oh and a double spiral staircase!!!! That was probably my favorite little architecture of the day. And I think I would like my portrait to be painted instead of just a picture. Each of my family members as well!

Anyways the outside of the Musée Jacquemart-André:

And I just had to pose next to an European Lion statue cuz it's so different from the asian ones.

Here's the Parc Monceau, it's not more english style cuz kids can play in it and stuff even though most of the grass is still marked off.

I thought it looked really real but these ruins are all fake and it was in vogue to make fake ruins back in the 18th century.

And that's it, time for more planning for my future house!