Louis XIV & Louis Tchang

This morning, after attending a work meeting close by, Timo came back with some croissants. I just had a bite of this buttery goodness (and I mean buttery); the remainder of my meal consisted of more crackers. We then made a trip to Château de Versailles, which is 10 miles west of Paris.

Instead of the metro, we had to take the RER to get there. We accidentally hopped on the wrong one and tried to step in the closing doors in order to open them back up and jump out. Well, my 1,5 liter water bottle got stuck in between the doors, and Raf almost got squashed as well. These doors DO NOT open up for you if you get stuck. A couple French girls were laughing at us as we rode to the next stop with my big water bottle stuck between the doors. Eventually, Raf asked a nice French woman for help, so we safely departed this RER and hopped onto the correct one. Good thing too, because had we stayed on that one, we would have been screwed.

Versailles was only a block away from the RER station. Around the touristy places like this, there are a lot of African men selling knick knacks. This one guy was trying to sell blinking Eiffel Tower keychains outside of Versailles (?).

Raf (in French): "Hey, the Eiffel Tower is that way." (Raf points in the direction behind him)

Knick Knack guy: "Ah, bon?" (Oh really?)

HAHAHAH! Anyway, here are some cool photos.

Approaching Versailles. This Château is ginormous!


Hi


Every other room looked like this.


Top of the opera room


Louis XIV, a serious womanizer (different woman every night in different rooms)


ONE of his bedrooms. He has a million drawing rooms throughout the Chateau.


A mathematician from back in the day. He created the first systematic hospitals (hence the word, hospital).


Part of his gardens.


His wife's estate was about 1,5 kilometers down this way to the right. She's got a huge "mini-chateau" like his. There are gonDOLa's (pronunciation via Timo) in that little lake all the way in the back.


Walking back to the main estate.


After spending two - three hours here, we made our way back home safely. While on the train, we had to take pictures similar to Luigi's on a train in Europe.

Don't hate! HAHAHAHHAHAH!


We arrived back home in the afternoon only to be consumed with some serious hunger (especially me since I've been running on crackers the past couple days!).

We were famished so we stopped by a boulangerie to buy:
· Madeleine
· Éclair au chocolat
· Flan – Goooooodd (a la Japanese)
· Pain au chocolat (chocolate croissant)

Oh, my name in French translates to Yellow Bread. What a perfect translation for a Chinese girl that loves to eat bread. (Pan also means bread in Spanish and Japanese, woot woot!)

We also stopped by this "fast food" Greek place that Timo was raving about.

Falafels here make all the falafels back home taste like SHIT! See the tender chicken, tzatziki sauce with tons of flavor, fresh veggies, and YES, FRENCH FRIES. This combo was SO delicious!


After I scarfed down a lot of the scrumptious food that we bought, we rested for a bit, and then went out again. Raf found a Mango store (and shopping area) close by Notre Dame. Since I hadn't seen it yet, we went to go check it out. I bought another cool shirt from Mango for only 20 Euro (at this time, all the stores in Paris were 20% - 70% off, the big sale time of the year until things close down in August). After some shopping, we went to check out Notre Dame, and then back home to rest up for dinner.

On our way back home, we saw a little pooch with World Cup Fever representing France!


This morning, we had actually given my mom's Godfather (also my grandpa's best friend from college), Louis Tchang, a call. He lives just outside of Paris. Because of the short duration of this trip, I told my mom to let him know that we would meet up with him if we had time. It was tough to get ahold of him because we didn't have a cell phone. And again, I felt stupid leaving a message in English when his answering machine was in French. Even my Chinese is pretty sucky. I left another message for him later in the afternoon. He didn't hear his phone ring at the time, so he ended up calling back Timo saying:

"Parlez-vous anglais, chinois, français?"

Timo thinking to himself "(Who is this? I don't want to buy anything!)”

Hahaha, in English, Louis told him that he wanted to take us to sightseeing the next day at places that were three hours away from Paris! Anyway, I was able to get ahold of him later on in the evening to inform him of our departure the next morning to London. He was really excited to see us so he insisted on driving into Paris to take us out to dinner. It took him 1,5 hours to drive through the Paris traffic + thunder storms. He made it safely to Saint-Michel around 9pm. We were trying to decide on whether to eat French food or Chinese food, so we decided on Chinese since I wanted something soupy for my stomach.

We were driving around the packed parking garage for a bit until we finally found a spot. When Louis parked, Timo said,

”Tres bon.”

This means “delicious.” He meant to say, good [parking]. Hahah! Louis then said,

”You mean, tres bien.”

For dinner, we had:

· Rose wine
· Seafood tofu soup (a little thicker than back home, but still good)
· Chicken feet (which Timo and Raf found quite enjoyable. Raf's first time trying it)
· Shu mai (pork dumplings)
· Sha Jiao (shrimp dumplings)
· Fish with veggies
· Sweet and sour shrimp
· Sautéed beef w/ sauce
· Mango sorbet (refreshing)
· Caramel ice-cream (this was really good!)



The difference with this restaurant compared to home is that they have a decent variety of wine they serve before your meal. Interesting, wine with Chinese food, but only in France! Also, they don't automatically give you free tea; you have to ask for it. The soup also did not come family style, and instead, was served in a small bowl. Also, all the waiters/waitresses spoke perfect Mandarin and French. Unlike America, where most of the waiters/waitresses speak only a few words of English.

There was a cute little French girl sitting at the table next to us wearing a pink qi pao (traditional Chinese dress). She actually could speak a little Chinese like, "Ni hao (How are you), ma ma hou hou (it's okay/so-so), Xie Xie (thank you)." It was really cute! Her accent was pretty good. She learned a bit because her father is some composer for the symphony so they spent some time in Shanghai, China.

Despite my extreme tummy discomfort (it took me an hour to eat that tiny bowl of soup), dinner was fun. Louis ended up speaking more with Raf and Timo in French. His English was very good, but I'm sure it was easier for him to communicate in French. He learned English and French in China, and moved to Paris about 25 years ago as an electrical engineer for a refrigeration/cooling company. He married the daughter of a French ambassador in Shanghai, but was later thrown into jail for 20 years during the Cultural Revolution for the accusation of being a spy for the French. They had a daughter together whom my mom grew up with (she is now living in Milan w/ her Italian husband). The Communists eventually forced them to divorce. After he got out of jail, his ex-wife helped him move to Paris and find a job. He married again (another French lady). Interesting, huh? He hopes that someday my mom can help him write his life story.



Outside the restaurant


Louis wanted to take pictures with all of us.


I was really worried that he would be insulted that I didn't eat a lot of food. Also, for Chinese people, if you are sick, they make a bigggg fuss about it so I was afraid that he was going to tell my mom. (Then I wouldn't hear the end of it forever!) Surprisingly, he didn't make a big deal about it, and didn't tell my mom! Overall, his personality is very French. I was expecting him to be more "Chinese" if that makes any sense. (I mean, even though my parents have been here for years, they are still in some ways very old-fashioned/traditional Chinese). Louis explained to us the Feng Shui of the restaurant. It is located where the two rivers meet (Seine and Marne [I think]); this calls for a prosperous location for the restaurant. He talked about the World Cup, Tour de France (he is actually not a fan), some famous nude beach in France, ping pong, as well as places he has visited throughout France. He likes to be the tour guide for visiting friends (he has been to Versailles 10x. LOL). I later found out that when he called my mom, he asked why Bush was still in office. Hahaha, that is like the first question Europeans have to ask us. Did I mention that he is 80-something years old, and is like a serious power walker (well, not literally, but he walks so damn fast!). I think he might be in better shape than me! And, he was wearing a Louis Vuitton belt. hahah!

Too fast for me.


When dinner concluded, he took us on a quick tour through the French Chinatown. Even though I felt like passing out on and off throughout dinner, I'm glad we were able to meet. Dinner was fun and delicious, and hopefully we will meet again soon!