Paris Je T'aime!

Ok, so this is long overdue, but as promised, I will give day-by-day recount of the hard-earned, weeklong trip to Paris + day trip to Brussels. 

Monday Nov 7th-Tuesday Nov 8th:
The trip started out on a semi-awful note… after having worked EIGHT 10-12 hour days in a row, my brain was so fried that I forgot to bring my AmEx to the airport, which of course, was the one credit card that I needed in order to check in.  Thankfully I remembered about half way to the airport, and since we left early than planned, we had enough time to go back to the apartment so I could dash upstairs and get it.  Check-in was quite smooth, aside from the marriage proposal from the customs officer. :P  Coincidentally, we were on the same flight as one of our senior team leads at the CDC office, so it was nice to chat with him and his wife while we waited to board the plane.  Unfortunately, the plane ride itself was not that smooth-- it was a long overnight trip from Abuja to Amsterdam, particularly with multiple babies wailing the entire 6 hours of the flight.  The layover in Amsterdam was about 3 hours, so Jess and I had some time to do some souvenir shopping (hey, I will be flying to Amsterdam pretty much every single time I come in and out of Africa, so might as well get a memento of sorts). 
I had my first chocolate croissant on the flight from Amsterdam to Paris via AirFrance, and it was oh-so-buttery-delicious, even though the coffee was instant Nescafe (yes, coffee snob that I am)… had a bit of difficulty finding our way through Charles de Gaulle airport, but we managed to buy the correct metro ticket to the city.  Armed with a Google map printout of directions from the landlady of the apartment we were renting, I was able to navigate us from the metro stop to our 4th floor apartment in Marais, a hip, up and coming neighborhood in the third arrondissement (I would say it's sort of like the hipster-y Williamsburg area of Brooklyn). 

The view from our apartment (above), and me sitting at the dining table in our apartment (below)

After settling into the apartment, we set out without plans to explore our local arrondissement and accidentally hit the first landmark, Place des Vosges, one of the oldest squares in Paris, and then walked south and made our way towards the Seine River, where we saw the majestic Hotel de Ville (sadly, I keep meaning to look up what this place is, since I couldn't find it in my guidebook… and I've been back in Abuja for almost 3 weeks now, and I still don't know what it is… lazy bum that I am).   Being the girls that we are, Jess and I got sucked into shopping along Rue de Rivoli and Rue St. Antoine--actually, come to think of it, I had already started; I spotted a super cute cashmere scarf in the window of a shop while walking to Place des Vosges, and impulsively purchased it…following the crowd of other tourists, we found the Bastille monument (no more jail) and took a few pictures there before walking back to the metro atrea where we first arrived for dinner, and to escape the impending rain. 

Me and Jess on a park bench in Place des Vosges (above).
I had downloaded Anthony Bourdain's Paris "No Reservations" episode, but of course, like the entirety of the trip, I didn't plan as extensively as I should have, so I didn't even end up watching it to see what specific restaurants we should try.  Starving and freezing our patooties off, we decided to find the first cafe/brasserie that looked reasonably priced to grab something to eat.  Ended up at Cafe Benjamin in the Chatelet area--I ordered steak tartar and pommes frites and a Nutella crepe to finish it off (it's actually called an "Africa crepe", haha).  After not eating too much meat in Abuja, it was quite nice to feast on steak our first night out. :)  After finishing dinner, we stopped by the local grocery store (G20 Supermarche!) to pick up some fresh fruit, water, ORANGINA!! and I splurged and bought serrano ham and some semi-hard cheese (HEY, when in Paris, live it up!), before going back the apartment and passing out.

Wednesday Nov 9th:
We woke up super early on Wednesday to plan out or day of museum/landmark hopping.  In our attempt to beat the crowds at the Louvre, we took the metro from the Rambauteau station, next to the super ugly Pompidou Art Center--stopping first at Tout Chaud to pick up a pain au chocolat for breakfast--and picked up our museum pass for the week at the office in the museum.  We were able to hit about half of the "famous" art pieces in the Louvre (this was determined by what items were highlighted in the museum map… we just ran from one exhibit to the next, heh… clearly not the cultured way to do it, but oh well), before it got super crowded around 1pm.  We decided to move on, and stopped to have lunch outside, sitting with the Louvre behind us, the Tuileries Garden in front of us, and the Eiffel Tower in the distance, enjoying a ham and butter baguette, Orangina and apricot tart for dessert from the local Paul cart outside the Louvre gates.  YUM. 

 Me goofing around in the Louvre's Medieval Art Exhibit (above), and a lovely picture by the Seine River (below).

 After finishing lunch, we made our way towards the Isle de la Cite, from the Pont Neuf bridge along the Seine, and saw the Square du Vert Galante, a tiny little park at the tip of the island, the Place Dauphine (don't actually remember the significance of this, which is what I get when I journal 3 weeks out from the actual trip :P), and then stood in line for quite some time to see the St. Chapelle Cathedral, one of the oldest churches in Paris.  Unfortunately, it was undergoing major renovations, so there were a few places that were off-limits, but it was awe-inspiring to see the sheer size of the stained-glass windows (if I remember correctly, they are the oldest stained-glass windows in Paris!).  After St. Chapelle, we walked south towards the famed Notre Dame Cathedral and Bell Towers.  Touring the inside of the Cathedral was free, and quite full of tourists, but we had to use our museum pass to access the Towers.  Took some time to wait for the batch of people before us to come down from the Towers before we could go up… 422 spiral-y steps to the top of the towers to see the actual bells and come face to face with centuries-old gargoyles (didn't see Quasimodo though :T).  The view was spectacular, since it was a super clear and sunny afternoon; we were able to see the Monparnasse and Eiffel Towers and the Sacre Coeur Basilica perched on top of the hill in Montmartre.  Coming down from the top of the towers was harder than going up. only because I started getting really dizzy in the process.  We took a few minutes to explore the Crypte Archeologique underneath the Notre Dame Cathedral, but since all the placards were in French. I didn't really understand what the exhibit was trying to show, aside from the obvious fact that they were the ruins of the old city foundations. 

 View of Paris from the top of the Notre Dame Towers (above), pensive gargoyle overlooking the city (below).

 View of the Sacre Coeur Basilica in Montmartre from the top of the Notre Dame Towers (above), full view of the Notre Dame Cathedral, with buttresses! (below)

 We wanted to hit the Pantheon before it closed for the day, so we ran-walked to the Latin Quarter/6th Arrondissement area.  Basically a huge tomb in the middle of the University district, the Pantheon housed a lot of famous dead people-- Marie Curie and her husband, Victor Hugo, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Voltaire, som other famous people… and the Foucault Pendulum, the world's largest.  We got a great view of the Eiffel Tower at dusk after we finished touring the Pantheon, and then we popped into the famous Shakespeare and Co Bookstore on the Left Bank of the Seine, where a lot of American ex-pats spent their time.  Was super cute, but also a bit pricey, so I didn't buy anything (that's what Amazon is for, heh).  We walked our way back to our 3rd Arrondissement neighborhood, along the Rue des Archives, where the Jewish History Museum and National Archives was, and then stopped at the local corner brasserie, called Comptoir du Archives, for an amazing dinner of confit du canard (duck confit!!), pommes frites (but in coin form), soupe a l'oignion (French onion soup with cheese toast on top, heavenly!) and then a glass of their house pinot noir.  It was so reasonably priced for how awesome the food was; in retrospect, I think it was the best meal of the trip, or at least the most… French, haha.  We topped it off with a delicious sucre and buerre (sugar and butter) crepe at Crepes Suzette just down the street, a cute red-awning, closet-sized creperie.  Jess and I had to roll ourselves home, we were so stuffed, and crawled up the four flights of rickety, uneven stairs to our apartment.  Showered in the super tiny shower stall (even just turning around, you would hit the temperature knobs, and depending on the direction that you turned, you would either scald yourself or get a frigid blast of cold water), and spent some time researching activities for tomorrow, before utterly passing out.
Me trying to do the touching pose of the Eiffel Tower, sort of failed... in front of the Pantheon (below)

Thursday Nov 10th:
We started the day with our second trip to the Louvre, to finish off doing our warp-speed tour of the most famous art pieces in the galleries.  Again, stopped by Tout Chaud for breakfast pastries… this time I got a raisin/custard croissant for the road.  We started off at the Louvre by sprinting to the Mona Lisa--she is SO tiny… blows my mind--and then to the headless, Winged Victory statue (if you've ever seen Funny Face with Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire, you'll know this scene), and then the Venus de Milo again (we went to see her yesterday, but Jess wasn't satisfied with the picture that I took of her and the statue… yes, I suck at taking pictures).  All in all, we basically ran our way through the Louvre to see only the most famous items, and even then. it took about 4-5 hours each day to just hit those!  So, moral of the story is to… just come back and visit the Louvre/Paris again the future! :) 
Wandered over tot he Tuileries Garden after we finished with the Louvre, took a few pictures… probably more to see in the spring when everything is blooming… and then hopped over to the Musee L'Orangerie to see Monet's famous Waterlilies paintings.  Actually, this museum was built specifically to house these paintings--Monet wanted to create a peaceful sanctuary after the war (WWII, I think), and so he donated his Waterlilies so they could be displayed here, as a refuge for shell-shocked, war-weary Parisians.  After the Musee L'Orangerie, we walked over to the Place du Concorde, where the large obelisque stands. 

 Took a few obligatory tourist pictures (above, me attempting the jump in mid air pose of the Obelisque) and then hopped on the metro to Rue de Raspail, in the St. Germain du Pre area for an afternoon of Parisienne shopping!  We started of at Un Sac du Jour, a place reviewed in Jess' Lonely Planet guidebook, where you could customize your purse in every way imaginable--it was an interesting concept, but waaay too expensive.  Then we hit the Luxembourg Gardens, except since it was the middle of Fall, there were no flowers, just like the Tuileries Garden…. just a lot of naked trees and dirt flower beds. :(  Again, another reason to come back during the spring or summer!  Unfortunately, this was when I started to feel a painful twinge in my left knee… I tried to walk it off, but it got progressively worse, and I ended up sitting down and watching the locals run around the gardens for a bit before the pain subsided to a dull throbbing, so we could continue walking.  We hobbled to Rue St. Germain and started hunting for famous chocolate and patisserie shops; Jess knew a lot about artisinal chocolate, having worked in a gourmet food shop.  We first stopped at Pierre Herme, one of the more famous chocolateries (he is a famous pastry chef), and bought 3 macarons to try: rose buttercream, chocolate noir, and white truffle!  They wre deliciously fluffy and not too sweet…on a side note, my goal this holiday season is to try and make macarons for holiday gift giving.  Then we walked over to Patrick Roger, another famous and super pricey chocolaterie, where we saw a giant chocolate gorilla in the display window.  Didn't end up buying anything here though… by this time, my knee was hurting so much that we decided to metro it back to the Place du Concorde, so we could check out a few more chocolate shops.  We stopped by Maxim's, a super touristy chocolaterie (although Jess says their chocolate-covered orange peel is divine) so Jess could take a picture of her in front of the flagship store, and then walked over to Rue St. Honore--one of the more ritzy shopping avenues--and hit Michel Cluizel, another chocolaterie.  Either I was really hungry, or just trying to take my mind off my knee, but I splurged and bought four pieces of chocolate (I think it cost me like, almost $15 USD, haha): lavender honey, dark chocolate earl grey, passion fruit ganache, and dark chocolate with sea salt… YUmmerS. 
Super happy Jess in front of Maxim's (below).

 My knee hurt to the point that I could barely put any weight on it, so we made our way home (I was limping pretty badly), and stopped by the local patisserie for a late lunch.  I got a four cheese quiche and some cannele!  Literally crawled my way up the stairs to the apartment, feasted while watching an episode of Once Upon a Time on my Ipad (I think Jess passed out halfway through the episode), and lounged around for a bit/allowed my knee to rest, before going out again for shopping around Marais.  Hey, no pain no gain right? ;P
We walked along the Rue des Rosiers and ended up at the Jewish District, stumbled upon two gourmet tea shops that Jess was familiar with--Palais du The and Kusmi Tea--where I bought a flower black tea mix and a cute teaspoon tea strainer, before walking back to the same Crepes Suzette creperie for a late night snack: a spinach and tomato galette (which is really like a savory buckwheat crepe, not like a free form tart-style galette that I was thinking of), and a marron et creme fraiche (chestnut and fresh cream) crepe for dessert.  Before I eating, I stopped into Comptoir des Cottoniers, a trendy clothing store, where I eyed a super cute, very French grey wool coat… that cost $350USD. O_o  Tried it on, fit perfectly… just… couldn't bring myself to get it just yet…. but more on that later. ^_^  Finshed off the evening by planning out our itinerary for the next couple of days… Brussels, Versailles, new hotel along the Champs-Elysee… !!!

Friday Nov 11th:
Friday morning Jess and I split up--she decided to do a whirlwind tour of the last few major landmarks in Paris, while I stayed in the apartment and rested my bum knee… it was pretty stiff in the morning, but at least I was able to hobble around the apartment and clean things up, pack, etc while Jess visited the Sacre Coeur Basilica and Les Invalides (Napoleon's Tomb).  It was actually nice to stay in and just vege… even at the expense of seeing the sights.  I figured, gotta leave something to see for the next trip to Paris, right?  The last few days were really crazy and jam-packed anyway… was nice to just sit and stare out the window for a while, watch the locals move about… there were definitely more people on the street, since it was a national holiday… Armistice Day, I think is what it's called, to commemorate the end of WWI. 
View of Sacre Coeur in the morning fog, courtesy of Miss Jessica (below).

 When Jess returned around noon, we made our way to our next living accomodation, Hotel Belfast, in the Champs-Elysee/Arc du Triomphe/Eiffel Tower area.  It was a cute hotel, but quite tiny for American standards.  With our luggage, we barely fit into the teensy elevator (definitely not made to accomodate obese American tourists).  I commend ourselves for coughing up a bit more money to stay in nicer places… I had a bad experience in the Madrid hostel when I went to Europe last year… so from now on, apartments and hotels!  I'm done with hostels… unless it's the hostel that I stayed at in Lisbon (I have very fond memories of that one).  We took the metro back to the 1er Arrondissement in the afternoon to visit the Musee D'Orsay, which has a really famous collection of Impressionist Art.  The museum itself is actually an old train station that was converted into the museum… so it had that really awesome domed and tiled architecture… of course, those are the worst terms to describe it, haha.  We saw the famous Van Gogh self-portrait with his ear missing, a good number of Monet's other famous Impressionist landscapes, Renoir's dancing ladies, Degas' ballerinas, and a whole lot of others… some interesting sculptures in the hallway galleries as well.  Since my knee was still bothering me, I decided to take the elevator, but with only one elevator in the whole museum, it took us almost 10 minutes just to get from the 2nd to the 5th floor.  I actually got scolded by an older museum attendant (in French of course… and it was simple enough that I could understand her), for taking up valuable elevator space as fit and able-bodied youngsters (granted she didn't know about my bum knee)… we should have taken the stairs!  I can totally play the "old person" card now though, as I'm officially in my mid- to late-twenties, hehe. 
We left Musee D'Orsay when it closed, and walked along the Seine, taking in the beautiful night view of Paris (even though it was oh-so-cold).  Thankfully we passed by a pharmacy on the way back to the hotel/dinner-hunting, and I popped in to get some icy/hot equivalent patches for my knee (I had purchased an ACE bandage the night before in Marais, which helped, but not by much).  Tired, hungry and cold, we picked the closest cafe to grab dinner, but unfortunately, was the wrong choice… I ordered steak au poivre and creme brulee for dinner, and was majorly surprised to see the cook MICROWAVE my steak!  In PARIS?! Bah.  I was unhappy… and so was the steak… it was sadly rubbery.  The creme brulee wasn't that great either… he burnt the top :(  It was a sad and disappointing dinner, but no point crying over spilt milk… we trudged home and got ready for our day trip to Chateau de Versailles the next day.

 Me all bundled up, in front of the Musee D'Orsay sign (above), and the view from our hotel room of the Arc du Triomphe and the tip of the Eiffel Tower in the corner (below).

Saturday Nov 12th:
After figuring out the Paris train system, we hopped on the red and transferred to the blue line to get to Versailles… train ride was about half an hour to get to the Chateau.  I would have taken a nap, unfortunately there was a super annoying American woman in our car who just wouldn't shut up about her amazing TV shows on her Ipad, how awesome her macarons were, blahblahblah.  Wasn't able to get a wink of sleep.  We finally made it to Versailes-- was a beautiful, clear, sunny day oustide.  We started out at the grand, gilded gate entrance, and made our way through the royal quarters, the sleeping chambers of the King and Queen, and then to the famed Hall of Mirrors.  I guess it makes sense that the mirrors looked really old, since the Treaty of Versailles was signed so long ago (ok, I really need to brush up on my history… was it WWI or WWII?  This is slightly embarrassing…), but they just didn't look as shiny as I thought they would be.  We took a number of pictures inside the chateau, then headed out to the surrounding gardens.  So vast, so many fountains, so many statues (that were wrapped up because of the low season), perfectly manicured hedges… but again, no flowers.  This is a place I will definitely have to come back to in the Spring/Summer seasons… We had a delicious picnic next to Neptune's Fountain, of serrano ham and cheese and French baguettes.  I decided to toss the cheese rinds to the seagulls lounging around in the fountain, and ended up getting attacked by the birds trying to eat the crumbs on the floor.  We finished touring the chateau, took a few awesome jumping-in-the-air photos, and boarded the train back to Paris.  We did manage to pick up our train tickets to Brussels too, at the same station, but not without making a fool out of ourselves first.  We tried to pry open the automatic sliding glass doors to the ticket office, without realizing that we just weren't standing in the right place for the sensor to automatically open the doors for us.  I think the ticket agent was pretty bewildered at our crazy antics…

 Me and the throng of tourists in the Hall of Mirrors... I look a little dazed (above), and a view of the manicured gardens from a top floor window of the Chateau (below).

 Doesn't that look like a fake backdrop?  The front of the Entrance to the Chateau (above), and me imitating the angry fishie in the background (below).

 Tree-Dwee in the Versailles Garden (above), and super elated, jumping Dwee (below).

 On the way back to Paris, we decided to get off a few stops early at the Eiffel Tower stop.  I mean, we've see it multiple times from far away, but I figured we had to do the obligatory up-close photo.  I didn't realize how BIG it was… and brown!  Why did I think it would be steely-grey?  Took a few more jumping photos in front of the Eiffel Tower, walked across the Seine to the Cite de Architecture, a mall-like structure with various museums housed inside, and then proceeded back to the hotel for photos with the Arc du Triomphe.  It wasn't as imposing as I thought it would be, but still quite a sight, particularly with the multitude of cars circling around it. 

 What is up with me and this pose (above)?  Asian twins at the Eiffel! (below)

 Me looking lost... although I did figure out where we were going (above), jumping-for-joy Dwee in front of the Eiffel Tower (below).

 Obligatory Asian pose in front of the Eiffel (above), me trying not to get run over by crazy drivers circling the Arc du Triomphe (below).

 After researching the stores along the Champs-Elysee, Jess and I decided against high-brow shopping, so we headed back to our old neighborhood where we first stayed, for shopping in the Marais.  I finally gave in and decided to get the grey wool coat from Comptoir des Cottoniers (thought I would need a thicker coat for the trip to Brussels the next day), and plunked down $350USD to get it… yay late birthday/early Christmas gift to myself!  We also stepped into Pain et Sucre, an up-and-coming patisserie reviewed in the NY Times (which I only realized later), where I got a few more macarons and a homemade black currant marshmallow!  Macaron flavors I tried were mint chocoloate, butter and salted caramel, and apricot/rose/black sesame (that one was the best!).  We ended up back at the Jewish District, and having relatively few options left for food, and not wanting to repeat the awful cafe experience of the day before, I decided to try the shwarma/falafel sandwich that I read about in the guidebooks.  OMG, have never had better shwarma… soo umami-ly delicious and cheap!  I also got a sugar and lemon crepe at the stand next door for dessert, and at both of them on sitting on the steps of corner shop, just like a true Parisian! :)

Sunday Nov 13th:
It was an early morning trek to the Gare du Nord station for our day trip to Brussels on the high-speed Thalys train.  It was silly really, the cost of our first class ticket to Brussels was actually almost 30 euros cheaper than our economy class return ticket.  The first class cabin has free wifi and free breakfast!  Over the course of the 1.5 hour train ride, I read up on major landmarks to see in Brussels, had a few delicious croissants with coffee and orange juice, and took a short catnap.  Brussels was cloudy and foggy when we arrived, and super cold… thankfully I had my new cashmere scarf and festive winter coat.  We got off at the Brussels Midi Station, and spent a good deal of time trying to figure out a) where the bathroom was--we found it, but at to pay 0.5 euros to pee--and then b) how to get change to purchase a metro ticket to the station where the center of town was (we ended up having to go back to the bathroom to use the change machine to get Euro coins)… Finally figured out which stop to get off in order to see the sights in Brussels, and made it to the Grand-Place Square, one of the msot famous landmarks in Brussels.  It has incredibly old but historic and majestic architecture (but still smelled like pee)… we started out by visiting the church of St. Nicholas, which was the first building we came across from the metro stop at the Bourse, the Brussels Stock Exchange building (actually, I don't even think we saw the Bourse, come to think of it).  Within the Square, we saw a bunch of Belgian? boy scouts running some sort of scavenger hunt event, super cute in their knee high socks and handkerchiefs around their necks. 

 Me in my new coat and cashmere scarf in front of the Grand-Place Square (above) and Jess super excited in front of the Neuhaus chocolaterie (below).

 We walked down from the Grand-Place to the famous Mannekin Pis, the small child/boy peeing statue… turns out he is really quite small, and not that great, but the locals do dress him up in seasonal outfits every so often.  We took a few obligatory pictures with the peeing boy, and then made our way to the St. Chapelle Cathedral, one of the more well-known churches in Brussels… but really, by this time, all the churches looked pretty much the same : l  Toured the inside of the church, and then walked south towards the Marolles district, the blue-collar area of Brussels to check out the weekly Sunday Flea Market.  We got really overwhelmed with all the merchandise however, so we left after doing a cursory walk of the market grounds… everything looked too delicate to buy and take home anyway.  While walking towards the Grand Sablon Square, we accidentally passed the backside of the Palais du Justice, Brussel's High Court… and that too, smelled like pee.  Why Europe?!  Please de-pee-ify yourself!  The building was pretty ugly actually, under lots of scaffolding and covered in graffiti. 
At the Grand Sablon Square, sort of the Brussels Champs-Elysee equivalent, there were a lot of high-end chocolatiers, upscale boutiques, etc.  We stopped into the famed Pierre Marcollini chocolaterie, but found yet again that everything was too expensive, so we just strolled around outside (more like power-walked, since it was so nippy)… I found another Pierre Marcollini shop that sold hot chocolate, so I decided to pop in and order one, just to say that I had some Pierre Marcollini chocoate, even though it was melted :D  Super rich, super creamy, super cocoa-ey…. but not cloyingly sweet, thank goodness.  It helped keep my hands warm while we walked up to the Petit Sablon Garden, which was again, brown and flower-less.  But that's what I get for going to Europe in the Fall. 
We walked back up towards the Palais Royale, a square that houses the majority of the cultural museums in Brussels.  We took a few pictures with the giant statue of an important person on a horse (they're always sitting on a horse)… stepped into the Musical Instruments Museum to regroup and warm up from the cold, then decided to quickly check out the biggest cathedral in Brussels, the St. Michel and Guldera Cathedral.  Unfortunately, we again went the wrong way and approached the Cathedral from the backside, haha.  We walked back to the Grand Place to commence souvenir shopping for family and friends, and started with the Galleries St. Hubert, which is supposedly the oldest covered gallery/shopping area in Europe.  Since it was Sunday, a lot of shops were closed, but at least all the chocolate shops were open, so we walked into a few to get an idea of what we wanted to buy.

 Mannekin Pis! (above) Me gorging on Belgian Frites! (below)

 Hunger overtook us, so we intently searched for a Belgian frites stand… finally found a small corner shop on a side street of the Grand Place, and waited almost 20 minutes to get our frenchyfries… with andalouse sauce!  Such fried delicious goodness, I was so famished I burned the top of my mouth in a gluttonous attempt to shove the food into my mouth.  I still need to figure out what andalouse sauce is… some sort of spicy mayo/aioli thing… then went across the street to get a Belgian waffle (gauffre!) topped with powdered sugar.  The girl making our waffle was on her cell phone though, so it got a little too carmelized on one side, but still good nonetheless.  We hit a whole bunch of chocolatiers afterward--Leonidas, Neuhaus, Mary Chocolatier, La Belgique Gourmande… bought a dark chocolate and pear bar, a Neuhaus rasberry dark chocolate bar and this nut/dried fruit thingie (I can't remember the name) from Neuhaus too.  Can't wait to try those, but going to share with the g-ma, so need to wait a few more days until I get back stateside before I can try them.  I also decided to buy two loaves of bread to use up the small jar of Nutella I bought in the Paris supermarket (decided not to check my luggage, but I couldn't very well throw it away, so I figured I could just pre-slather the slices of bread with Nutella… BREAKFAST of CHAMPIONS! 
We finished shopping/got waay too cold, so sat down to dinner at a traditional Belgian restaurant in the Grand-Place, called D'Kertke… Something like that.  We ordered Moules Burgundy and Flemish beef stew and stoump (not sure if I spelled it right, but it's the Belgian version of mashed potatoes).  We were both too tired to order beer, and turns out, the mussels wasn't what I had in mind either, but it was delicious anyway.  We finished dinner earlier than expected… actually we finished our entire day earlier than expected, and still had 2 hours to kill before out train ride back to Paris.  We arrived at the Brussels train station to try and see if we could catch an earlier train home, but no dice, there weren't any seats available.  We just sat at the station, shivering, until our 930pm train arrived.  I totally passed out on the ride home… it was a great trip overall, just really packed… and really cold :T  I packed my things, showered and went to bed, but not before I made a point to mentally prepare for our poopy return back to work in Abuja.

 View of the Grand-Place Square with all the awesomely intricate architecture (above), night view of the Grand-Place Square, on the opposite side (below).

Monday Nov 14th:
Got up super early to nutella my loaves of bread (should that be a euphemism for something? haha)… and then gathered our things and checked out of the hotel.  The flight from Charles de Gaulle to Schipol wasn't until 11m but since I wanted to get my VAT refund on my new grey coat, we decided to get to the airport as early as possible.  VAT refund was a piece of cake, so we had a lot of time to do some last minute souvenir shopping… but it turns out, the shopping in our terminal wasn't so hot--just a bunch of booze and cosmetics, with some chocolate sprinkled in between.  I settled for using my euros instead on my last Parisian pastry hurrah: a pain au chocolat and butter croissant from the Paul stand in the terminal.  Our flight was delayed because of fog in Schipol, so we didn't board until over an hour later.  This made for a pretty tight layover in Amsterdam; we had to run to our connecting flight, so we had no time to do any additional shopping, sadly.  I spent most of the flight from Schipol to Abuja watching in-flight movies and napping… usually I hate airplane food, but I was definitely quite taken with the food on KLM… or maybe I just was really hungry, so everything tasted good.
We arrived at Abuja on time, and made it smoothly through immigration and customs (the key is to approach the officers with a nice smile and engage in polite laughter/banter… worked the last few times!).  Uncle Pitt's drivers picked us up and dropped us back at our apartment in Wuse II before 11pm.  All in all, it was a great whirlwind impromptu trip… can't wait until the next Eid/Sallah holiday for another jaunt to Europe!