April in Paris

Last week we went on our next trip to Paris, given the four day holiday we had here in Belgium. It was a busy four days, but we continued our exploration of Paris- a feat that can never truly be accomplished in its entirety. This city seems more interesting the more we learn about it, and the “top twenty” tourist attractions only scratch the surface of an ancient and sprawling city covered in monuments, temples, museums, and tombs.

After resting on Thursday night, we set out for The Louvre: Part Deux. It was a heroic effort in stamina, and we spent a full ten hours in the museum (with two breaks for lunch and a snack). This time around we covered the ancient Mesopotamian and Egyptian antiquities, the Italian and Spanish paintings, and French sculpture and some French antiquities. We rented the audio guide to the Louvre as an experiment this time around, and it was actually quite informative and helpful.

It was a great pleasure to see the archetypal Egyptian “Book of the Dead”, completely unrolled and on display. I captured a video of the entire length of it (I do not use lighting or flashes per museum rules, so I apologize for any blurred or dark images). Click here for that video: Book of the Dead.

We also saw the Code of Hammurabi, the code of laws of the first king of the Babylonian empire, which later influenced the Torah and other codified laws. I studied this in World History my first year of college and wrote an earnest term paper on it, and was very pleased to see it.

Of course the most famous piece in the Italian painting collection (and probably the most famous painting in the world), is the Mona Lisa. This time around we braved the crowd and went to see the famous da Vinci. Taking pictures in that chamber, even without flash, is strictly forbidden, but somehow I think you have a good idea what it looks like.

From the sculpture room, this is the fresco of St. George smiting the dragon. Dragons automatically make any piece of art awesome, but I thought the light coming from the window was illuminating the dragon slayer was neat too.

After our challenging day we retreated to a dinner of falafel pitas in the Latin Quarter, a section of Paris that we grew quite fond of during this stay. There are many very good restaurants there with excellent deals. In fact, the Latin Quarter really deserves its own post, which we’ll get around to sometime.