Girl Meets World: "The Defense"

... or properly known as La Défense (la de fance). What a sight! It's the business district of Paris full of big buildings all around, one of which Sadia works at doing investment banking. The most jaw dropping thing (for lack of a better word) there is the MASSIVE replica of the arc de triumphe fittingly named The Grande Arche de la Fraternité. This thing is monstrous, so much so that I couldn't even fit it all in the screen when attempting to take a picture of it. There's a a huge court yard full of hustle and bustle as well as a huge (yes, apparently I don't have a huge vernacular) shopping mall. If I'm not mistaken, it's the second largest shopping mall in all of Europe.

This mall has a bunch of American stores in it including MAC which I was most thrilled about (merci beaucoup Paris)! What I was even more thrilled/shocked to see was a group of at least 25 people in a roped off area visible right when entering the mall. This group was dressed from head to toe in their Country getup and were square dancing to some Brad Paisley! Thom told me this happens daily but to different genres of music. These people bring backpacks of clothes to change into for their lunch break and rock out for an hour... blue jeans, cowboy boots, and all! Watching them was a riot and made me miss my Incahoot Wednesdays!

Thom took me to Orange (which is like the AT&T of Paris and most of Europe) to get a cell phone. I was expecting to get a crappy go phone but to my surprise he got me a Blackberry with unlimited texting and internet! I was starting to prepare myself for the archaic times of using mapquest before leaving the house to go somewhere but now looks like I can be updating my facebook status, muploading, BBMing, and finding my way around Paree with ease :)

Before leaving Orange, the cell phone guy gave me an orange carnation for International Women's Day! Didn't even know there was such a day but I didn't complain.

One other thing completely unrelated is I discovered a common treat served at Starbucks is a stack of 3 small pancakes. I wonder if they serve maple syrup on the side?