Visiting Versille
[2007.10.10] I suddenly realize why I strangely feel Paris like my
‘hometown’ when I first arrived. To some degree, Paris
does look like Shanghai thirty years ago when I was
there with my Grandparents. Or as people say, Shanghai
is east Paris. The street, and air, the crowded small
buildings…But now Shanghai has changed a lot and I
never felt familiar when I visited there. However here
at Paris those remote memories came back.
Yesterday is also a very tired day. I went to bed at
around 3am. So today I slept until almost 1pm.
Today’s target is Versille, far away in the southeast
of Paris. I took Metro and RER, went through some nice
suburban house region. The houses are very close to
each other, nice and clean and lots of flowers and
plants and trees. The overall tune is very soft.
Versille is Louise King’s palace. It is a grand
building group, with a grand huge park. I don’t know
what else to describe big. Anyway it is just very big.
I think taking picture is a meaningless action,
because no picutre can cover a single scene. The
difference is seeing a movie in wide screen theater
and seeing it on paper booklet. For example, normally
a park will use bushes to make a maze, it is using
French Wu Tong to make it. The palace is on the hill
top and the garden is going down hill. So the King can
see the garden from the palace. I guess they must
visit the garden by horse.
Inside the palace it is overwhelmingly decorated from
ceiling to floor. On every wall there is a huge
painting of the king or queen or Jesus. On the
ceilings there are knights and angles and venus.
Everywhere is gold or marble. I don’t understand why
the king and queen need such large and tall rooms.
Compare to Versille, the forbidden city in Beijing is
like a motel comparing to a 5 star hotel. You have to
be here and see it yourself.
After that I got tired again, because there is just
simply lots lots of walking. Not like in China, here
no one sits or eats in the park or in the palace. I
came back to hotel, got a big plate of salad from the
hotel’s salad bar, and ate an instant noodel I
brought. From what I have seen, normal french
resteraunts are very similar.
Tomorrow is the last day of the conference. In the
morning I will go to the meeting. In the afternoon my
goal is to visit the top shopping center. I found that
French woman’s coats are very elegant. They only wear
black or brown. I should get one too from this fashion
capital of the world.