Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Notre Dame Cathedral

Dear Landlady,
Sorry for the delay in writing but Paris is just too much fun!  This week we spent a good bit of our time touring the Notre Dame Cathedral, which, as you probably know, is one of the best known cathedrals in all the world. Such architecture! So different from that feeding trough that we found the Christ child in oh so many years ago...

And we had the good fortune to meet some fellow astronomers.  So colorful.  They hail from Mumbai where they dwell within a Zoroastrian community.  Turns out there was some confusion when they were purchasing their tickets online to return home from their tour of Rome.  Somehow they wrote 'Paris' instead of 'Parsi.'  They thought the question had to do with their religious identity, not their flight destination.  Can you imagine?  So a simple spelling error compounded by a misunderstanding caused quite the mix up.  As you know, wars have been started over less!  But the Parsis have been delightful companions for us.

 
Of course there was an awkward moment when #3 blurted out that he didn't quite understand how they could possibly have been able to type, never mind purchase tickets online since it's quite obvious to everyone present that their arms are only painted on.  Oh my, dear landlady, there was such a cumbersome silence at that point, but the Zoroastrians were kind enough to eventually find the humor in the situation. I'm going to have a word with #3 when we get back to the hotel. 
 
 
Will write more tomorrow.  We're off to see the famous Notre Dame bells.  I hope the vibration does not knock us off of our nonexistent feet. 

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