After breakfast at our usual cafe across the street, we hopped on the Metro and headed towards our first stop of the day--La Sorbonne. When we got off the Metro there were no signs, so I tested out my Fresnch by stopping a girl to ask her for directions. As it turned out, she was actually a student at the Sorbonne, so she walked us the few blocks over there before going on her way. Who says the French aren't friendly? The university is beautiful. I would love to study here for a while. It's exactly what one pictures a stay in Paris would be like. The school is surrounded by little cafes filled with students poring over their books, sipping cafe au laits, and taking drags on their cigarettes. The world going on around them, and these students so engaged in their own discussions they are completely unaware. I'm coming back to study here someday.

The Pantheon was next. The Panthéon was originally built as a church but is now a famous burial place. Among those buried in its necropolis are Voltaire, Rousseau, Marat, Victor Hugo, Marie Curie, Rene Descartes, Louis Braille, and Soufflot, its architect. Its facade is modelled on the Pantheon in Rome. Now that's a sight. There are enormous tapestries hanging on the walls inside. In the center of the building, cordoned off in unobtrusive black rope, is Galileo's pendulum, quietly proving the rotation of the earth.

We headed over to the Centre Pompidou next. It's a building in the Beaubourg area of Paris, and it houses the Museum of Modern Art. Now I have never really been much for modern art, but it was pretty cool. There are colored pipes outside the mall's structure, and behind the mall there is a small, shallow pool with modern objets d'art.

Among the row of shops by the Centre, there is an internet cafe we discovered. (We "discovered" it much like Columbus "discovered" America, in that it had already been there for quite some time.) I coughed up 5 euros for half an hour, and then spent 20 minutes trying to figure out how to use the French keyboard. Grrr....

Eventually we decided that it was too cold and too late to be traipsing all around town. I took matters into my own hands and picked a bar to duck into and warm up. Of course it was a gay bar. Really. We walk in and sit at a booth, fine. We notice there are no ladies present, great. Our waiter approaches us, he's wearing a tank top, but okay, sure. He and the bartender seem awfully chummy, maybe they have a great working relationship. Then I go into the bathroom, and this is where it all turns around. Pride parade posters and flyers cover the walls, along with an ad for what I'm sure is the French version of P-FLAG. Vive la France!