Whenever I’m in a new city, I tend to book a lot of tours to see and learn about it as much as possible. Because of this, my trips to Hawaii and Costa Rica, as great and memorable as they were, were quite exhausting! So when I had the chance to visit Paris this past May, I told myself to slow down and take in the city, one block at a time.

My first meal in Paris was at a little place called Canteen Bus on Rue d’Alesia. The food was tasty and the portion was huge so I was fueled and ready to explore. I’m not too proud of my French, to say the least, so to get ready to navigate the next few days, I needed to get phone and data service for my spare iPhone 3GS (I broke my beloved Google Nexus 4 two days before the trip!). After popping in a SIM card from SFR, I was well on my way.

Since this is my first time to Paris, I visited most of the places a typical tourist would. And eat a lot, of course. I visited Notre-Dame shortly after my meal at Bistro Romain Restaurant, strolled through Jardin du Luxembourg, then ate at Creperie de Josselin. The next day I met up with some local friends and took a 3-hour drive to Deauville seaside resort, not without stopping first for some baguettes. Then we drove back, had Pho, and walked the Seine river at night. Here, I saw something very unique. On both fences of the Pont des Arts bridge, which connects one side of the river to the Louvre museum, there are thousands of love-message-engraved padlocks of many shapes and sizes. These padlocks, called cadenas d’amour, are from lovers who threw the keys into the river as a sign of hope for eternal love. This is a new fad in which the city authority doesn’t yet know how to deal with because there are 2 schools of thoughts. Many think this is romantic and draw a lot of tourism but others think it’s no different from graffiti.

Next day, Au Paradis du Gourmand — Paris’ Top Baguette Winner 2013 — was on my agenda. And it didn’t disappoint, although the person who helped me wasn’t too nice. Maybe it was because I took too long to figure out what I wanted. But seriously, it was quite difficult to choose when everything looked so good! Anyways, I then walked along the Avenue des Champs-Elysees, took a bunch of photos at the Arc de Triomphe, ate dinner at Saint Germain, and discovered a little place called Maison Georges Larnicol. And here, I found my latest favorite dessert, kouignettes. You have to try it when you’re in Paris!

To round out the trip, I visited Musee du Louvre, ate at Jacques Genin, watched Moulin Rouge (so disappointed!), and ate macaron at the original Laduree. Oh, right, I also stopped by the Eiffel Tower. Rockwell Kent was the wiser when he said “All things look good from far away…” because it is so true, in my humble opinion, when it comes to the Eiffel Tower. As I walked around the city, I took a lot of beautiful photos of the Eiffel Tower but when I stood there at its feet, it didn’t impress me the same way. It just looked old, rusty, and…tall. The feeling didn’t really change when I finally got the chance to go to the top level of the tower since every 10 minutes I was reminded to be aware of “pick pocketers” from the overhead speakers. However, it was still a memorable night for personal reasons!

Overall, it was a great trip. I walked many miles, ate a lot of savory food and saw many cool places. Two things that I became so dependent on without even realizing it were Google Maps and Google Translate. With a combination of walking and taking the train, I was able to visit most places within 30 minutes. And Google Maps made it ridiculously easy. I just had to punch in the destination’s address and it did the rest. It even told me when to leave and which train to take. And when it came time for human interactions, as in when I got stuck and needed to ask someone for help, Google Translate stepped in. I just wrote my question in English and Google Translate translated that for me into French. Then I just showed it to whomever I needed help from. Not the most elegant way to interact, and I got a few chuckles occasionally, but it got me help and saved me and other human beings from a lot of hair pulling and hand gesturing.