The other night I told Asia, “Stick your head out the window. See all those lights? There are 50,000 people down there. Listen close. Can you hear them?” She listened intently for a minute, before shaking her head. “Exactly”, I said, “But they all hear you. Quit being so loud.”
Paris is like a giant library. Regardless of how crowded a bus, train, restaurant, bar, or park may be, it’s always shushy quiet. And no matter how hushed our tones, we’re the loudest! Luckily the Parisians are too quiet to tell us to hush. Instead they look mildly huffed, sort of like a cat twitching her ear out of annoyance. So there’s that.
Yesterday the kids and I jumped on a random bus to see where it would take us. The highlight? Zach had to pee crazybad, so he got to use one of these:
These public toilets are everywhere. They self clean after every use, scrubbing and drying the seat, walls and floor. Quite awesome. And free.