{"id":72,"date":"2024-05-19T08:18:23","date_gmt":"2024-05-19T13:18:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/?p=72"},"modified":"2024-05-19T08:18:27","modified_gmt":"2024-05-19T13:18:27","slug":"revolutionary-paris-a-journey-through-history-and-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/2024\/05\/19\/revolutionary-paris-a-journey-through-history-and-art\/","title":{"rendered":"Revolutionary Paris: A Journey Through History and Art"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

After a few informative days, today\u00a0promised\u00a0to be even more fun, with a walking tour about American Revolutionaries in Paris and a museum visit on the agenda. We\u00a0started the day early\u00a0in the\u00a0morning, next to the Danton statue, where we met our tour guide.\u00a0I\u00a0was excited to\u00a0find out\u00a0that the tour would cover\u00a0a lot\u00a0about the French Revolution and its history\u00a0too, especially since the French and American Revolutions were interconnected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Our first stop was a small street packed with historical significance. We\u00a0stood near a shop that used to be a printing press, a crucial player in the revolutions. Printing\u00a0presses were vital as they educated the public and allowed publishers to disseminate their revolutionary ideas. Another\u00a0key\u00a0element in both revolutions was the cafe culture. We\u00a0visited the site of the first cafe in Paris, which opened around 1650 and still operates today. Our\u00a0tour guide told us how this cafe\u00a0specifically got\u00a0famous because of its two entrances. As\u00a0the majority of people\u00a0gathering in\u00a0there were middle-class men, this allowed them\u00a0to\u00a0easily\u00a0escape,\u00a0if their debtors came to look for them. Cafes\u00a0provided a space for\u00a0people to gather, discuss, and debate their ideas. Even\u00a0back then, people with similar political views would gather at the same cafes. Eventually, each political group had its preferred spot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Another captivating stop was near the Senate building. It\u00a0was interesting to discover that the origins of the terms “left-wing” and “right-wing” trace back to the French Senate. In\u00a0the past, the conservative party occupied the right side of the Senate chamber, while the liberal party sat on the left. This\u00a0arrangement led to the adoption of these terms to describe political ideologies. Even\u00a0today, the French Senate keeps this tradition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Before the French Revolution, France didn’t have a standardized\u00a0system of measurement. Various\u00a0units, such as the King’s Feet, were used. However, after the revolution, French people wanted to remove all symbols associated with the monarchy.\u00a0The\u00a0meter\u00a0was defined\u00a0as one ten-millionth of the distance from the equator to the North Pole\u00a0along a meridian through Paris.\u00a0To\u00a0promote the new metric system,\u00a0several meter standards were placed\u00a0in public places.\u00a0These\u00a0were physical representations of the meter to help familiarize the population with the\u00a0new\u00a0measurement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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To end the tour, we went to the Pantheon.\u00a0Originally\u00a0built as a church dedicated to St. Genevieve,\u00a0the Pantheon\u00a0was later repurposed\u00a0as a mausoleum for France’s most distinguished citizens. As\u00a0an Armenian, I was proud to see a\u00a0big\u00a0poster of Missak Manouchian hanging in front of the Pantheon, whose reburial\u00a0there took place\u00a0just a few months ago. He\u00a0was a resistance leader during World War II, leading the famous Manouchian Group, a French Resistance network in Nazi-occupied France. He\u00a0was captured by the Nazis and executed in 1944. As\u00a0we continued to explore, our tour guide told us about other luminaries, including Voltaire, Marie Curie, and Victor Hugo, who found their final resting place in the Pantheon.\u00a0The\u00a0stories of these great minds and their\u00a0contributions to society were\u00a0truly\u00a0inspiring.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The second half of the day was in the Mus\u00e9e Orsay. When\u00a0we entered the museum, even the building itself amazed me already.\u00a0It\u00a0was\u00a0originally\u00a0built\u00a0to be a railway station\u00a0in the 1900s to accommodate the high demand of people traveling in Paris. Later\u00a0it\u00a0became one of the city’s most iconic cultural landmarks. Our\u00a0tour focused on the transition to Impressionism\u00a0which\u00a0brought a new perspective to the art world. As\u00a0we explored the galleries, our guide told us about Impressionist artists such as Monet, Renoir, and Degas. Their\u00a0paintings captured the essence of the everyday life of ordinary people. The\u00a0highlights of our visit for me were the iconic works of Van Gogh and learning about his unique painting style. His\u00a0bold colors and dramatic brushwork left a lasting impression on me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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After getting some rest from all the walking we did throughout the day, my roommate and I decided to head to the Republique metro station for dinner. We\u00a0found a cozy little\u00a0bistro\u00a0with outdoor seating. As\u00a0we enjoyed our\u00a0meal\u00a0french meal, we couldn’t help but soak in the vibrant atmosphere of the area. Even\u00a0late into the evening, the streets were alive with Parisians and tourists alike,\u00a0all\u00a0enjoying the warm night. The\u00a0distant sound of street musicians added a nice touch to our evening. This\u00a0experience made it the perfect end to my day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After a few informative days, today\u00a0promised\u00a0to be even more fun, with a walking tour about American Revolutionaries in Paris and a museum visit on the agenda. We\u00a0started the day early\u00a0in the\u00a0morning, next to the Danton statue, where we met our … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1437,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1437"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72\/revisions\/80"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uml.edu\/paris-spring-2024-session1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}