On Monday March 10^th (Day 3 of the trip) we went to the Louvre. The Louvre is a museum that holds a good portion of the most famous works in the Western world. The museum was once a palace but was converted to a public museum by Napoleon Bonaparte.  

Our first stop in the museum was the Mona Lisa. This painting was created by Leonardo da Vinci who at the end of his life worked at the French court. Leonardo was never satisfied with the work, and it is rumored that the paint was still wet when he died. The painting is a lot smaller than it appears in images. Professor Cadero-Gillette had a pass that gave her “the right to speak” in the Louvre. This pass allowed us to get beyond the outer barricade and to see the Mona Lisa more closely.

After seeing the Mona Lisa, we stuck to two galleries on Level 1 of the museum. In these galleries we looked at art from the Renaissance, Baroque and 19th century. This portion was personally my favorite part. Many of the painting we took a close look at were ones I had learned previously about in art history class at UML. For example, we looked at a painting by Caravaggio titled The Fortune Teller. I had previously seen this painting in a Baroque Art class. This semester I am also taking 19^th Century Art. Many of the paintings we saw in the 19^th century gallery were works I had seen and learned about in class. These painting included The Oath of the Horatii, The Coronation of Napoleon, The Raft of Medusa and more. It was very surreal to walk through the galleries and see works of art I had only learned about and seen in classes.

We had the afternoon free, so most of our study abroad group went to Galeries Lafayette. Galeries Lafayette is a department store from the 19^th century. Paris is where department stores originated. This particular department store has a beautiful stain glass ceiling. While at the department store, we got lunch at DS Café. I really loved this café! I am allergic to eggs and a vegetarian, but this café had many vegetarian options and icons to indicate allergens. I got the risotto. Our waitress was also incredibly nice. She managed to remember all nine of our names.

After lunch we took the elevator and then a few flights of stairs to the rooftop of the Galeries Lafayette. From the top of the building, we had a breathtaking view of the city.

For the rest of the afternoon we did a little more exploring of the area around the Galeries Lafayette before heading back to our rooms at FIAP.

For dinner my roommate and I used our Navigo cards to take the bus to the 5th arrondissement (district). There we had dinner at a Greek restaurant called La Crète. The food was amazing! The interior was very cozy and traditionally European. It was an incredible way to close the day!