Joyeux Noël

There were many reasons why it seemed like a good idea to us to travel around Europe during Christmas time this year, chief among them that we were already in Europe courtesy of Calvin College.  When else would we have the chance to see some of the great sights of western civilization without having to pay the airfare to get here? 

Still, a vacation in Europe, especially western Europe is not inexpensive.  And so we are economizing where we can.  Thus we find ourselves spending Christmas in Paris, yes, but in a pretty ratty hotel in Gare du Nord, described by The Mini Rough Guide to Paris as “rough, boisterous and shabby”.  Indeed.  

Name of our hotel mis-spelled on its own front door:

the name is Hotel Liege-Strasbourg (named after the street it is on)

Thus we find ourselves walking the crowded streets around our hotel on our way to more desirable spots, sharing the sidewalks with people described by Jeff as “definitely not genteel”.  Bastian has dubbed our area “the h-area”, due to the plethora of wig shops featuring many neon-colored dos among the more ordinary styles and also to the clumps of  hair littering the sidewalk.  Merry Christmas….

On our way to a Christmas Eve mass at Notre Dame - an other-worldly experience of another sort – we pass people set up for the night on mattresses or in sleeping bags on the street, and I think “no crib for a bed”.  And thus arrives my epiphany.  Of course!   When Jesus arrived he didn’t even have a ratty hotel.  The first Christmas could not have been clean, and “genteel” was probably not a word ever used to describe the shepherds.  And Jesus didn’t come to help the homeless – he was the homeless.   So in our non-traditional, not exactly Christmas-y feeling observation of Christmas this year,  maybe we are closer to Christmas than ever.