July 24, 2009

Today we had our visit to the OECD - Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. I was really excited for this visit since I just took Economic Development in the spring and loved the class. Unfortunately the visit wasn't anything that I expected. The first half was quite interesting, though too short, and the second half was a drawn-out explanation on how to use the data online. On the plus side, we go unlimited access to all of this data - literally millions of dollars worth of data for free.

Visit aside, we headed back to the hotel for a quick change and lunch and then we were off towards Versailles. We stopped to visit two Christian missionaries living just outside of Paris. They gave us a presentation on the state of the Christian faith in France - it is not good. It would take 150 years to get France to a saturation point (sorry for the business term) even close to ours in the states. Still though, this couple is working hard. Their kids all went to Messiah, one just graduated last year and even worked with Reid in the dining hall! I really enjoyed their talk and it was cool to see a couple know and trust that while things may not be growing very rapidly now, they are planting the seeds for a serious harvest in the future. Afterwards, we headed to the Palace of Versailles. No house in Orange County can compete with this place! Hundreds upon hundreds of rooms make up a palace so large the thousands of acres of land and gardens that surround it seem tiny! There was more gold in this palace than in all of the Prince's bedrooms in Saudi Arabia and the Emirates. It was neat to walk in the same palace that so many French Kings and Queens have walked before me. The hall of mirrors was abosluteley astounding... pictures will hopefully come soon!

From Versaille we got the evening free. A bunch of us stayed downtown and walked around. We headed over to a church on a hill that overlooked the majority of Paris. It was an amazing site, and the Church itself was astounding. We hung around for a while and then split up. Amy and I were tired while Billy and Chelsea wanted to head to the Eiffel Tower and go up at night. Amy and I decided to walk back. As we moved on we kept noticing more and more red lights... until we saw that we were in the red light district of Paris! The cool part was getting to see Moulin Rouge. Beyond that, it was getting dark so we hurried along and got back quickly. Well, that leads me to now and I should get to bed. We have to get up at six tomorrow to go climb the Eiffel Tower! One more day in Paris!