to travel / orly airport & level airlines, paris to new york

I haven’t read much about my specific Level airline experience (booked through Chase Ultimate Rewards, ticketed by Iberia, operated by Level). I hope someone else can benefit from it.

My Paris trip came about very casually when I was texting with a friend on how long we haven’t seen each other. I had plenty of vacation days and was forecasting some downtime. As a collector of points/miles, I had a lot of options to work with. I don’t travel as much as I used to so I have no status. The challenge was finding something that worked around the US Thanksgiving holiday when many others are also traveling, two months out. I used AA miles for the outbound flight. For the inbound flight, I wanted to return on the Saturday evening (not 6am!) or Sunday after Thanksgiving (peak travel time). While in the US, there is often not much of a difference if you book a roundtrip vs two one-ways, it’s not always the case when you’re crossing the Atlantic.

Level Airlines was the best option. They are a budget airline and owned by IAG (which owns British Airways, Iberia, etc.) The flight between Paris and New York was Saturday evening, and it operates out of Orly Airport and Newark Airport (technically not New York).

to travel / happy new year!

I’m currently ensconced in a comfortable, fluffy hotel bed in Amsterdam. I was so exhausted from trekking to Amsterdam via Delhi – Moscow – Paris that I passed out for 8 hours straight once I got to the hotel. I’m digesting a huge (since I missed dinner) hotel buffet breakfast before I hit up all of the museums.

The past week or so has been a whirlwind of eye-opening experiences. I really enjoyed the golden triangle, spending tons of time with NYC friends, meeting new friends, experiencing an Indian wedding extravaganza, and cannot wait to go back and learn more about India. We travelled in luxury but there were snippets of the India’s harsh reality – children trained to be hawkers at a young age, illiteracy, poverty, threat of terrorism, etc.

In typical Irene fashion, the trip had its fair share of bumps — I brought the wrong camera charger, found a generic replacement in Paris that I thought was defective, but thanks to some pre-falling asleep strokes of brilliance was able to make it work. I also barely made my outbound flight (thank you, flight delay), barely got to Paris Nord in time for my train to Amsterdam (no thanks to flight delays, but thank you, nice Aeroflot flight agent) but had enough time to find a pharmacie open on a Sunday* to stock up on more Dermaphil Indien lip balm, which is my new favorite.

Since I’ve been between computers, I haven’t had time to install Adobe Lightroom to process my pictures. All of the pictures below were taken with my Nikon D80 or iPhone and post-processed on my iPhone via applications: tadaa, Instagram, or Diptic (which had a massive update and is my collage app of choice).

I’m not big on New Year’s resolutions, but do have a few that I’d work on regardless of the New Year that can be shared on the web:

• Eat healthy. I really want a Vitamix blender, I can’t tell you how many veggies I throw out because they went bad.
• Work out. I’ve fallen off this bandwagon.
• Get to airports earlier. My previous just-in-time strategy is nail-biting stressful.
• Make better shopping decisions. I love J.Crew’s style resolutions, particularly the edit closet and wear more black.
• Purge / eBay. I’m glad that many items sold in my eBay store while I am away!
• Read books. I read a ton of blogs and magazines.

(click to enlarge)

*I transited through Paris on a Sunday, which means that most shops are closed. The pharmacie I went to did not show up on any Google blog posts and I needed something closer than a 10-15 minute walk given I had substantial bags to lug. I found it the old fashioned way — I stuck my head outside of the station and looked for a green, lit “+” sign. So if you’re in the Paris Gare du Nord train station on a Sunday and need a pharmacy close by, head to the Pharmacie Centrale du Nord on 132 Rue La Fayette. They are open on Sundays from 10:00 – 20:00. The best exit point from the massive Gare du Nord station is the doors opposite of the Thalys tracks (~7,8,9). Head straight away from the train station.

to travel / en route to…

…Paris, New Delhi, Agra, Jaipur, and Amsterdam!

Merry Christmas!

I didn’t expect to be traveling out of the country so soon after my extensive travels this summer, but a girlfriend is getting married in India so a bunch of us are heading there to celebrate New Year’s and her wedding together! I’ll be stopping in Paris and Amsterdam on my inbound and outbound. If anybody has any recommendations on these places, please drop a note!

Source: Paris (image, image), India (image, image, image), and Amsterdam (image, image)

to travel / snapshot of paris

I haven’t been taking as many pictures as I’d like. Oh well.

to shop / irresistible paris and hong kong

I’ve been super lazy about consolidating my pictures. I don’t think I’ve touched Lightroom since a month ago? So, for my non-Instagramming friends, here is a snapshot of recent purchases.

Shu Uemura closed their US counters a few years ago. As much as I love shopping online, it just isn’t the same! I had a few hours to kill in HK and went a little crazy at the IFC mall. Enough to qualify for their VIP club, which comes with a facial and eyebrow shaping that expires in August. Grr. I love Shu’s concealers and am glad I got two point concealers — they aren’t sold in the US (yet?). Their packaging is cute but I think it’s smaller than the old old concealer that I got the last time I was in HK. I’m also in LOVE with the ultimate natural mascara (which was a push by the SA after she gasped at my eyelashes) because it holds a curl better than any other mascara I’ve tried. I used the basic mascara a long time ago and this is its successor. Reviews on MUA are very mixed.