Eiffel Tower

I wonder if parisans ever get used to the Eiffel Tower and accept it as just another part of the scenery. Like the campanile back at Berkeley. To me, it is just this big bell tower* that I can see from everywhere, and all it does is remind me to get my butt back to the library and study. Except this isn't a bell tower, it's the Eiffel. Tower. I mean, can you ever get used to something as magnificent as the Eiffel Tower? As I look back at all the pictures I took, I still can't believe I was there. Even with all its commercialization and exposure, it still takes my breath away. But it stuns me the most when I catch a glimpse of it unexpectedly. When we're walking back from a cafe and in the distance you see the tip of the tower peeking out. Or on the way to the metro when, as we cross the street, all the sudden the Eiffel Tower is just a hundred feet away from you, and its all lit up for the night. It's just...there. It seems too unreal that I have had the opportunity to actually go up the Eiffel Tower. Like, that is an experience I can file into my Life folder and mark as done! How many people say that their life is so good, they could cut out a piece of it and paste it onto a postcard? I know I sound like a broken record player by now, but "unreal" is still the only apt word that I know to describe it. Totally unreal, but in the most amazing way.

*Weeell, it is the tallest bell tower in California (suck it, Stanford)