The Original SoGoPro Street Team Blog

As promised to some here is a quick blog about our SGP Paris meet. Hopefully you are still interested in hearing about it - Dani Hanne and I are excited at the idea of sharing some of our memories with you all. Volcanic eruptions, budgets and family commitments meant our meet was marginally smaller than we had initially imagined, but hey, start small – it can only get bigger! So here we go for the first Euro/global reach meet of SGP.


The Commandments:
Thou shalt frequent as many of the 20 arrondisements, on foot in heels
Thou shalt consume a minimum of one hot chocolate
Thou shalt not dine with a party greater than five
Thou shalt have photographic evidence of many happy moments
Thou shalt communicate regularly with mom
Thou shalt only eat at locally owned restaurants
Thou shalt have the choice to not order a full French menu
Thou shalt not be pickpocketed
Thou shalt stalk lovers by the Seine and photograph them
Thou shalt create new friendships and cherish these moments

I am Northern Irish, I met The Netherlands (Hanne) by the Arc de Triomphe. Here comes the Mary Poppins reference (and I know) Hanne won’t mind, but I was waiting to meet her in front of the Arc de Triomphe when she appeared red faced at the top of the escalator with the biggest suitcase I have ever seen.

And this suitcase – man it was solid, not a soft top, but rock sold hard top, not a rucksack /backpack or trolley case in sight – this case was so big and so heavy that she could have been hiding as much crap as Mary Poppins had in her own carpet bag! Poor Hanne had been dragging the darned case around all morning and so we decided to head off directly to the hotel in St Germain des Près to meet Switzerland (Dani). Hanne got all checked in and we went to go up to the room to unpack. USA may be super sized – over here it is far from the case, Europe is tiny, coffees are tiny, portions are tiny, elevators are NO exception. The elevator was the smallest thing even I have ever seen, Hanne was lucky enough to get her case in it but only standing on its end (the case not Hanne). Then came another teaser reference, the room with the view – that is one thing I will say for the hotel room it had a fantastic view of les Invalides and the Eiffel Tower and Parisian rooftops as far as the eye could see.

We headed back down to the lobby to wait for Dani and the foolishness began, another of my references - there were free sweets in the hotel lobby and a dubious metal box with some random vapours escaping from it – we reckon it was laughing gas, we laughed alot! It was awesome, to see these two in the flesh so to speak. Missing the sidebar from the previous chat room format means a lot of folk communicate personally via MSN/Skype/Facebook now rather than on the cbox, as we don’t like seeing SGP chat straying too far off topic! Hanne and I have spoken over Skype a few times and I have marvelled at Dani’s pictures on more than one occasion, but have never spoken to her or met her.

So this very sunny spring Saturday was spent getting to know each other, each of us with very different lives, aspirations and even language! So 26°C and no polar bears to hand, how better to break the ice than walking, chatting, dancing around, taking silly pictures and above all supporting the same one common theme that brought us together in the first place. That, dear Street teamers, involved us being dressed pretty much the same, we were walking, talking, laughing happy adverts for SGP. Actually I think Hanne deserves a special mention for the “triple combo” white signed t-shirt the sweat shirt and the wristbands – SCORE!


So, I hear you ask, where did we parade ourselves and the short answer is pretty much everywhere it this fabulous city that has become my home. The hotel was right by the Sorbonne University which is a gorgeous area steeped in culture and history. Our first wander took us up to the Jardins de Luxembourg and the Fontaine de Medicis this is where the majority of our silly icebreaking pictures were taken and it was a lovely place to catch some sun, and relax by the ponds.


We were all starving by this time and headed over to a brasserie for some lunch. Note to anyone travelling to Paris, remember patience is a virtue but if you don’t speak up at some point you will need to be virtuous all day long! After a good 20 mins waiting at a table that needed to be cleared we eventually were graced by the presence of our waitress, who actually handed us a note book and pen and asked us to write our own order down as this would save her some time – her boss was less than impressed and I just hope she didn’t get fired! All fuelled up, fed and watered we headed down towards Notre Dame too see some creepy gargoyles, then wandered by the Seine. It was round about now that the ‘telling mom’ reference came into play, but I don’t want to give silly ideas to any impressionable young things we may have reading this, so the ins and outs of that one will remain confidential! So there we were ambling along the left bank of the Seine, book stalls as far as the eye can see 'Les bouquinistes' as we call them stretch the whole way down left bank of the Seine. You can get lost in your own thoughts browsing and buying, UNTIL your juice opens up in your bag (Hanne) again a moment of pure Parisian Chic! Following our trail led us to Pont des Arts then Pont Neuf, and the Tuilleries. I left our friends at this stage, I had to get back to my kids to start my second day!



Sunday was an exhausting day for me as I went back into town to meeting Hanne and Dani this time with my own kids. * tangent * many thanks to both Hanne and Dani for putting up with my mom attitude that kicked like an automatic weapon on day two. So, rendez-vous under the Eiffel Tower and it was to be another scorcher of a day. Another day and another group of ladies who lunch, we had fun in a restaurant I know fairly well France (by means of Jessica) joined us for a while on Sunday afternoon too, so that was nice, and added another string to our bow! ! All in all a lot of fun was had by everyone! We enjoyed researching firsthand the city which has won the hearts of SGP and is the setting for the graphic novel, (there were some fabulous gargoyles to be seen too!) You know, what I loved most of all about this meet is the fact that three ‘likeminded strangers’ met up together, and became ‘likeminded friends’ – all thanks to a mutual interest in a production company based in North Carolina! I will never cease to be amazed!