Day 3 in Paris: Return to the Lourve

There are 35,000 works of art in eight separate departments at the The Musée du Louvre which takes up 60,000 square feet of space. But when you get there, all you'd really want to see (& so does every single other Asian) is one thing only... The Mona Lisa.

Mona Lisa somehow looked much better in 'real life'. The colours were actually more vibrant. But I think nobody realised that cos everyone was jostling for position to take their been there pictures. With the peace sign on their fingers.

We bought a €9 full-day pass cos we figured we'd be there practically the whole day. It's a simple calculation. If it takes 1 minute to look at an artwork (inclusive of the time for walking), 35,000 artwork would take you 45 days. So prioritisation was very important.

The Louvre started out as a fortress back in 1190 to protect the small town from enemy attacks. Then as time went by, different kings with running-number names of Louis I, II, IVX, XXVII, VXIVX, etc. expanded the drabby old walls into a super rich palace while the children in Africa had nothing to eat.
Then somewhere along the line, part of the palace became an art gallery & was opened to the general public in 1793. And today, the gallery has engulfed the whole palace like cancer.

Observe carefully the level of intricacy in the designs, & the richness of everything.

The kings must have been so rich that they ate gold & pooped gold, with intricate designs.

This is what you call filthy rich. Nearer to home, we call this got money until no manners.



I'm seriously wondering if the French royalties were Foochows.


A lot of the earlier paintings were visual representations of biblical stories like Samson & Delilah.

Some were of major events like the coronation of some King Louis the VIIXVVXII to the power of 3 or something close.


Others were mostly portraits of famous people like Napoleon.

Now that I look back at it, it is no wonder why Paris became the place to study art. It simply has one of the best art repository in the world.

I hope these kids are learning real art & not painting something the likes of Negaraku Gemilang or Wawasan 2020.