I'm Feelin' 23

Anyone who knows me well knows that I hate my birthday. Getting older freaks me out, and every birthday I feel like my memory is already fading while the number of wrinkles I have grows. Needless to say, I'm usually not excited for my birthday. The first thing I looked at when I got my flight roster for January was where I'd be on the eleventh. I figured with my luck, I'd be doing some horrible turnaround. But I was scheduled for not a one, but a two night layover in Lyon, France! A two night layover is rare, and this flight is one that people bid for because it's so nice. So happy birthday to me :)

The crew I flew with was amazing! My supervisors told everyone it was my birthday, so they sang to me on the bus going to our hotel and a group of them came out to dinner with me to celebrate. The next morning, a group of us explored the city together. We took a cable car to the top of the city where the Basilica of Notre-Dame de Fourvière looks over the city. The view was incredible, and the church was one of the prettiest I've been to. 

                                                    
We found a cute little restaurant called the Crock n'Roll where their specialty was croque-monsier a.k.a. a sandwich with 1% bread and non-cheese fillings and 99% cheese. Seriously, SO MUCH CHEESE but oh so good! And because it was France, we had tons of wine with lunch, plus Nutella hot chocolate for dessert, then walked down the street to a pastry shop and got even more dessert there. I've never had so much cheese and pastries in one day. After losing all self control at a Sephora sale, I finished off the night with a Nutella crepe from a street stand. Sadly, it was the one and only crepe I had on the trip. I don't know what I was thinking.
The next day was just more shopping because it was France's Black Friday week, and then we headed to the airport to go home to Dubai. On the flight home, the 2 semesters of French I took 5 years ago came back to me and I magically understood the customers and had conversations in French. I also had a full conversation in Italian and I thought I'd forgotten most of that too. 

Overall it was a great birthday trip with lots of great food! I can't wait to see where I'll be next year!