Paris, Top Tourist Destination?! Someone's Pulling Our Leg

Above, I'd take Tokyo's Skytree before Paris's Eiffel Tower any day. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

I had to laugh when I saw this article over at Japan Today:

PARIS —Some 32.3 million tourists say France’s city of light and romance can’t be beat. 

Paris was once again last year the world’s top tourist destination, the regional tourism body said on Monday, citing hotel occupancies. 

Despite some tough global economic conditions, it said 2013 was a very good year for tourism in Paris and the surrounding Ile-de-France region, with foreign visitors at “the highest level in 10 years”.

While Paris may be a beautiful city, the reason that the article brought a chuckle to me was that I was having a conversation with someone recently about his visit to Paris. He said that it was a nice city, except that the place had the distinct smell of urine in the air.

I've heard that people urinated in the streets in Paris, so I wasn't too surprised to hear of the odor. If I really wanted to go somewhere where the area smelled of piss, I'd just go to Skid Row in Los Angeles.

Personally, I'd take Tokyo as my favorite city to visit. While it may be one of the world's most populous cities, at least it is clean and doesn't smell of urine.

To read the full article, go here.