Students from St Peter's Anglican College received more action than they bargained for on their school trip to Paris.
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On their two-week trip, they saw the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, Moulin Rouge, Palace of Versailles and Monet's garden.
The students and teachers were also one of the few groups to see the Cathedral of Notre Dame before fire destroyed the building's spire and most of its roof.
Year 11 student Jane Wicks said she could not believe it.
"One of the other girls on the trip said Notre Dame is burning down and I thought, 'I'm tired, can we not do this now?'," Jane said.
"But then we saw the video and thought, 'how is this happening?'."
While the students did not approach the April 15 fire, they recalled the city's atmosphere.
"You could feel it, going through the metro the next day and you kind of felt that people were hurting," Jane said.
It survived 700 years and two world wars - and an electrical spark almost destroyed it.
- St Peter's Anglican College year 9 student Maddie Jones
Year 9 student Maddie Jones said it didn't seem right an electrical spark could have almost destroyed such an old building.
"It was really sad seeing the people there. It didn't feel real that we were some of the last people who had seen it in its original form," she said.
"It survived 700 years and two world wars - and an electrical spark almost destroyed it."
Year 9 student Brock de Winter said he was glad to see the cathedral before the fire.
"Seeing all the cherry blossoms out the front, then going up to actually see the spire on one of the top levels of Notre Dame ... was beautiful," he said.
When asked what interested him about studying French in the first place, Brock said it was to partake in the trip.
The trip helped improve his French accent and allowed him to experience another culture.
St Peter's French teacher Kate Woolnough said the group went back to the cathedral on Easter Friday to see it cordoned off by gendarmes.
"A service was broadcast on the streets with priests in robes praying and singing as part of the service with the Catholic public joining in," she said.
Notwithstanding the fire, Ms Woolnough said the trip to Paris was an exceptional way for the students to learn about the world.
Students navigated the Paris subway and were immersed in French language, history and culture.
She said the principal of the Parisian school the group stayed with for three days was impressed with St Peter's dedication, especially coming from a regional Australian town.
"The French high schools in the middle of Paris are inundated with requests from English-speaking schools from all around the world to visit," she said.
"The principal said we normally just ignore those emails because we get several a week.
"But the embassy was really impressed with the fact that we're coming from a tiny regional area, you've got kids doing French from prep to HSC and the numbers you have are unheard of in a regional part of Australia."
"They made a special effort to get us into the high school and we were accepted with quite short notice."
She said it was not easy to learn a foreign language in Australia, especially at the South Coast.
"There's nothing in the outside world that reinforces it," she said. "It's only what they put in."
"Oh Paris": A reflection on the blaze
St Peter's English teacher Rhys Nicholls had read Victor Hugo's "Hunchback of Notre Dame" only days before the fire.
He reflected on the burning of the cathedral:
"I'm currently standing on the corner of Rue du Haut Pavé and Quai de la Tournelle with several hundred very sombre Parisians and we are not more than 200 metres from the great round window of the ancient and majestic Notre Dame.
"A goodly portion of the crowd is quietly signing a hymn as they watch mighty spouts of water trained against the great limestone edifice: symbolic spiritual epicentre of Western Europe for almost 1000 years.
"A wave of respectful applause eddies towards us, rolling gently west up Quai de Tournelle. As It carries to us, heads turn to follow a slow moving fire truck and two jogging fire fighters.
"The vehicle moves closer and the gentle applause washes into our crowd, who first clap, then cheer loudly as the troupe pass us by and continue up the street and across the bridge to join their comrades in the desperate battle to save their beloved gothic icon.
"The singing does not cease, instead providing a thick blanket of harmony while people murmur and stare. It's just gone midnight but I doubt this city will sleep much tonight. Oh Paris."
Andrea Cantle
Twice weekly
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