Once I settled down on the British Airways plane, I noticed the girl next to me seemed like she was studying abroad as well. She’s spending the semester in Prague. We chatted for a while about it and the conversation really calmed my nerves about the whole thing. I started to feel confident and excited. This is it! The plane took off, and when Boston was only a mass of twinkling light, I knew the following months would be a once in a lifetime experience.
I got little to no sleep on the plane. I watched the Social Network, and even though I am no longer part of it, I genuinely enjoyed the movie. After the plane landed, it took a good 15 minutes to get off the plane, another 10 to take the bus to the terminal that was the size of an airport itself, and security took another 20 minutes. I only had a 1 hour layover. I said my goodbyes to the girl, ran to my gate, and just made it in time to board the plane to France.
Getting out of the airport of Charles de Gaulle was fairly easy. Thanks to mom, I was able to hop on an AirFrance bus that took me directly to Gare de Lyon. In all of my excitement I forgot to go to the bathroom. It was the longest bus ride of my life.
I arrived at Gare de Lyon, exhausted, with a great urgency to relieve myself. I asked a man behind the ticket booth where the restroom was. He didn’t understand my English, so I tried again in French. “Ou sont les toilettes?” I stumbled with little confidence. He didn’t bother to listen and looked at me with disgust.
He said in French “I don’t speak English.”
I repeated myself in French with more confidence, “Where is the bathroom?”
He didn’t listen again. He didn’t want to listen to me. He asked everyone around if anyone spoke English. This was the point where I realized that my downfall to this whole confusion was the fact that I was not French and I spoke English to him. I should of held my private parts and jumped up and down like a three year old to get the point across but so save myself from humiliation I repeated in vain “Toilettes!”
Finally another customer understood, and asked the rude man behind the ticket counter. “Ou sont les toilettes?”
The man replied in really fast French, which I completely understood. And I spat back “Je compris.”
On top of being in the condition I was in, that interaction put me in a terrible mood.
To make up for the rude man behind the ticket counter, people went out of their way to help me when they saw I was in need: A man ran to open a door for me, a woman helped me carry my luggage up some stairs, an old woman made sure I would get off the right stop, and a worker cleaning the trash was nice enough to walk me directly to my train door when I had failed to find it. The universe is balanced after all.
At the train station in Aix, I was promptly introduced to my French father, Lawrence. He shook my hand, said in English with a strong French accent. “Ok, let’s go.” and marched with haste towards the car, I quickly followed behind. In the car, he spoke to me in English, but I would try to respond in French. However, he didn’t seem to have the patience to listen to my stumble over my sentences so he continued the conversation in English:
“A lot of snow in Boston?”
“Oui”
“Ok, good.”
Lawrence is a man of few words. He was very direct when speaking and very serious. I could see how someone would be intimidated by him, but I was so eager I asked a lot of questions. We zoomed and swerved around cars in downtown Aix. I couldn’t see much but it was fairly busy at night. There were cinemas, cafes, restaurants, clubs, and stores. It seemed like a funky college town and I fell in love immediately. I pointed out an all glass building that was lit up with trees growing inside. “How beautiful!” I exclaimed. Lawrence informed me it was a parking lot. We both got a good laugh out of that.
To be continued.
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