Well, so far so good! There won’t be much to report on in this post, but since I had a little down time with nothing else to do, I figured I might as well try to prevent a backlog from occurring in the future.
Last night my bus got in a little after midnight, and into a station on the far side of Paris from my hostel. It was dark with very few people around, and unfortunately not very much in the way of instructions of where to go next. To be honest, I wasn’t even sure if Paris had a subway system or what, and meanwhile I had no Euros in cash yet, so taking a cab probably wasn’t an option, although it would’ve made things a lot easier I’m sure. Fortunately I had some power left in my phone (a rarity) and despite not having any wi-fi I was able to ask the almighty Google for how to get to the hostel. It told me to take a bunch of numbers to various places, without explaining whether I was looking for a bus or a train or what, but I assumed it meant a bus. So I’m wandering around these little streets trying to find a “14” bus stop, dragging my big-ass suitcase along the cobblestones, and after about 15 minutes of this I finally find what looks like an entrance to a subway station, so I figure to hell with finding a bus right now, I’m sure I can figure out the subway system easier, and there’s no way that the ticket machines won’t accept my card.
Well it turns out the subway system, called “Metro” was actually what Google was trying to direct me to, and I happened to bumble onto the 14 line, headed north into the center of Paris, where I had to change trains by walking through a really huge central station called Chatalet (accents will be missing everywhere because I don’t know how to easily type accent marks on an Android keyboard, instead of my familiar PC/Windows one). When I got off the second train (the 4, at Barbes & Bouch-something) I was again at something of a loss for where to go next. In the dark there’s no good way of orientating oneself, and Paris, like the rest of Europe, has a bad system for marking which streets are which, despite the fact I’ve at least learned what that system is. (It’s putting street signs on buildings, sometimes, on the second floor level, in colors that don’t read well at night, again but only if they feel like it)
Well, after two false starts, the third time was the charm and I finally figured out which direction was which and where to go. It was shortly after 0100h at this point, but I got to the hostel, and checked in with a very friendly receptionist. I dropped my bags off in my room in the darkness, and then immediately headed back out in search of Euros and food, because I hadn’t eaten since before I boarded my bus back in London. Fortunately it didn’t take much searching for an ATM, though it did take a little looking before I found a Turkish kebab shop that was still open, so I got myself a chicken wrap with tomatoes and some kind of white sauce that was really delicious- and although I could’ve eaten more, I decided to just eat that little wrap to hold me over until the morning.
I got back to the hostel, and found myself a little frustrated with having to do some degree of unpacking, and making my bed in total darkness while others slept. I don’t know why so many hostels do this, have their rooms be nearly pitch black without the lights on. The fact is that people are going to come into the room at different times, and they’ll need to figure out their stuff, get ready to sleep, hell- even to figure out which bed they’re supposed to sleep in! And doing all of that in total darkness is just a recipe for stubbed toes, and taking much longer making a medium amount of noise than would be necessary if there was just *a little* bit of light in the rooms from a natural source.
I let myself sleep in till 9am, then took care of email, then got up and took a shower, gathered my laundry, and headed out the door in just my gym clothes, which earned me looks of confusion from my roommates and people on the street. It’s raining, and only about 5C out, which I think is warm enough for a jog down the street to the laundromat in shorts and an athletic shirt, but it seems to have confused most others, lol.
It took a moment to figure out how to work the machines, but I got my wash in, and then headed back out on to the streets where some tourists were mingling despite the rain, in search of breakfast. I found a creperie just in front of the funicular up to the cathedral here, and ordered an apricot crepe for 4E, and ate it as I walked back to the laundromat. Now I’ve just been sitting here, waiting for it to finish, and then I’ll figure out something to do for the afternoon!
My first impressions of the French people I’ve seen here at the laundromat are, first of all: only cute girls use the laundromat apparently, French people absolutely say hello and goodbye to strangers (unlike most cities in America), and that between my appearance and occasionally my accent being good enough, people think that I actually speak French. It’s a little problematic, as I can understand written French quite well, and can understand spoken French okay- it really helps if it’s a bit slower and clearer- and then my ability to speak French is a real struggle as my brain seems to only want to speak Arabic. Anyway, if people get the wrong impression from my French accent, they frequently speak too quickly or use slang words or whatever and it’s harder to understand them- but I’ve got a few days here to get the hang of it!