The Paris Metro, a wonder of efficiency. Photo by Brittany Petersen.
After my walking tour debacle, and realizing that I had more than a week to spend navigating Paris, I was happy to hand over responsibility for getting me around the city to the public transit system, known as the Metro. The trains are clean, fast, efficient, and they run every 2-10 minutes -- a vast improvement over the Chicago el ("elevated train") system, which may leave you stranded at the Howard el stop for the better part of an hour. The Paris Metro was a breeze, to the point that after just two days, I helped a woman punch in the correct ticket purchase on the automated Metro machine -- speaking nothing but French.
Now, I should qualify that I took seven years of French -- from seventh grade through my freshman year of college -- but I do not actually speak French. I'm lucky to recognize commonly used verbs. I've got "Je parle anglais" and "J'ai faim" ("I speak English" and "I'm hungry"), but more complex compositions leave me feeling sheepish and stupid.
But somehow, using enthusiastic gesticulations and a few key words like "oui" and "ici" ("yes" and "here"), I helped this woman buy a ticket from a Metro machine on my third day there. Whether or not she arrived at her intended destination is none of my concern; as far as I know, she's wandering Romania right now.
So I was doing really well. And after a couple days in Paris, I realized I was making no friends at my hostel, which was chock full of snorers and high school students, so I decided to strike out on my own, and on the suggestion of a friend I checked out www.meetup.com, a website to encourage social interaction in various places, including Paris. I wanted to see some live music, I decided, and I punched in a search for live music in Paris on a Tuesday night.
Lo and behold, one music event was being held in Paris that evening -- a viewing of "gypsy jazz" at a bar on the north side of the river, an easy 30 minutes on the Metro from my hostel. It started at 8pm. I looked at the clock -- 7:45pm. I considered for a few seconds, then snapped my laptop shut and picked up my purse. Let's have an adventure, I thought.
I boarded the Metro using one of my pack that I'd bought that day, after helping the other woman. As I descended to the train, I tossed the ticket in the waste bin -- no need for it now -- and checked the clock. Two minutes to the next train. My God, I love the Paris Metro.
My route required that I change trains after a few stops, so I disembarked and, practically humming a happy tune, followed the signs toward my train exchange. That's when I spotted the police.
They were checking tickets. Apparently jumping the turnstile is a rampant problem in Paris, and so every once in awhile the police set up a cross-city sting to make sure riders have either a validated ticket or an unlimited pass. I had neither. I started to panic.
I approached one of the policewomen, who asked to see my ticket. Or at least, I think that's what she asked, since she was speaking French, and my French remains at the level of a 9th grader who hasn't paid attention in French class for the past two weeks. I asked her to repeat in English.
"Where's your ticket?" she said.
"I don't have it. I threw it away. I'm sorry, I didn't know I needed it," I answered, confident she'd take pity on me, a poor, uninformed tourist.
She said something in French. It involved the words "25 euros." She pointed at her clipboard, which indicated I owed her a fine for not having my ticket. Twenty-five euros is the equivalent of a night in a hostel, which is a lot of money to me at this point.
I looked at her pleadingly and tried to haggle. "I'm sorry, I had a ticket but I threw it away. Here, here's a new one. I'm sorry, I didn't know."
She said some more things in French, and checked with her colleague. It added up to, "No. You need to pay 25 euros."
I looked at two guys standing next to me, who were watching this unfold, and who attempted to translate for me.
"I'm sorry, I don't understand, I didn't know I needed to keep my ticket," I kept saying. "I promise I had one."
Apparently my word is no good in France. I started to cry, and so to save face, I pulled 25 euros out of my wallet -- the last cash I had -- and gave it to the woman before pushing past her and on to my train.
The nerve. I was a legitimate rider. I had paid for my ticket. I was just too uniformed to know I had to keep my ticket. I wallowed. I cried harder. A man on my next train handed me a tissue and asked what was wrong, but I responded that I didn't speak French, and he left me alone.
I'm still not sure why I got so upset, except that I was in a different country and I'd been disciplined for a crime I hadn't actually committed. The injustice drew tears.
I reached my stop, and I went up to ground level to cry a little more in the park. I tried to call my grandparents, because it was too early in the morning in my parent's time zone to call them, but I got no answer. I heaved a bit, slowed down my breathing, and tried to focus on the mission at hand. I was here to make friends. I didn't want to show up to this random meet-up -- that I'd informed no one I was attending -- with tears streaming down my cheeks. I located what was left of my cool, stood up, wiped off my face, and walked the two blocks to the bar with the gypsy jazz.
I had a fantastic night. The people I met -- half a dozen from America, France, and England, all English-speakers -- were wonderfully friendly and interesting. After the gypsy jazz was over, a few of us wandered to a nearby hookah bar, where we continued chatting until after the Metro had closed for the night. (The one major drawback of the system, in my opinion.) I had to catch an expensive cab back to my hostel, but I didn't mind because I had managed to salvage an evening that had begun with tears and what I considered a waste of my money.
I continued riding the Metro throughout my stay in Paris, though I joked that I'd learned the hard way to keep my ticket on me until I'd actually left the station.
I wouldn't be telling this story if there wasn't a happy, triumphant ending.
The day before I left Paris, I was heading into the city with my friend Alexandra when we got stopped by police checking for Metro tickets. I had mine, of course -- like I said, I'd learned the hard way -- and I flashed it proudly and sashayed by their barricade with my head held high. As we walked up the steps, I turned to Alexandra.
"I win," I said. "I win at the Paris Metro."
She laughed and shook her head. Silly tourist.
Paris, consider yourself conquered.
No comments:
Post a Comment