When I lived in San Diego I read countless "moving to a foreign country" ex-pat adventures. I couldn't get enough of them. No matter how exasperating the ex-pat writer thought her experiences at the hands of the foreigners were, I thought they all sounded incredibly romantic or exciting.
Now I know better.
Last Wednesday I set off in my taxi for Roissy (Charles De Gaulle Airport for all you non-natives) for the short hop over to Frankfurt. I was attending a Finance conference in Vallendar which is near Koblenz----------I know, I had never heard of either of those places either.
I had checked my flight status before going to bed the night before and found out that it had been cancelled. Normally, I NEVER check my flight status. I am one of those blind faith in the system types- who is lazy too - and I hate to be bothered with my reservations once they have been made.
But - NOW I live with Monsieur Organization (opposites attract) and so am nagged into checking and rechecking such things.
Okay - I guess it was sort of a good idea -I got to find out my flight was cancelled, expend frustrated energy trying to connect to Air France "Help-Lines" - an oxymoron. No self respecting French company can be reached by phone after 10 pm - are you kidding? And go to bed fretting about it.
No real worries, the next morning I got rebooked.
I climbed into my taxi and there was already 15 euros on the meter. I am getting bolder with my French these days so I questioned the driver and argued with him all the way to the peripherique.
To no avail - but I felt better. Besides - this kind of dispute is practically a national sport in France.
At the terminal my new flight was also cancelled.
Shit.
I traippsed over to the counter. The Air France people helpfully explained that the air control guys were staging une gréve -a strike - and all the flights to Frankfurt were cancelled for the whole day. I don't know why they were picking on Frankfurt.
Strikes are ANOTHER French national sport. Thanks to this one I got to fly from Paris to Amsterdam, hang around there for a couple hours while the snow swirled out the windows and then get flown to Cologne where I got a train to Koblenz.
It is frickin COLD in Germany - and dark. Paris in winter may be famous for its grey skies but in comparison to the Rhine Valley - you need sunglasses.
No wonder Germans always seem sort of grim.
And no wonder everyone thinks I am deranged when they hear I am from San Diego - What are you doing HERE? When you could be THERE?
Sometimes I wonder.......
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