Home: A Series of Ridiculous Events

Never in my life have I experienced a day as completely unrealistic as this. Oh wait, make that two days...or actually, 61 hours.

I've been considering for a few days how best to write this entry. The whole situation was so ridiculously humorous that I'm worried that I can't give it justice with my measly writing skills. I think, for the sake of time and space, I may just make a list. I really don't need to add commentary. The timeline speaks for itself.

Saturday, December 19, 2009:

7:45am France time (1:45am Virginia time)- Leave house with dreadful anticipation of the long day ahead. Already know about blizzard conditions and flight from Washington DC to Roanoke being rebooked for the next afternoon.

8:20- Watch host father uncharacteristically get into a shouting match with a horribly obnoxious driver at the airport in Marseille.

8:35- Remove 1 kilo worth of Christmas presents from my 50 pound suitcase at check in.

9:00- Make it to the gate after successfully passing though security.

9:30- Run into a German friend from language school who ends up being on my flight to Frankfurt.

10:00- Board first plane.

10:25- Warn flight attendant I only have 40 minutes in between flights. Will I make it?

10:30- Take off. So far, so good.

10:40, 11:00, 11:30- Flight attendant returns to me multiple times with positive information about our flight time and gate, therefore assuring me I would arrive in plenty of time for my connecting flight.

12:15- Deplane and run through airport.

12:35- Flight attendant was right. Arrive in plenty of time for flight from Frankfurt to Washington DC.

1:00- Board plane.

2:00- Take off, an hour late. This is perhaps the key moment of the entire experience.

For the next 8 hours- Sleep, listen to iPod, read New Moon, sleep, talk to woman beside me who is an English as a second language teacher, decide maybe I really don't want to be a teacher, sleep.

4:00 Virginia time- Fly over Washington and begin descent. Miles to destination: 32.

4:02- Miles to destination: 392. What?

4:03- Pilot on loudspeaker speaks a lot of German. Half the passengers look startled. The rest have no idea what he said.

4:04- In English, "You may have noticed we have again begun to ascend. It seems the visibility is too low on the runway because of the blizzard. For your safety, we are flying to Charlotte, North Carolina."

4:05- I am really bummed. I learn later that if we had left on time, we would have been able to land.

5:30- We land in Charlotte. I am almost glad of the diversion because we flew through sunset and I was in the sky as it turned rose and I watched rainbows play in the vapors coming off of the wing.

5:32- I call home. I am thinking, I really hope they decided not to pick me up in DC. Mom answers. I breathe a sigh of relief. She says, "Oh good timing! It took him 8 hours through the snow, ice, and car wrecks but your dad just got to the airport to pick you up. You will have to stay there tonight though because they just closed 81 South." "Oh no Mom! I'm in Charlotte." Silence. "I guess your dad is going to have to stay at the airport by himself. Wait, what are you doing in Charlotte??"

An hour and a half later- We are still sitting on the tarmac. We are informed that customs will not let us off the plane. We are going to Atlanta, Georgia. "Um, hey Mom, I'm heading further south..."

8:00pm- Land in Atlanta. Thank God for cheerful southern airport workers. So maybe customs guys aren't the nicest but everyone else sure was helpful.

Between 8:00 and 9:30- Go through security (to leave the airport? still haven't figured that one out), claim 50 pound luggage, re-check luggage, take train to other side of airport, re-claim luggage (we still haven't figured this system out either), get in line for hotel vouchers.

Around this time is when specific time is difficult to remember. By now, we were functioning only on lunch, a snack, and a lot of confusing hours without sleep. I will make up times for the sake of explanation. It will be close enough.

9:45- Strike up a conversation with some people in line. Meet Eddie (British guy who's lived in Turkey his whole life, who's mother is Greek, who's mother tongue is somehow French, who works for an Italian spice export company, who calls me Kary, who makes fun of my French, and who has a daughter my age, i.e. my adopted father for the rest of the trip. He has been travelling from Turkey since Friday morning and has not changed his socks.) and Emily (About my age, veterinarian, lives in DC, coming back from visiting her sister and new niece in Austria.)

10:45- Reach the front of mega-long line (our plane had over 400 passengers). Get hotel and food vouchers. Apparently look somewhat anxious despite feeling surprisingly calm. Go with Eddie and Emily to shuttle to go to hotel.

11:30- Finally get on shuttle. Atlanta is freezing by the way and by the size of most of our coats, I don't think we were expecting to be waiting outside for 45 minutes. Cough that I finally got rid of comes back with a vengeance.

12:00am- Stand in line at Clarion South waiting for a room. It is too late to use the $25 food voucher for dinner. We are all starving and on the edge of passing out from dehydration. Emily calls the Lufthansa number they said to contact for flight information. They are closed. We could call again at 8:00am.

12:45- Eddie and I get to the front of the line. Emily is at the desk getting checked in. The hotel's internet dies. The front desk people freak out. Emily gets a room. Eddie and I go to the desk. The front desk people are very sweet and extremely apologetic. They only know of two clean rooms and since the internet is down, they can't figure out which other rooms are open. They bargain with each other and finally Eddie and I get the last two keys. I feel briefly sorry for the people behind me but with the exhaustion, that soon passes and I only feel relief.

1:00- Leave my room with the door open in search of the drink machine. Return with Fanta Orange in hand to hear Eddie (who's room is across from mine) frantically calling, "Kary, Kary, your door is open!" He thinks I'm inside and don't know. He doesn't want to come in but he is scared I'll leave it like that all night. He is panicking. He is also probably waking up everyone in the hotel. I run to assure him I am ok. I then gulp down half the can of soda.

1:30- I take a shower. That makes the whole day seem better. For some reason my feet had chosen that day to reek to high heaven.

2:00- I pass out in a nice squishy American bed after a 26 hour long day.

Sunday, December 20, 2009:

(Supposed to be at church this morning, playing violin and visiting friends.)

8:57am- I awake to my mom calling the room. "Why aren't you awake? Your dad is still at the airport and we need you to figure out what's going to happen with your flight!"

9:15-9:30- I am on hold with the airline. Never get to talk to anyone. Even Lufthansa doesn't know what's going on.

9:30- I meet Eddie for breakfast and hear all the rumors about when/if flights were leaving.

10:00- I think I offend a German woman by the fact that I don't drink coffee. It's ok. In the end she is happy to take mine since I obviously would let it go to waste.

10:45- Leave in a taxi with luggage, Eddie, and a new friend who works in the US consulate in Chile. We get to know each other well in such tight quarters.

11:00- Get in line for Lufthansa flight LH418D.

11:30- Cheer when we all hear that they have finally allowed our flight to go back to DC directly at 4:00. We aren't licensed to fly between states and they were threatening to make us fly back to Frankfurt and then back.

2:00- After 3 hours, get to the front of the line. Receive new, ghetto-looking boarding pass and food voucher and check huge bag.

2:20- Eddie and I feel bad for security when we have to take off our shoes. Also, the metal detector man makes fun of my pink-toed socks.

2:45- Finally eat good, real food. Also randomly see someone I worked with at Doe River Gorge in line with me at the Chinese restaurant.

4:00- Meet back with Emily and another German friend and board plane. We leave mostly on schedule.

5:30- I am ecstatic! We land and I am about to see my dad who, bless his heart, has been waiting for me since 3:00 the previous day.

6:00- We find out there are so many planes on the tarmac, we are going to be waiting at least an hour in the plane before we can park at a gate.

6:45- Our crew leaves because they have to go back to Frankfurt. I later learn that Frankfurt's airports are now closed and I feel bad for the crew who are stuck again.

7:30- We still haven't moved so they bring us the mobile lounges that transport us to the terminal.

8:00- I see my dad!

9:00- German Lufthansa woman cries as she tells us the plane is still not parked and our bags are still on the plane. It has been a rough few days for Lufthansa.

9:30- We eat scones and coffee/smoothies from Starbucks for dinner.

10:00- We are still hanging out with Eddie and his daughter waiting for our bags.

11:00- The bags start going around carousel 10, after we had been told it would be 11, 12, or 13. We were just excited to see bags. Everyone cheered each time someone found their bag.

11:30- The carousel stops. There are tons of bags left from all the people who decided to give up and go home. The five hour drive doesn't give us that option. We all help take those bags off. We wait for the carousel to start again. It doesn't. I have been very calm about the whole experience but at this point, I, and many others around me, almost lose it.

12:00am- Apparently a little Hispanic lady heard something about the other 200 bags being stuck in customs on the international side, where they shouldn't be. She makes a guy go find them. Ten minutes later, the carousel starts again. We are too tired to cheer but finally everyone is happy. I hardly believe my eyes when I see my bag go by. I watch it and then say, "Dad, that one might be mine. Can you check?" He sprints and hauls it off. Finally!!

12:30- We get lost on the way to the hotel which should be 2 minutes away. Despite it all, I am thinking how much I appreciate Lufthansa's level of service, our crew's great attitudes, and the family-like camaraderie that developed between the 400 of us on the flight.

2:00- We have found the hotel and we pass out, once again, without real supper.

Monday, December 21, 2009:

(I am supposed to be on my way to Tennessee to visit college friends.)

We get up, eat a good breakfast, and drive five hours on perfect, clear roads.

3:00pm- We pull into the driveway. Dad decides to take a few minutes to smash down some of the snow in the driveway with the car wheel. We drive backward and forward...in the driveway. Finally I say, "Really? REALLY?" He understands and lets me out of the car. I go in and I am home!!!!

Aubagne

I'm mad, so I have to write this down for you in order for me to find it funnier than I do right now.

I'm so thankful for the theme and title of my blog right now because that's exactly what tonight was like: In Pursuit of Aubagne. It normally takes 20 minutes to get from Marseille to Aubagne after theatre class. Tonight it took an hour and 45 minutes. Ergh!

I was driving through Marseille, happily remembering all that had gone on in the theatre (Ingmar Bergman is awesome by the way) when I came to the entrance ramp onto the road home. It was blocked. I drove into some random neighborhood thinking it was just that entrance that was blocked. Not so.

It took me a full hour to realize that there was a detour sign on all the blocked ramps. Now, the idiots who block highways at midnight and make dumb signs might say it was my fault, but if the sign is miniscule and only says S32 or some such nonsense, how on earth was I supposed to realize that was it.

So when I finally figured it out, I followed the detour S32 signs all the way back to where I had come from. Then the sign randomly changed to S31 and sent me straight back the way I'd already been. Finally I ended up in an enormous stream of angry cars stuck on a tiny road. I knew I had found a group to follow.

We eventually made it into Aubagne. I pacified myself the whole stupid drive with the knowledge that I would (hopefully) soon be complaining about my plight to all my lovely readers.
I did manage to find two things to be thankful for. One, I now rock at shifting gears. I thought I had it down before but now I am totally stellar. Two, I now know by heart all the backroads from here to Marseille. I know them so much more than I ever wanted to. They are not beautiful and they are kind of scary, but maybe someday, that knowledge will do me good. Maybe.

But before you feel too sorry for me (because I know you were planning to), be relieved to know that otherwise I had an amazing day. We played a game in class (at one point I had to role play as the obnoxious 15 year old daughter of one of the guys in my class...great fun), I had good conversations in French with the kids' grandfather, and theatre class was amazing!!

I've also gotten multiple comments/encouragements on the improvement in my French today and I'm really, really happy. My theatre teacher told me that by the end of February, I will be speaking/understanding/pronouncing great. I hope she's right. I'm so excited!

Une Fete Merveilleuse!

I love loving lovely days! Today was fantastic, fun, and full of friends and food.

We had our school Christmas party this morning and it made me so happy. We laughed so much that I still have a headache and my cheeks hurt but it was so worth it. We all sang together in seven different languages. We gleefully watched a sultry tango demonstration by two members of my class. We giggled through three fantastic skits. And we ate a lot of food.

I love being a part of this group of international students of all ages. I love the French teachers and faculty. I love that I can be my own version of me, rather than the version I've grown myself into all these years. I love that I can find some of my identity in being American. I love that I can hang out with other Americans and dress in red and green for Christmas parties and take cheesy Christmas pictures. And I love that we can all understand each other despite language barriers if we try.

And I really, really love Christmas!

Noel en France

I'm just going to start with an apology and get it out of the way. If there are any of you out there in cyber-space who check my blog as obsessively as I check other peoples', I am deeply sorry for the whole week and a half that I left you with no knowledge of the happenings in my life.

If you have Facebook you should feel less desperate for news since I swamp everyone's news page with (almost) every thought that pops into my head. For example, you witnessed the whole stream of consciousness decision-making that is my life, like: Where should I live after France? Texas, Florida, Virginia? Ooo, Seattle looks nice. What will I do in Seattle? Hm, maybe I could get my certificate to teach English as a second language. But Kaity, you don't like to teach. Maybe I could learn to like it since it would involve travelling to awesome places like Russia and South Korea. Yeah, that's what I'll do. Move to Seattle and then on to other random and glorious locations... You get the picture. Keep checking Facebook if you're interested in the completely opposite direction my mind will probably lead me next.

So for real occurances, these last few days have been full and fun, but I've forgotten to write about them because I'm so looking forward to this Saturday, only 6 days away. I'm going home for Christmas!! I've been counting down for a few weeks now and it's completely overshadowed most goings-on in my life. Also I've been sick, which may account for some forgetfulness. I've been sleeping a lot!

But it would be a shame to miss the Christmas season in France. It is charming. In the little town where I live, the Christmas lights are up downtown and there are elaborate nativity scenes set up in glass boxes for everyone to enjoy. There is also a fantastic Christmas market every weekend. They sell everything from soap and jewelry, to loaves of bread twice the size of my head and whole dead pigs wrapped up in string. Last week there was a carnival and an amazing wooden carousel that was run by parents see-sawing and a man playing the piano and accordion. Fascinating!

School is exceptionally fun as well. We are having our Christmas party tomorrow and I'm so excited! Hopefully I'll remember to tell you about it.

Last night was a lot of fun. We had a party for all the people who have helped them renovate the house this past year. There were 13 adults here and 6 kids. We ate amazing cheese fondu and lemon ice cream floating in champagne. I was fortunate again to be seated next to a British man so I was able to chat happily in a mix of English and French depending on if I was talking to someone on my right or my left.

Afterward, we all gathered in the salon to play one of those famous people trivia games that I'm generally pretty awesome at if they are played in my language. It was a great vocabulary lesson. And when it was my turn to describe the people to my team, there were enough English speakers in the group that I was allowed to play in English. And can I just say, thank God for Ian Fleming (007), without whom I would never have scored us any points.

It's nights like that that make me love the people of France. I already love the language, the scenery, the food, etc... but each time these people include me in their lives and attempt to find topics of conversation that we can both understand, test out their English on me, suffer through my poor French, and let me play on their team even though I have no idea what the game is about, I fall in love with this place just a little bit more.

But, all that being said, I cannot wait to see my family and friends and eat my Mama's cooking!

The Rest of My Finger

Ok, so I didn't actually cut off any part of my finger, but I did make a pretty good sized slice across my knuckle. It's slightly ironic really. I had been thinking just this evening, as I balanced boiling hot water full of potatoes in one hand and tried to fish out the slimy potatoes with a knife with the other, that I would be lucky to get through the evening without injuring myself. I just expected it to be with boiling water or the salmon I had burning in the pan. It wasn't my best culinary experience.

But no, I got the food prepared and on the table without any serious problem. The kids and I ate leisurely and again, there were no problems. Then it was time for dessert. We have recently become obsessed with slices of bread with butter and honey. Paul's tartine came off without a hitch, just like usual. Then I foolishly decided that I wanted my third (or maybe fourth, but who's counting?) slice of bread of the day.

I began cutting the bread. I don't know how much you know about French bread, but it is delicious. It has a soft center and perfectly crusty...well, crust. But crusty crust is also hard, sometimes like a rock. This one wasn't as hard as some but I'm taking any excuse I can get. I was cutting with ginormous serrated bread knife. It works amazingly well for cutting hard bread. I imagine fingers are a piece of cake in comparison.

I looked up for a second to talk to a child. I do not have the best coordination in the world. Apparently I cannot move my head and my hand in two separate directions at the same time. I looked down in time to see the serrated blade running through my finger. It was slightly disconcerting but mostly I was thinking, 'Wow, I think there should be blood."

Then there was. A lot. The kids were hilarious. They ran in two different directions looking for band aids and then watched with the utmost concentration as I rinsed the gaping wound and tried to explain in awkward, pain-laced French that this is the reason it's not good to play with knives. Then Marie helped me put on my band aid. It was only a little crooked.

We also took a break when the blood flow slowed to run up to my room to find my camera. I like to document my battle scars. But for your sake I will post the "clean" version, with the band aid already applied. If you have a stronger stomach than some people I know, you can check out the "unedited" version on my Facebook. I find it impressive.

Thanksgiving in France

First off, I have a big, fluffy cat sitting on me while I'm writing this. It makes me happy. But that's not the subject of this post.

The subject is just what one might guess from reading the title: my experience of Thanksgiving in a country that doesn't actually celebrate the holiday.

We decided to have a Thanksgiving party on Friday night, not on the actual day but I really didn't even notice because I was working and there is not Thanksgiving stuff in the stores here, only Christmas decorations.

I did go shopping with my American friend in the Auchan (their version of Wal-Mart) for the supplies for the next day. I didn't buy a lot but I scoped out the things available in preparation for the next day. (It's amazing how many essential Thanksgiving ingredients they don't sell here. Of course, they're probably shocked by the miniscule size of our stores' cheese sections so I can't say too much.) I was off the next morning until 4 so I had plenty of time to run back to the store.

Well, Friday morning came and went while I slept. Then I woke up to the unceasing ringing of the telephone. You know those days when everything seems to go wrong but ultimately ends up ok? That was Friday.

It was Anne trying to get me to answer the phone to let me know there were two cases of swine flu in Marie's school and I needed to go pick her up. Ok, but when was I going to get the shopping done?

I panicked a little but then realized that there is a perfectly decent grocery store right across from the school. So, after I picked Marie up from her masked schoolteacher (it was creepy), we went to the Casino grocery store. Marie was very helpful in attempting to carry the flour for me and we found everything pretty quickly. I was really excited! I had to get creative with a few ingredients but it all worked.

Then we got home, ate lunch, and Marie took a nap. I used this time to cut apples for the Apple Pie Cake and grate a lot of Cheddar cheese. Then I picked up Paul and set to work on the real cooking.

You must keep in mind that this was the first time I had made any of the things I was planning or had even really cooked any real meal at all. I can bake, so I wasn't too worried about the cake, but I was freaking out a bit about the rest.

The putting together of the cake and the macaroni and cheese were much easier than I expected. But I couldn't work the oven. It's complicated and the instructions are in Italian. Why? I have no idea.

So I called Anne. She was supposed to be home at 6:30, an hour before our guests arrived. It was 7:15, I couldn't work the oven, the mac and cheese needed to bake for 45 minutes, and she wasn't there yet. Yikes!

And then company arrived. I had never met them before and I was in a kind of frenzied state of cooking and stressing out. It was slightly awkward but not too bad. Anne and Julien showed up pretty soon after and we got dinner figured out. We spent the evening comparing me to different Desperate Housewives. I started as Susan but I didn't burn the mac and cheese so I ended up being Bree.

We had turkey cutlets with gravy that tasted like brown, wet flour, packaged mashed potatoes, corn, really good green beans that Anne made (I couldn't get ingredients for green bean casserole but it tasted almost the same), my mom's and grandma's recipe for macaroni and cheese, and the cake. I was pretty surprised that it turned out pretty good and there was so much food I was stuffed and we had leftovers.

All in all, it turned out to be a really pleasant evening. I'm also more confident in my ability to grocery shop and to cook, but I still like baking better. You cannot believe how amazing the smell of nutmeg, cinnamon, and vanilla are after not smelling them for months. The mac and cheese was definitely my favorite and almost tasted like Mama's, but I can not wait until Christmas to eat the real thing with my family!

A Sugar High

Wow, what an amazing day! This was one of the best days of my time in France. It may have something to do with the fact I'm still smiling from last night, or possibly because of the copious amounts of sugar I consumed today, but no matter what the reason, I'm happy to be happy.

We started the day like every other Wednesday with handball for Paul. I already knew something suspiciously good was going on when much of the usual complaining and arguing that usually happens these mornings was nowhere to be found.

Handball went great and lunch went off without a hitch. Then came the project. I told the kids if they were really good, they could help me make an American dessert. My parents had sent a package that finally got here yesterday and it was stuffed with ridiculous amounts of knee socks, candy, and pudding. I must say, I'd like to eat it all myself, but I think that would not be prudent for my sugar levels or my waistline.

So, I'm feeding it to the children as well. This afternoon we made French Vanilla pudding (which I thought appropriate). It was so great! It's so easy that basically the kids made it themselves and were quite proud of the fact. And man, I never realized how much I missed pudding, Reese's, Mounds Bars, Cow Tales, Skittles, and popcorn until today.

We enjoyed our pudding and then it was calm time. Marie tried to sleep for two hours (with limited success) and Paul and I played with his train and I read him Peter Pan while he molded clay. It was peaceful and amazing. As a reward, they got one piece of candy each.

Then it was snack time, and since I was really amazed at the behavior today (as in, they said please and thank you to each other and there was no screaming or anything) I said we could watch Peter Pan. So, we settled down with some amazing microwave popcorn and enjoyed the film. You know, Peter Pan actually works really well in French.

Then I made dinner early, and everyone ate very well with the promise of pudding and a new bon-bon for dessert. When we were done, I doled out a few Skittles each. I think that was actually the biggest success of the day. I was hugged and kissed repeatedly for that one. Then we read more of Peter Pan and they were off to bed by 8:30.

Oh how I love the simple pleasures in life!