A Paris! (2/24)

After leaving the airport in Birmingham (where the Coventry clan saw me off!), I flew into Charles de Gaulle airport in France. I am lucky to have mostly flown into Orly airport the times I've arrived in France by air… let me just start by saying that I chose to fly into Paris because I got a good deal on a ticket, and it seemed worth it to fly in lieu of a more expensive Eurostar (Chunnel) train ticket (or having to make it to London again, and then the train station at a very early hour).

Well, it turns out if you do not check in online and register your checked bag that way with this discounted airline (FlyBe), it costs you a whopping £30 (that's about $54 USD). This is a cautionary tale - don't let it happen to you!

So… I make it to CDG, with a few Euros that my Dad gave me, and start to look for a bus that will take me to the 'Aérogare des Invalides' that is apparently very close to where my old host family now lives (in the 7th Arrondisement, right next to the Champ de Mars - and the Tour Eiffel). It turns out there is no direct bus from CDG, only from Orly. Well, ok - the nice man at the information window gets out a map of the transit system and shows me how to get to Invalides on the RER (local trains).

I get to the where the RER station is in the airport, and go to buy a ticket at one of the machines. It costs about 8 Euros, the machine tells me, to get into Paris (although that seems high?)…and then it refuses to take my bank card. Or bills. Just Euro coins. So, I go to the information window near the RER station to talk to a person - and they are not too helpful. I go to buy something at the newsstand store to get change (meanwhile, I'm lugging all my luggage around with me!)… only to be told that there is a change machine nearby (hidden from view from the machines by a big pillar), and he cannot make change for a 5 euro note. It turns out, the change machine can't, either!… So, finally (after calling my host family, who awaits my arrival patiently, which was estimated as being about a half hour before this moment), I just go and get money out of the ATM (and pay the outrageous $6 fee my bank charges me), and get my change and ticket…and I'm off on the RER and walking adventure that finally gets me to 46 avenue de la Bourdonnais, Paris.

(Whew!) In the end, I think it might have been better to take the train…! That's what I'm going to do on my way back to England, for sure. Before I say more about all of the really great things about being in Paris again - I just have to say how frustrating (and funny) it was to be able to speak the language, and still have so many problems getting what I needed, figuring out the 'system' at work. It's times like those that you think it's set up to be frustrating and to make you feel inept and culturally maladjusted if you're not 'from here'. I've felt like that in Boston when I first arrived, and sometimes in other big cities in the US, when I use the public transport system for the first time. I can't imagine how much harder that would have been if I didn't speak the language(!)...

(Next, Paris adventures...then the WWOOFing! Pictures when I can upload them...)