as per the usual pattern of my life, my hopeless romanticism has been quashed by a stark and painful reality; paris may be the city of l'amour but it also does rail construction and traffic redirection terribly. all in all, this is not such a burden for parisians themselves to bear. they holiday in august anyway so changes to the metro and the RER at these times are but the niggling, loud chews of a lover at the dining table to them. transport inconveniences are not quite enough to make them throw in the towel and go and find a burly bruges or sweet-talking venice to replace their famous capital for. it's ok if your partner has a perennial bad habit so long as you can withstand the worst of it with patience or escape.
but to a foreigner, with her ear out of the french language and a TGV connection to make in an hour and a half, disruptions to the train system are akin to your husband planning a boys weekend over your wedding anniversary and then not returning your calls while he is away. it's hurtful, stressful and leaves you on the verge of tears with an anxiety headache to nurse.
so here I stand, the slighted lover. i have twenty-two minutes to make my connection now and i started my transit journey over an hour ago. it's approximately the temperature of a just-popped toaster in the underground and a multicultural mélange of body odour permeates the air. the train shows no sign of leaving the platform to châtelets les halles, which my last train expressed through without prior warning, which i have to change at to get to gare de lyon, which is normally only two stops away direct on the malesherbes line from gare du nord, the station i started at. unfortunately, that line is closed for maintenance today.
technically i should have been where i want to be right now forty- five minutes ago. instead i am further away from it than when i began.
the minutes pass excruciatingly quickly. should i get off and catch another train on a different line or maybe try the street for a taxi or perhaps just admit defeat and abandon my non-refundable ticket to lyon and book a room in paris for the night and try again tomorrow? my mind backs and forth between the 'your life is in your hands' optimism of a tony robbins self-help tape and the 'things can only get worse' anticipation of a george r.r. martin novel, only without an imp as a glimmer of hope. by the time the doors shut and the wheels start turning towards châtelets les halles, i have been standing on an unmoving train for sixteen minutes.
it seems i am not yet well equipped to plan overseas holidays. there are many decisions i made which lacked foresight. the fact that my single night in london was the closing ceremony of the olympic games resulting in exorbitantly priced accommodation all over london and an inability to find anywhere decent to stay, for example. traveling out of london to france the day after the closing ceremony, one of the busiest commuting days of the year europe has seen since the day before the opening ceremony of the olympic games, another key example.
saved by the kindness of a friend of a friend and a bed in a third floor bathroom near clapham junction on the former count, it seems i am at the mercy of sweet strangers through the stresses of the latter as well.
once i finally make it to gare de lyon, with eight minutes until my train leaves, and four train lines and twenty one platforms to navigate, i have never been more thankful for an old, french newspaper vendor. he very patiently explains to me how to decipher the maze of arrival and departure screens after i frantically ask him how to get to the TGV in broken french. i don't have to explain to him that my french is a bit rusty. he can tell from my pained expression of concentration as i listen intently to understand him when he asks where my train is headed in his natural tongue. (still, i understand his question AND respond in french. i'll take one small victory gold medal, please!)
'you will see on the screens two columns près de la destination of the train. the petit white box is to wait down here, the petit blue box, it flashes, le nombre, you must go,' he explains in gentle, broken english. i nod intently, storing away his clues. The fact that i'm in a rush gets lost in translation and i have to cut him off as he continues about how much he adores the movements of a busy train station. 'merci, monsieur!' i yell as i wave and madly dash through the peak hour crowds (another wonderful logistical travel plan on my part) to look for my flashing blue number, which i assume from monsieurs instructions will direct me to the correct platform.
six minutes to go. my eyes search for lyon on the screens. LYON PERRACHE! there it is, flashing, bright and beautiful. right below it, also flashing with the same departure time is lyon part dieu. good. four minutes to go. fumble through my bag for my ticket. scanning, scanning, scanning for any indication of which it is. part dieu! a quick back and forth between my eyes and the screen reveals my flashing blue number thirteen.
in the end, i make it with two minutes to spare, and settle into my seat feeling glad, but very unfresh.
i know i wouldn't have made it but for the sweet too advice of the attendant who issued my eurostar ticket at st pancras. the adventurer in me was about to go through with a ticket arrangement leaving thirty-five minutes transit time. being spoilt and pampered by my family in ditchling and canterbury for the past five days had whet my appetite for dwelling on the edge a little. and a potentially too short transit time in a city i haven't been to in seven years is exactly the kind of danger that pushes me to the max and stretches the limits of my comfort zone.
'perhaps we should rebook you onto the later train to lyon from paris? it's actually only £10 more and you'll be in the premier class so you'll get some food,' were his saving words. it's like he knew the only thing i would exchange my thrill seeker ways for would be a snack tray so he just went for it and dropped the f-bomb. my prioritisation of food over most things in my life has yet only saved me from the throws of hunger. even so, there had been little that had ever caused my affection to waver. now though, with more than ever gratitude in my heart, i can safely vow never to diet again. if it weren't for my desire to be fed, i would not have made it to my hotel room in lyon to alex, who had travelled 526 kilometres, on three trains, in eight and a half hours from toulouse. france is not the tiny hexagon it seems on the map.
s my train set in motion from gare de lyon, i chided myself for my novice travel plans and my adventurous finesse that had so quickly waned. i hope for the best in people and places for the most part, which often leaves me worse for wear. so, jilted by my first experience of paris in a little under a decade, i stared out the window for consolation.
france, i'm not sure if you're playing hard to get or just afraid to commit because you're not sure what the future holds but you should know that i'm not in the habit of being quick to let go. maybe you've never had a girl be so forthright with you but i think you should give me a chance. i'm not asking to live here or anything, but it might be nice just to get to know each other over the next two weeks. i promise I'll have affection for you, even in august, when you chew loudly and forget anniversaries because i can see good things in you that are worth fighting for.
and, as per the usual pattern of my life, my romanticism set back in, uninhibited by the reality of experience. i quickly forgot and forgave the emotional tumult as the train rolled on to lyon, past the pasture and the ponds, the fields of goats and sunflowers, and the little villages full of provençal brick, all cast in the warm gold of a french setting sun.
