Today, I hate Paris.
Of course this day would come eventually, but did it also have to rain? And did my foot have to be bleeding at the same time? (No, universe, I don’t think so.)
As background to this story, I have a 30-minute commute home from school, which is normally fine–I listen to music, read the paper, examine other people and make mental notes about future fashion choices. I also have a Passe Navigo, which gets you unlimited around the city, except that it’s only available on a weekly or monthly basis, and since I arrived in the middle of January, I only got one week’s worth. The fonctionnaire told me it wasn’t worth adding another week since February is Friday, and I should just buy a packet of 10 tickets. Fine. Whatever.
To get into the Metro, as with most metros, you either swipe your pass or you let the machine suck up your ticket. Obviously I had a ticket, so I put it in, tossed it out, bid my friend adieu and got on the train. La di dah, listened to some Imagine Dragons, sat next to a sleeping woman, nothing special. Off I go to change trains at Opera. But there’s a bunch of people holding official looking equipment in the hallway that goes towards my train. “Billet, mademoiselle?”
What? Sorry, I’m just changing trains, I tossed it at my original stop.
You can’t do that.
But I’m just changing trains.
Trente euros, s’il-vous plait.
I already paid, I can show you the rest of the tickets–
Trente euros.
I, being flustered and having no idea what was going on, argue with him a little more, saying that look, I have a pass, I have these other tickets, I’m from the States and just got here a week ago and I’m sorry, I have no idea what you’re talking about. He keeps asking for the euros, and when I figure out he’s telling me 30 and not 3, as I had misheard, I freak out and say no, this is absurd, I’m sorry that I didn’t know but I’ll know next time and I’m clearly not trying to hijack your train dude. (May not have said the last bit.) I’ll just walk from here, I say. I’m not spending 30 euros on a 10 minute train ride.
You can’t leave, they say. These are the rules.
So they snatch my student card and won’t tell me what’s going on, but they start writing something down. I ask what it is and they don’t answer. So I ask again, a little louder, and my French isn’t perfect but I know they understand me. They refuse to explain and ask me to sign. Hell no, I say in my head, and out loud I repeat “c’est quoi, madame?” It’s a ticket that they’re writing me. Let me repeat that: they are writing me a 60 euro ticket for not understanding what was going on, not being familiar with the rules of a city that I’ve been in for just over a week, and for throwing away a paper ticket, the brethren of which are littered all around me, and everywhere else in the metro.
So I pull out my bank card in frustration, and all four of them huddle around it, trying to get it to work, and muttering about how no it won’t work that way, it’s American. Finally it doesn’t work, and they rip off a sheet of paper and circle a number and tell me to call it to pay up.
I understand that there are rules, and there’s probably some vaguely good reason for this one. But my frustration lies in their absolute unwillingness to explain what was going on. Honestly I thought for a few minutes they were just con artists trying to scam you, as appears to happen here all the effing time. As I stormed away, an electronic announcement came on to cheerfully warn me about pickpockets, and I muttered bitterly to myself about more bureaucratic ways to steal.
This is a cultural difference that will probably make me laugh in a few weeks, and I’ll know for next time. But for now, I would just like to announce that today I find Paris insufferable, and will spend the rest of my day defiantly in my flannel and yoga pants, eating clementines, listening to country music, and reading something English. Yeah, take that Paris.
Emily Wolfteich 