Got a new, sweet ride -- but where do I park it?

Bits and bobs today…The headline event is that my playmates arrived! My cousin, Little Margaret Harris of Denton, and our mutual good friend, Susan Hollister of Durham, flew in this morning. Our rendezvous, however, nearly didn’t happen.

Note to Self: Learn the French words for “car park” BEFORE arriving at one of the world’s busiest airports.

Had a good plan to start with: Get up at Dawn’s Hairy Crack to go pick them up. No problem. Find the bloody airport. Check. Find the correct terminal. Gotcha. NOW WHAT?! Where do I park the car??? If there were signs with directions to the parking garage, I have no idea where they were or, more to the point, what they said. Some symbols would have helped. But at 6:30 a.m. in a steady stream of impatient French drivers it was too early – or too late, depending on your point of view – to whip out a French- English dictionary.

Happily, I had built enough extra time into my journey to accommodate doing several loop-de-loops around Charles de Gaulle and several provinces of northern France until I managed to find the entrance to a parking deck. By then, paying 8 euros for the privilege seemed like quite a bargain.

I’m absolutely delighted my Guilford College buds here, and as usual, we’re having a splendid time. The weather continues to be stunningly beautiful. All is well.

Which brings me to Item #2: The Daewoo Deathtrap has been retired. Previous readers may recall my…er, difficulties with the car that came with my exchange house. Under the best of circumstances I’m not fond of gear-changing. Most European cars have manual transmission and I have managed OK in the past, but there is simply more of me than there was of this tiny vehicle. At the end of every journey I was fit for nothing except some Advil and a heating pad.

So I did the only sensible thing any 60-something, comfort-addicted, creaky-boned, amply-proportioned American lady would do: I rented myself a bigger car with automatic transmission. Because of a mix-up at the rental counter, I got an upgrade: A full-sized Citroèn sedan. What a sweet ride! That sucker cradles my frame like a Sleep Number bed and glides down the highway purring like a kitten. Voilà! I’m back in serious travel mode.

My last observation for today has to do with French children, or probably more to the point, child-rearing. The French don’t seem very big into correcting their children or quieting them down in public places. Cases in point: Yesterday in the grocery store, there were literally dozens of screaming, unruly, out-of-control children. And nary a parental nudge to any of them that their loud, obnoxious behavior might be inappropriate in public. Are these mamas deaf??

And Sunday at the village flea market here in La Frette, there were squads of squealing children who ran wild undeterred by a mother’s knot-jerking. If it had been an American scene, I have little doubt that some little bottoms would have been smarting by the end of the afternoon.

This observation brings me to this advice to the French military: If it ever appears that Germany has the annexation of France on its mind again, simply deploy a battalion of French pre-schoolers to the border. Having to listen to those little chil’ren for a day or so will be all the deterrence needed to stave off a prolonged conflict. Bless their bratty little hearts.

Lazy in La Frette

The weather in Paris continues to be absolutely gorgeous and I have slowed down to nearly a crawl…Can’t wait for Susan and Little Margaret to get here Tuesday morning. I need some playmates.

In the meantime my days have been punctuated by routine chores like laundry and grocery shopping. Here I am within a stone’s throw of Paris and I can’t seem to generate a head of steam to go do anything there. For one thing, I couldn’t find anything online this weekend that appealed to me. Of the 93 cinemas claiming to play English-language movies, not one title was worth spit. One would think I could’ve found a nice choral concert, or maybe a chamber ensemble. Non.

The harder I looked online for something to do, the more appealing the lounge chair in the solarium became. A lovely view of the garden, a cool beverage, a classical station wafting from my new radio...Very enticing. Who says I have to go and do anything? Can't I just be content just to "be"? Can this attitude be a product of age? Am I, god forbid, turning into my mother, gripped by inertia and content to "set" all the time??

Going into Paris would also entail driving that blasted Daewoo to the train station. I’d rather lance my own boils. So I am contenting myself with a lazy Sunday, soaking up La Frette's atmosphere and stunning sunshine.

I already subjected myself to the Daewoo torture once today to go back to the super-duper Carrefour grocery store. I found it Friday and it knocked my socks off. I was in such a sensory stupor I could barely buy a couple of pastries before limping back to the car. Today, newly regrouped and armed with a list, I was better prepared. Naturally, the store was closed. I admit to uttering a string of unladylike oaths in the parking lot.

Carrefour is a Super WalMart on steroids. I kid you not. This particular establishment, located five miles and 637 speed bumps from my house, occupies at least the same acreage as your biggest WalMart. It’s a grocery-pharmacy combo. That’s all: no clothes, no toys, no automotives. Imagine a WalMart with liquor, foods from 100 different countries, and an amped-up French bakery. The vastness and the calibre of the selections are overwhelming. I was in overload by the time I got to the oranges (imported from South Africa) on Aisle 2.

My other remarkable shopping experience occurred Friday, as well, at the farmer’s market in the next village, Herblay. It featured only local growers and producers, with some imported goodies thrown in. Homemade sausages from the hog farmer who raised the hogs they came from. Cheese made right here in France. And fresh pastries from the local baker. Yum!

So even though I’m not racing around at 120 km an hour, I’m eating well. And my reading material ain’t bad, either. I’m reading one of Mark Twain’s earliest books, Roughing It, about his adventures in the American West during the 1860s. His little travel anecdotes and observations are wry and funny and just marvellous. Who knew? Mark Twain was a blogger!

The picture shows me liberating a freshly-baked baguette from the bakeress at the Herblay market.

All quiet on the Western Front? No way!

No one has ever accused me of being particularly flexible. I’m seldom mistaken for one of those go-with-the-flow individuals; it’s one of the many less attractive traits I got from Mama, rest her rigid little soul. But when I’m overseas I do try to adapt as much as possible – you know, to get the most from my travel experience.

There are a few things, however, that I find hard to compromise. One of them is the need for music. I’m hard-wired to need music around me, especially when I’m alone, as I have been most of this week. My French exchange house has a TV, but the only English-speaking channel, the BBC’s equivalent to CNN, has such a buzz in the reception that I can’t make out much of they’re saying. Did John McCain call for us to bomb Portugal this week? I couldn’t swear to that report…

There’s a radio in the sitting room but it’s not hooked up to speakers. Operation of the CD player requires an engineering degree, and the small radio in the kitchen, which may have been new when the Everly Brothers were rocking the airwaves, went mute the instant I touched it. I have that effect on electronics.

The three – count ‘em, three – online music services to which I subscribe back home are unavailable over here. Those crafty foxes know I’m trying to access them from a foreign computer and have blocked me from downloading a single tune. And did I mention the tiny car’s radio had been removed, and of course I couldn’t figure out how to get it back in? I was so desperate I’d have listened to ghetto rap.

And so I soldiered in silence for several days, becoming more morose by the hour. I cursed myself for never having gotten up to speed on technology such as iPods and MP3 players. They’re probably obsolete now, anyway. Lord, when did I blink and become a fossil?

Then it occurred to me: I am only a 20-minute train ride from Paris! SURELY I could find an electronics store there, flash an obscene number of euros, and buy myself something that would make some music-like noise.

Confidently I set out yesterday, calling on my guardian angels as I boarded the train. At the Paris station, the third person I stopped knew enough English (“electronics?”) to give me directions to the FNAC store, apparently the French equivalent to Radio Shack, which was literally across the street! The place was mobbed, but within 10 minutes (and the requisite obscene number of euros) I had myself a sweet little portable Sony radio – about the same low-tech model I so proudly owned when the Everly Brothers rocked the airwaves.

Boy, did the rest of the day perk up! After poking around the Sacre-Coeur Basilica and the Montmartre Museum in Paris, I swanned back to the house in La Frette (think Brooklyn in relationship to Manhattan) and spent a lovely evening with a book and Ravel, Mozart, Schubert and Harry Connick, Jr. Great company, n’est pas?

P.S. The photo up there was taken of the River Seine in the public park in La Frette, just at the bottom of my street, the day after I arrived. The weather has continued to be just that gorgeous all week.

Jumbo me takes to the road

Well, I’m finally here in France and somewhat settled…As usual, I’m struck by the smaller scale of things – cars, roads, rooms, drinking glasses…We Americans are so accustomed to JUMBO and conspicuous consumption, and the Europeans manage with less, and in a way that’s kinder to the planet and their heritage, I think.

Anyway, today I had my first solo outing with the car, a Daewoo built to be driven by an anorexic troll. Think of a mini-sausage casing, say, the size of a dainty cocktail weenie: that would be the car. Now think of about 74 lbs. of prime sausage meat to be stuffed inside that sucker. NOT a pretty picture. Especially when gear-shifting is involved. Yikes! On my best day I despise gear-shifting, but this Daewoo was simply not designed for a person of my womanly proportions. In some countries, I could get arrested during my execution of second gear. Fortunately, the French are quite relaxed about those matters.

Anyway, my objective today was the Chateau d’Auvers, a castle about 35 miles north of Paris that has been renovated and turned into the site of a multi-media tribute to the Impressionist painters. The presentation is sort of Disney-esque but it’s quite tasteful and well worth the drive – after I was able to find the highway.

Between the total lack of signage and the é+§&@$£# gears in that car, I was just about to give up and call it a day. I’ll admit to many unchristian utterances during my fruitless ponderings of the map and wrong turns. Even worse than the Brits, the French eschew the use of north/south, etc., and require you to know which town you’re heading toward. I needed to head EAST to find Auvers, but from the sun I knew I was obviously driving south. So I did a loop-de-loop (downshifting into second gear as seldom as possible), eventually finding the right road (no thanks to the Ministry of Signage, the scoundrels) and the homage to the Impressionists.

Maybe I wasn’t the only tourist having trouble finding her way: I was only one of four visitors today at the Chateau. So I had Van Gogh (who’s buried there), Renoir, Serat and them pretty much to myself. But you’d think that for all the trouble the Auvers castle folks went to to simulcast their commentary in eight languages, including English (bless ‘em) they’d provide better signs.

For her part, the sausage is just glad to be out of her casing for the rest of the evening. I’m heading to some yummy goose pate that the French are so justly famous for, and a beverage -- jumbo-sized, of course.

Royal Concessions

YAY, in a few minutes it'll be September and I can say I leave this month! Isn’t it about time!?

Seems like I’ve barely made a ripple in the pond of summer for the last couple of years. Last year I was in the throes of job-searching (ugh) and this year I’ve been prepping for the Big Trip. Summer sort of slid by unnoticed.

The payoff – two months in Europe – should be totally worth it. For the first time ever, I'm a fan of autumn. My brain is sooo ready for some novelty, even if it’s looking out on somebody else’s backyard.

Every day I’ve tried to do at least one significant thing to move myself closer to “there.” Today’s agenda involved a phone call to the Queen’s Gallery in Buckingham Palace. That's in London, y'know. My online trolling had unearthed what sounds like a very posh and nifty art lecture and reception taking place Oct. 21 as part of their current exhibit, “Art & Love: The Passion of Victoria and Albert.” The curators of this fascinating royal couple’s art collection, assembled over their 22 years of marriage, will give an erudite talk and then the ticketed guests can wander through the galleries and mingle with one another to the strains of live music.

The event notice also mentioned refreshments. Very civilized, I thought. And tickets seemed reasonable – “12 pounds (8 pounds concessions),” according to the website.

Tickets weren’t available online, thus necessitating the phone call. With Visa at the ready, I ordered two tickets with concessions, figuring if I’m going all the way to Buckingham Palace for a do, I’m gonna get my royal hot dog and Co-cola, right? The lady on the phone hesitated. “No, madam,” she explained patiently. “It’s either 12 pounds OR 8 pounds.”

Not fully grasping that we were in the midst of one of those quirky American English breakdowns, I said again (more slowly this time) that I would like tickets to the lecture AND refreshments, figuring that the 12 pounds was the base price and eats were an additional 8.

“Ah,” as light dawned in the bowels of the palace. “Concessions means ‘Are you in a special demographic categ’ry, like child or senior citizen?’ If you fit into one of those groups, the price is only 8 pounds – and yes, it includes both the lecture and refreshments.”

Well, did I feel like an idiot?! Who knew? I’m a concessionaire! We finally got it sorted, I got my “concession” because I’m at this advanced pinnacle of age – and yes, I’m getting my hot dog and Co-cola as well as the scholarly lecture, for a budget-wise 8 pounds (about 12 bucks). Life is good.

OK, I doubt whether a weenie has ever actually emanated from Her Majesty’s kitchen, but you get my drift. The ticket lady did mention something about wine and hors d’oeuvres. Wonder whether they’ll break out the Waterford crystal for me?

Packing my 'chute

"For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move." -- Robert Louis Stevenson

I can't totally agree with ol' Bob there -- the idea of traveling to Afghanistan, Pakistan or any of the 'stans, for that matter, holds no appeal at all, I'm afraid. But I get the gist of what he's driving at: The going is important. Yep, I do get that.

My exchangers from France arrive a month from today. For all intents and purposes my own trip begins then. You can't see it, but I'm doing a Happy Dance.

As most of you know, I've arranged back-to-back house swaps in France and England this fall. Already I'm getting those little butterflies in the bottom of my stomach when I've got a trip coming up. It's a familiar, pleasant, slightly unsettling feeling. Will I remember to pack my underpants?

Having inherited the McCarn anal streak, I make To Do lists. These To Do lists have spawned more To Do lists. We're now at To Do 6.0.

And then there's the house: It has lists of its own. When you swap your house with someone else, of course you want to leave it in spruce condition. But in the months leading up to the exchange, at least at my address, water marks myteriously appear in the ceiling, my mattress starts sagging, and all the rugs and curtains, like lepers, start screaming "Unclean! Unclean!" My fellow exchangers usually report this same phenomenon.

I'm ticking off tasks daily, but with only a month to go, I'm not sure I'll be fully ready to leave by November. Of 2012.

Having said all that, as usual I'm actually savoring the preparations, the research, the anticipation. I call it packing my 'chute. It's the earliest part of the travel package, and it always pumps me up for the adventure ahead.

Of course, not every trip involves new custom-made draperies in the living room, thank goodness. But I looked at the pending arrival of my visitors as a handy excuse to take on that long-overdue home decor project. They're already up and look exceptionally cool. (See for yourself above.)

The first couple with whom I'm exchanging, Yves and Chantal Benoistel, live right outside Paris. After they arrive in Charlotte we'll have 24 hours together before I leave Sept. 10. It'll be wonderful to meet them, get them oriented to my newly-spiffed-up house and show them a bit how the streets work around town (i.e., Queens, Queens, Queens and Queens Roads).

I just hope they like big, bold, burgundy-colored tulips.

On the joy of "reading"

It may have been St. Francis of Assisi -- or Groucho Marx or Madonna, I forget which -- who said that the world is a book, and they who don't travel are reading only one page.

As a kid the farthest I ever got was central Florida. This was in the pre-Disney days, you understand, so there was basically nothing there but bugs and swamps. I was relegated to the back of a pickup truck that had been crudely tricked out as a camper. A boiling hot, dismal camper. The Okies escaping the Dust Bowl had more luxury. The memory is not a pleasant one. Of course, my mother featured in this episode, so that's enough explanation right there.

Neither Mama nor Daddy cared one whit about going anywhere, not even the beach. Daddy had had his four-year hitch in the Army in Europe during WWII, and that did it for him. He got back in one piece, and he aimed to stay put from then on.

The travel bug first bit me in college. Visiting classmates in exotic locales like Reading, PA, and Hackensack, NJ, was like being set down on a distant planet, and this small-town North Carolina gal loved every rundown row house, every turnpike snarl, every exotic sausage.

It was different than Lexington, you see. And different was interesting.

Picture a dog with its head stuck out of the window of a car, its mouth open and its tongue flapping in pure joy over being taken for a ride. That's me at the start of a trip.

I'm hardly a backpack-and-tent rambler -- I require a clean bed and indoor plumbing at the end of the day -- but travel eventually took on a spiritual quality. On the road, it's easier to find magic in the ordinary. Life is more vivid. You rediscover things you'd forgotten you missed.

Don't get me wrong. My "homepage" is a comfortable, familiar place to browse. The view from my sunroom is beautiful. But to take my breath away, give me a new vista anytime.

(I took the picture above in September 2008 on the Greek island of Santorini. It still takes my breath away...!)