Why Paris is evil

Paris doesn't have to be avil, but It is. The buildings are beautiful and the weather is gorgeous. Hard to enjoy whilst lugging around a 120lb bag and 2 backpacks and a purse. I got off the train at gare Montparnasse after a long ride from the south. Where is the lockers? All closed since the London bombings, try Gare de l'Est. Okay, since that was the gare wrom which I was leaving I hauled myself accross the city by Metro and arrived eshausted at gare L'Est. Les lockers? Mais non! Try gare du Nord. Just 5 minutes a pied. Huh! More like 15 minutes, with a huge 30-stair climb (someone helped me out. Probably not Parisian) and a big hike. At the gare du nord I spent honestly 40 minutes walking in circles trying to find the lockers and terrified that someone would tell me that they were closed too. I asked and asked but everyone pretended that they couldn't understand my french. Also I kept getting LOOKS and bonjours. I was sweaty and miserable-looking. Did I look like I wanted a flirt?

I had to go out to the cash machine to get money for the lockers and there was a very VERY angry man. The bank machine had just eaten his card. And it was a stand alone machine and he was leaving Paris and needed his card. He started explaining this to the currency exchange guy behind the machine and he told the poor angry man that there was nothing he could do and call the number on the machine too bad too bad. THANK you R for the warning. I snatched my card out of there the moment it popped out. Scary!

Les bloody lockers cost 7 Euros! In Salzburg it costs 3.50. No comment. The security guard there kept flirting with me "oooh, you are from Canada. I know that because you have a CANADIAN FLAG on your backpack." Oh clever man! I am sure that witticisms like that will get you beaucoup de booty.

Once outside I asked a man at a nearby shoe store where I could walk to see something interesting. He immediately started talking in English. He asked me how long I was going to be in Paris. I said that it was a few hours, and what could I see please?
He said that no-one could see anything here at all and if I only had a few hours I had better just sit at the station and not go anywhere. I made it clear that I was not asking his permission to tour. Just some directions.

I managed to find somewhere relatively cheap to eat. The pasta was tres without flavour, but it was pretty. There are 4 more hours to kill. This city has no benches. There is nowhere to sit, and I am sick of walking.

By the way, I look like I have been beaten or that I just got home from Africe (hee hee W) or something. My left arm, which was bitten twice by a spider or mosquito or something, is bright red and rather swollen. The right arm is also swollen with a bite, and my clavacle too. I got scratched by dogs last night (they didn't mean it!) and my knee has a big scratch on it. The back of my right leg is bloody and torn from a rosebush when I went looking for chickens last night. ALL worth it, but these are going to be hard to cover up (it is ia DEEP scratch on my leg. When I went to my room last night it was bleeding a lot. Ew! Those things never heal!)

A few words about yesterday - I spent the day learning music. In the morning we went to the market to shop for chickens. Did I mention this already? Don't worry mum I'm not bringing home a chicken. Then I went swimming in the creek with 2 dogs, who kept thinking that I needed rescuing and jumped all over me. At night one could see the milky way. It was so gorgeous. I am sick of travelling alone though!

I should go and see this city. It is bad, bad to waste a day in paris, but I am so, so tired. I hope there is no-one beside me on le train.

Salut!