In Herblay (Part II)

The train is rushing past. I live so close to it, I can see (and hear it) outside of my window. One of my roommates is in the living room watching a "football" match, intermittently shouting phrases like "Oui!" and "Ouh là là!" at the television. ***

I'm writing this travelogue, sitting on my bed, trying to conjure up memories from three weeks ago. So much has happened since then. I'm even living in a different city.  

Still, I'll return to the story of my first week in France. The week in the city of Herblay. 

The day after I discovered that quality grapes actually taste like wine (I believe they were Muscat grapes), I took a trip back to the grocery store. This time I would walk there. 

There are so many things you need when you're moving into a place. This place in particular needed a little extra love. Our apartment was at the same level as the garage, but for all intents and purposes it was a basement. 

It had windows up toward the top of the wall to let in a little air, but it was so dark you had to have the lights turned on at all times in the kitchen and in the bedrooms.

The smell of something damp and dank permeated the air. It was something faintly reminiscent of the older dorm rooms at my alma mater (the dorm buildings that had the asbestos warnings written at the front entrance). I registered another stench, too. Maybe a mold of some sort. 

It was dusty. At one point, I opened a cabinet in the kitchen just above the burners, then immediately closed it. Some very large spiders were chilling in there (none of that daddy longlegs stuff, I'm talking the real deal here). I quickly decided it was their cabinet, and that it was rude of me to open the door without knocking. 

My room was fine, apart from the smell, the dust, some spider webs, and different spiders that were in this case small enough to share a living quarters with. I realize now that sentence sounds sarcastic. It was actually a sincere attempt to say it wasn't that bad. 

The toilet is another story. A thick, brown, (and what I would soon find was close to impenetrable) coating covered the bottom of the bowl. But I have lived in my fair share of less-than-ideal places, so I wasn't alarmed. 

I thought it was probably just mineral deposits from hard water and general lack of use. Then I scrubbed it once. Then twice. Then a third time. I only got real results when I poured Coca-Cola in the bowl and let it sit overnight. (Simultaneously a great and terrible advertisement for Coke).

The whole time, I thought it was just an old, mistreated toilet. I later found out that the other assistant in my program — who got to the apartment a few days before me — said flies had been buzzing in the toilet when she arrived. 

So... not mineral deposits. 

Anyways, the house needed some work. And I needed to go back to the store for more produce and more cleaning supplies. Of course, a simple trip to the store turned into a trek. 

I lived at the end of a culdesac. Woods that looked straight out of Grimms' fairy tales were nearby. That being said, the closest grocery store was a 20-minute walk, at least. 

I didn't know how to get there, but I didn't have phone data that would allow me to navigate once I left my apartment. No SIM card yet. Instead, I used the Wi-Fi at my apartment to get walking directions, then took a screenshot of them on my phone. 

I was off. Then I quickly learned that street names in France are little blue signs that are oftentimes hard to find, and that most streets look more like curves and circles than lines and angles. 

I was lost. I'd have to ask for directions. Time to practice my French. 

I saw a nice, middle-aged lady outside a home. I asked her. She told me the grocery store was far. I said I didn't have a car, so I was walking anyway. She told me she would ask her mom for directions because she didn't know the area.

Her mom came out, still sprightly. She gave her daughter instructions, then the daughter told me. This was all in French, so I took a little bit of pride in being able to understand her. I followed the random dirt path she showed me. Then I got out to a street. I took some turns, got a little lost again, but eventually stumbled upon another random dirt path. Believe it or not, a tiny little marker toward the bottom of the ground showed it was a real street — or trail, at least. It was actually listed on my Google Maps directions. 

It was the path of justice.

Really, that was the name. Chemin de la Justice. 

                           Chemin de la Justice, an actual path listed on Google Maps

From there...

I would eventually find the supermarket. 

I would eventually find the way back. After getting lost in the woods. 

I would eventually buy a SIM card for my phone. A few days later.

I would eventually realize that maybe, even though I had found stable housing, maybe I didn't come to France to live by the woods, in a basement, a full-on hike from a grocery store, nowhere near a train station. Maybe, I should try to live somewhere else.  

But I hadn't realized it yet. I thought I could still make it work. If you walked 6 minutes to the bus stop, then rode the bus to the train station, then took one train, then transferred to another, you could get to Paris in about one hour and 15 minutes. 

That could work, right?

 *** As I was writing, I got the alert from France's public radio station. France beat Germany 2-1 in the UEFA Nations League.

In Herblay

The house rests at the end of a cul de sac. A heavily wooded forest is just a short walk away.

I lived in that house for a week, and it was a formative stay, to say the least. My time in the city of Herblay — some 12 miles from the center of Paris — had its highs and lows. From the tops of the town's many tree branches to the crunched flora that lay underneath. In Herblay, I learned that marron is how you say chestnut in French.

I learned that dirt paths in the middle of nowhere always lead somewhere. I learned that somewhere can feel like nowhere if there's no train nearby.

Before leaving Florida, I secured housing in Herblay — a two bedroom in-law unit below a home lived in by the proprietor.  I was sharing it with another English assistant in my program who told me about the spot while I was in the middle of a desperate housing search.

The kitchen of the in-law unit is where I sat down and wrote my first post for this travelogue. My first night in France.

That evening, my stomach was empty from traveling. My legs were weary, too. I didn't have the energy to venture out and find food. At one point, I started eating my leftover mentos.

As I settled in, I heard a knock on the door. The proprietor's 10-year-old daughter was standing before me with a bright smile and a thick piece of chocolate cake.

"Bienvenue," she said. Welcome.

I'll always remember that.

A street in Herblay

The next morning, the proprietor gave me a ride to the nearest grocery store, along with a handful of reusable bags for shopping. No plastic bags in these parts. It was a Sunday, which meant it was a miracle the grocery store was even open. Most things in France are closed "le dimanche," and still the store was closing at 1:30 p.m. that day.

I walked in holding a "jeton" the proprietor gave me. It's a small, round plastic token, almost like a coin, that you put into a grocery cart in order to access it. Anyone in the states familiar with the German grocery chain Aldi will know what I'm referring to. But with Aldi you use real coins.

Anyways, I walk in, jeton in hand, looking around for the carts. I hadn't seen any outside. Finally, I approach a kind saleswoman at customer service.

She didn't speak English. I kind of speak French. In that moment, I realized that after four years of French in high school, another four years of French in college, and one month living just outside of Paris in 2013...

I had never learned the word for grocery cart.

Uh, je cherche uh...(I'm looking for)

Hmm, I know basket is a word in France, maybe if I say baskets I can just get a grocery basket instead. 

"des baskets?" I said

"Des baskets!?" she said.

Oh boy, baskets definitely does not mean baskets here.***

It turned into a quick game of charades until she said, "chariot." (shar-ee-o)

It was "dans le parking." So, the grocery carts were outside the whole time. And I will now, for the rest of my life, know that chariot means grocery cart in French.

The stores were not unlike American grocery stores. Though when I walked past the bread, I was amused that not a single baguette was left.

While browsing through cleaning supplies, an employee walked up to me to tell me the store was closing soon.

I got what items I had and I went to check out. Then I frantically rushed back to the aisles to get paper towels.

I learned a thing or two when I finally went to go pay. Produce has to be weighed beforehand. They won't do it for you at checkout. I did not know this.

So the cashier stopped when she saw my bag of produce and said something that to this day I do not understand. I could not make out a single word. Only after leaving the store, I realized why I couldn't buy any produce.

But I did get to buy the pre-packaged grapes. And I remembered then that real grapes have seeds. You see, everyone talks about how great French wine is. But that day, I realized why. Those were the best grapes I've ever eaten.




***While I remembered correctly that baskets is a word in French, baskets actually mean sneakers. So I was asking if they had tennis shoes at the grocery store.

How I learned to stop worrying and love the train

If you avoid the tolls, it takes 48 minutes to drive from Paris Charles de Gaulle airport to the small in-law unit where I was staying in Herblay, France. At the risk of sounding melodramatic, those 48 minutes felt like a scene at the beginning of "48 Hours."

I was in an Uber that I ordered from the airport. And for a moment, en route to the destination, I wondered if I'd actually get to Herblay.

Call it hyperbole. Chalk it up to jet-lag fueled paranoia. Or maybe it was a real threat. Who knows at this point.

The ride started like most do. The driver hopped out of the car, verified my name was the one on the app, then put my luggage in the back. We were off.

What a difference five years makes. The first time I wrote about a weird ride from Charles de Gaulle, it was in a taxi. This time around, I ordered an Uber. For whatever reason, my rides from the airport are always insane enough to warrant an entire post. Back in the 2013, the guy pulled over mid-drive so he could pee. 

No pit stops this time around. Speeding down the highway, my driver made conversation. 

He didn't speak English. I kind of speak French. He asked me if he was taking me to my house.  I said I was going to visit a friend.

He later asked me a second time if I lived there, maybe a third. Why, pray tell, do you need to know if I live there? I just kept saying I was visiting a friend. 

At some point during the ride, he went onto Google translate on his other phone and said to the dictation microphone, "T'es mariée?"

I already knew what he was asking, but within seconds the automated English voice responded on his phone, "Are you married?" 

I deflected answering the question.

Still, I was unphased at this point. I hadn't panicked until his next question, which, on the surface, might seem harmless. He asked if I had called anyone to tell them I was on my way.

My interpretation: does anyone know where you are right now? Would anyone be missing you?

That's when the warning signs came on. I have taken many an Uber before, and I did not think this series of questions added up. Well, they did add up, but not to something I wanted any part with. 

"Il m'attends à 17 heures."  He's expecting me at 5 p.m., I said.

The ride turned uncomfortably silent after that. I'm quietly mumbling all the applicable Psalms I know while I stared straight ahead at his phone, looking at his GPS for one wrong turn and knowing I probably couldn't tell the difference, anyway. He on the other hand, picked up the speed and sometimes looked back to see me stonily staring ahead at the map.

But I made it to my destination, thank God.

Call me paranoid, and I'd say there's a great Kid Cudi feature on the remix of that track. 

Call me paranoid a second time, and I'd tell you that international cities are hubs for human traffickers and what if...

TL; DR: Next time, I'm taking the train.