Back in Tejas (Paris Part 2 and Leaving Deutschland)

Well I’m back home now…but I will get to that later in this post.

John and I forgot a really great story from the end of our Paris trip. After midnight on New Year’s, we took the subway back home and all the cars were really crowded. I noticed this woman standing behind John with the most beautiful smile. I leaned over and asked (in French) if she spoke English. When she said yes, I told her that I thought she had a great smile, and she said she had been thinking the same thing about me. I don’t know how it came up, but she said she was Swedish but lives in Paris. When she got off the car, I said “ha det bra!” (goodbye in Norwegian, but understandable to Swedes). She answered back with “ha det bra” as well.

Ok, so that wasn’t the great story I originally reference, because the great story is ten times better than that. While all this was going on with the Swedish woman, all these French people (around our age) were jumping around next to us and singing in French. Soon, they noticed John and me and asked John what his name was. They then pleaded with him to sing everyone a song. I leaned over and told him to sing the Beautiful Girls song, so he did. Atfterwards, all those French kids started chanting “John! John! John!” and wanted him to sing another, so he sang Stand By Me. They cheered a LOT when he was done. It was so much fun. Like John said, when else is a whole subway car going to cheer your name?

I also wanted to write about the two days before I left (Friday and Saturday). I wanted to take John out for coffee on Friday night, so we headed to this little coffee shop we found a week or two ago right by the Schwetzingen castle. We were stopped at the door by bouncers!! They said we weren’t dressed up enough (“too sporty” they said). Apparently the calm coffee house turns into a nightclub on the weekends. Weird! That wouldn’t have been the calm evening grabbing coffee that we had envisioned even if we had gotten in. We tried to go again on Saturday afternoon, and it had returned to its normal coffee shop atmosphere. (Think about how weird it would be to go to a Starbucks on a Friday night and get denied entrance because you weren’t dressed up enough, and inside, there was a big nightclub scene.) We decided to get a late lunch there, and I had the BEST sandwich. It was on top of a baguette (as in the bread wasn’t sliced open) and had sliced tomatoes, zucchini, mozzarella cheese and oregano or some other spice. So tasty. IT figured that I would finally find something I liked to eat the DAY before I left.

My flight out was on Sunday at 2:10 PM. We got up early and left for the airport shortly before 11. We got into the check in area around noon, and there was a REALLY long line. We had wanted to get a leisurely lunch together after checking in, but because it took over an hour to get through the line, we had to eat a rushed lunch in order for me to make it through security to board my plane on time.

We said a very tearful goodbye, and I made my way through security. John didn’t stay to see me through, because we agree that it’s better to just say goodbye and go so we don’t have to stand there watching the other person leaving. I cried my way through security and was worried that I had mascara all over my face. When I got to the man who stamped my passport, I asked him if I had mascara on my face. He didn’t understand the word mascara, so I repeated “Do I have black on my face? I have been crying.” He misunderstood and thought I told him he had black on his face from crying. While wiping his face, he replied, “Oh, no. Must be from stamp.” I didn’t laugh until after I’d passed him, but it was funny.

My flight time to Chicago was roughly 10 hours, but we sat on the runway for an hour before taking off because the fog was pretty bad that day. Unlike my flight to Germany, I had someone sitting directly next to me. It really cut down on the already tiny amount of room you get in coach. To make matters worse, my seat didn’t recline. Bummer! There weren’t any other seats to change to, either. I don’t mean to complain too much about my flight, but I also have to mention the food they served. The lunch was ok, but dinner was a mushroom pizza. Mushrooms? Mushrooms?! Why serve something so many people don’t like? After I scraped off a majority of the mushrooms, I discovered the bread was also terribly tough.
I guess I shouldn’t have expected anything more from airline food though!

When I got to Chicago, I had to go through Customs, which took about an hour. I waited in line to get my passport stamped, then I had to pick up my luggage (two gigantic suitcases), drop off my Customs Declaration form and haul the suitcases to another room to be rechekced for my next flight. Then, I got on the O’Hare rail system and went to the terminal for my flight to Austin. Once there, I had to go through security AGAIN. Afterwards, I went to Chili’s and enjoyed a nice long dinner while watching the Cowboys lose (not so nice). My layover in Chicago was about 4 hours, so I had some time to pass.

My flight to Austin left a little after 9:30 and felt like it took forever. I couldn’t fall asleep even though I was very tired.

My roommates (all 3 of them) met me back in Austin and took me home. *sigh* I guess it’s good to be home, but I sure wish John could have come too.

One last thing… 5324miles.blogspot.com will still work to get you to this blog, but we decided to make a permanent blog together. That blog will be at www.sojoblog.com. We might transfer completely away from this blog, but then again, we might not! We really want to find a format that will let us customize how the blog looks, so stay tuned!