I Love Paris

          I see the dollar is getting stronger and stronger against the euro…or should that be the euro is getting weaker and weaker?  Either way, it should make American and Aussie travelers to Europe chuckle with glee as they load up with previously far too expensive goodies or gifts to take home.

          During my trip to Paris last year with my granddaughter, the exchange rate on our beloved dollar was so pitiful it was hard to enjoy many of the lovely sights Paris has to offer.  Well, if it’s a choice between the Louvre and lunch…?

          So of course, all this euro buzz brought to mind a previous trip to France some years ago.  After touring through Provence for several days, I’d made arrangements to meet up with friends in Paris.  Since we were booked into different hotels we agreed to meet outside Notre Dame early evening and figure out then where to have dinner.

          The cab from the station dropped me off outside my hotel.  A narrow street loaded with Smart cars and only a doorway into the hotel…hmmmm.  However, remembering how unimpressive some of the hotels had looked from the outside in Provence, I optimistically dragged my suitcase and roll-on over the threshold and smiled broadly at the rather fierce woman behind the desk.  I think working as a concierge was her weekend job…she probably works as a prison guard at the local women’s’ institution during the week.

          The prison guard spoke very little English and she apparently wasn’t too impressed with my French because she slapped a registration card in front of me, told me I was a half hour early for check-in and promptly ignored my presence for the next thirty minutes.  Not to worry, I was happy to sit in the lobby and peruse some of the brochures.  After all, I had hours before I was to meet up with my friends.

          Exactly thirty minutes later Madame Prison Guard advised me my room was ready for occupancy.  She apparently got this information through mental telepathy because the phone didn’t ring nor did anyone resembling a maid appear to advise the status of the rooms.  Ah, but why quibble over little details?  I was in Paris!  Let the fun begin!!

          It was then Prison Guard informed me that the elevator was not working and my room was on the third floor!  The elevator would not be fixed for at least 24 hours and so how do you like them apples?  I stood open-mouthed staring at the circular stairway that seemed to rise all the way up to heaven.

          Have you ever tried to get something big and heavy up a circular stairway?  The tread is not the same width all the way across…plus, in this case each step was only about ten inches wide anyway.  Oh, and Prison Guard was happy to tell me, there was no bellman, no janitor, no nuttin’ to assist me in lugging my bags up to the third floor.

          One might now wonder why I didn’t hotfoot it out of the place and find accommodations with a working elevator or at least a bellman…simple…Paris was more or less booked out…the French elections, Liberation day and the like.  So I was stuck.

          I tried to put a happy face on it and lugged my roll-on up the stairs one step at a time.  I was sweaty and exhausted when I finally got to my room.  I truly thought I was going to cark it right there and then.  But, I didn’t have time to drop dead…I still had to make a second trip dragging my very heavy suitcase.

          Back downstairs, I bent over my suitcase panting.  Madam PG apparently worried that I actually might become a corpse in her lobby, suggested I leave the suitcase behind her desk until the morning when, hopefully the elevator repairman would present himself for service.  I explained I was meeting friends for dinner, I had to shower and my change of clothes were in the suitcase.

          PG came up with brilliant idea…I should take my shower and then I could come back downstairs and change right there.  I had visions of me running down the stairs wrapped in a bath towel, rummaging in my suitcase for the appropriate items and then what?  Bobbing up and down behind her desk while I put on my clean knickers?  Heaven forbid that anyone else was checking in at the time.

          But, finally I was in my room, flaked out on the bed and wondering if I’d ever be able to stand upright again.

          That’s when I discovered the toilet didn’t work properly.  Flush and listen to the water running endlessly into the tank.  I located a maid on the floor above (who didn’t speak English of course…she didn’t speak French either, she was Jamaican) and with hand signs explained my problem.  She was so helpful, she showed me that by turning the water off at the wall all would be well.  So for whatever my euro outlay was per night, not only did I have to haul my own luggage up three flights of stairs, I also had to turn the toilet water on and off every time I wanted to pee!

          But I still love Paris.  I’ll just make sure future stays will have hotels with at least a bellman if not a working elevator.