Trying To Go To London

Travel Troubles.

It all started with the loss off my most precious documents. The passport is okay, but the people who give visas seem to have decided that if one loses a visa, one must jump through teeny tiny hoops set at dangerous heights in order to get a new one. Except they won't tell you how to get to wherever the hoops are, and you might not see all of them because they're all hidden like little Easter eggs. I had scheduled a visit this weekend to visit my aunt and cousin+wifey in London, and the desk for the airline closes exactly forty minutes before departure. Exactly forty minutes.

Yesterday, (Happy Thanksgiving) my father mentioned that though I could leave France without a problem, I might have some issues if I tried to get back into the country without a visa. I had asked the woman at the American Presence Post in Rennes about this very subject, and she had indicated that I shouldn't have any problems, but I figured (a.k.a. between Dad and Aunt Rhoda I was half convinced that I was never going to be able to leave France, ever) it would be prudent to double-check. I went down to the Bureau of Foreigners (that's the exact translation) and waited for about an hour to have a lady tell me that all I needed to do was attach a couple documents, one of which I didn't have. This conversation, once she actually stopped interrogating me long enough to tell her why I was there, took about thirty minutes, and I was already starting to feel pressed for time. The missing document was something the folks in Rennes were supposed to have copied for me when I went there, but they didn't. It was 11:00 am.

Panic! All I could think of was how the last time I called the APP Rennes (who had the document I needed) it took them four days to respond. Of course, I forgot that I called them on a holiday, but that didn't stop my respiration and heartrate from increasing at a dizzying pace. I rushed to school and found the number for the consulate in Rennes, and with my heart in my throat I called. Success! The lady answered. Ambiguity! She said she didn't always keep a copy of the files she sent to Paris, but she would look. She also told me I would have to come to Rennes to pick it up, which is a two-hour train ride one way. Success? She said she could fax it, but I didn't have access to a fax machine. Panic! At the Disco! I was running around, trying to print off copies of all the documents that I thought I might need, and asking for a fax machine. Success! The woman in the Office of International relations offered to let me use hers. Bigger Success! The document came through, I made copies and trundled home to eat and finish packing and tidying my room. Small failure. I couldn't find a stapler, so I had to just paper clip the documents to my passport. Small success. My room is tidy for the first time in a month.

Success! I got on the train on time, and arrived in Rennes with about an hour until the Ryan Air desk closed for the flight. Failure! It turns out that the shuttle to the airport left while I was getting off the train, and the next one didn't come until 5:01 pm, and would reach the airport after the office closed. I sat down to wait for a taxi, but the most taxis were waiting for customers who had summoned them ahead of time, and there weren't a whole lot of them waiting around. I sat there for an hour. Tiny success. I grabbed a taxi. Failure. The taxi came at 4:40. I had 25 minutes to get to the airport and to the Ryan Air check-in point. Failure! The traffice was ridiculous. I know the taxi driver could tell I was anxious because he kept reassuring me that the traffic would ease up one we exited the city. Bigger failure! We didn't get out of the city until a little before 5:00. HUGE FAILURE I ran up to the desk at, according to the airport clock, 5:08:30, three and a half minutes after it closed. The crabby lady refused to let me slide by; I was obviously not the first late and desperate customer she had dealt with. Despair. I shed half a tear before trying to find another plane to London. There were none leaving from Nantes, so I called home, called Aunt Rhoda, bought time on the internet (which was achingly slow) to search for flights. There was one from Paris, but it would have cost my an extra 200 euros. Er, maybe not. I thought about sleeping in my own bed for the night, but by the time I gave up trying to find flights I had also missed the last train from Nantes to Angers.

So here I sit at the B&B, having choked down a nasty sandwich from the vending machines and reserved another flight (at twice the cost of the original, and this is one way), I sit typing this entry on free WiFi. The internet came with a room that smells as if someone had opened a can of air freshener from the '80s and added some nursing home smell on top of it, and I can oncly access said internet while sitting in the reception area. Thus far six guests have mistaken me for an employee. I don't even know how to end this thing