It has taken me several days to fill out a simple form that I needed to fax back to the university. First I had to go to the papeterie to print the pages – ordinarily this is easy, but this time it was not. The USB drive that I had bought just for this project and had used with my Mac did not want to talk to the PC in the papeterie. The young man who had been very helpful to me in the past made every effort to produce the papers I had requested, even hooking up the store’s printer to my computer. In the end he had to copy the documents from my computer to his personal USB drive in order to get them printed. By then the store had been closed for 15 minutes. At this point, I did not ask if they had a fax machine and planned to return the next day with my completed forms.
When I got home, I discovered that there were two more items that I needed to print besides finding a fax machine. Michele steered me toward another office store not far from school that had been Mac-friendly for her. This I found in the morning but they did not have a fax. At this point I decided to ask the school if they could assist and they did. Unfortunately, the fax would not go through after three attempts. Then it was decided that they could be scanned so that I could send them via email. With just a little more drama, the entire set of scanned pages was sent to my email account and I happily went on my way and sent off the forms. Hip-hip-hooray! This was a much bigger task away from home than I ever could have imagined.
The next entries will likely be brief since I am preparing for my departure of Nice. Over the last few days I have been eating whatever combination of food the refrigerator has offered. Tonight, however, I found a marvelous thin crust pizza made in a van on a street corner for 5 Euros that will make lunch tomorrow, too. This has also been a time to say final good-byes to the many good people I have met and worked with over these last three months.
Michele and I went out for lunch together. I wanted to take her to Chez Panisse at the Best Western Hotel, but it seemed that the patio area was not being attended to before noon, so we walked back a few blocks to a little Salon du The. We ordered the Artichoke Heart with wine and then coffee afterwards. It was good, but the service left a little to be desired. We had a nice time talking about Michele’s dream of traveling throughout the States to places where famous authors lived. She and a friend may do this in the fall. I hope that we will be able to connect when she is in the Midwest.
After school today, I met Mariette (one of my previous teachers) at a little bar on rue Victor Hugo. We each had a glass of beer. We started out in French, but she was very kind and let me practice my English for most of our time together.
The other important task that I was able to complete online in the last two days was renting a car for my Luxembourg portion of the trip. Hopefully all will be in place when I reach my destination. Look out world! (Yikes!) Since it is Easter weekend, perhaps there will be less traffic on the roads for a few days.
These are the ordinary adventures of my days on the road. The entries of the next few weeks may be even more sporadic since I don’t know where I will find Internet service in Luxembourg and Norway. However, I hope that you will check back here occasionally for more stories and pictures.
Have a blessed Easter, Dear Reader.
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