So yesterday morning, I went to the train station. I was actually quite proud of myself for being an hour early for an early train. Since I had some spare time, I used a lot of it to figure out which platform I needed, and a bit to look around. This left me with about a half an hour to spare, which, judging by the short lines, would be plenty of time. This, of course, was an assumption based on another assumption: that my train wouldn't leave half an hour early. This left me, and several other people, looking forlorn in the train station in Barcelona, where the language is not quite Spanish. So after walking around a bit with someone who worked there, we were rushed quickly onto another train that was headed in the same general direction. And it conveniently left at about the same time our train was supposed to leave.
No a terribly hard fix, right? That, dear friends, is exactly what I thought as I sat down on the train and took a quick nap. I set an alarm for about 20 minutes before my stop, just to be safe. We get to the Figueres stop and I hop of the train, with some time to spare to jump on the next one. It takes me a few minutes to realize that they have dropped me off at Figueres and my ticket was for Figueres Vilafont, and I was fairly willing to bet that they were not the same station. On that matter, I was correct. I tried to ask someone where it was, but she just kept telling me I was at the wrong station. So I had to go look for the other train station. Fortunately, I walked outside and found a couple of cops. Even more fortunately, I was still in Spain, so I could talk to them. I told them what had happened and they sent me to the bus station, but told me to run because the bus was probably leaving in 5 minutes. So I took off running across the square in the general direction they had pointed for the station. I ran in the door, found someone as quick as I could, and told him I needed the bus for Vilafont. Seeing the train time on my ticket, he took off running, so I followed him. We ran outside, and he flagged down the bus that was already leaving. I hopped on board and prayed I would make it in time. Luckily, the security line was basically non-existent, so I made it through quickly and took off running under the tracks to the other platform. I managed to hop on about 30 seconds before they closed the doors. The nice thing was, everything happened so quickly that I didn't have a chance to freak out and think about what I would do if I missed the connection.
The next transition, at Montpellier St. Roch, went much better. I found the machine to print my ticket, struggled to understand what it wanted me to do, figured it out, and was on my way. I had a lot more time to relax on this train since it was a 4 hour ride. And I ended up sitting across from the perfect person. It was a little old French lady. She seemed very nice and tried to talk to me in French several times. Then she would remember that I don't speak any French and shake her head, laughing, and say "English...". Soon enough, a rather attractive man came around checking tickets. He stopped and chatted, laughing with the woman, then looked up and smiled at me and said something in French. And, of course, the lady shook her head, laughed, and said "English..." all over again, making him laugh again. It was at about this point that I really wish I knew at least a few words in French, although there was another point later. About halfway through the trip, my friend offered me some candy. She also told me to take two and laughed because I don't even know the word for "two" in French. I ate the candies, but quickly realized they were black licorice flavored, which happens to be my least favorite. However, the lady kept offering them. Since I didn't want to be rude and I didn't know how to politely decline so that she would understand, I kept eating them.
I'm pretty sure by the time I got off that train, everybody near by had laughed at me at least once, but I didn't really mind. I kind of enjoyed my little conversation through miming with an older French woman.
Luckily, I found my hostel fairly quickly. So I got settled in and then went for a walk. I wasn't really sure what to expect, but it was a beautiful night, so I took a few shots.
Until then,
KT
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