Probably more than any of my past trips to Europe, this one brought a mix of bad with all of the great. Let’s take some space to discuss what went wrong:
-Aging: the pitfalls of growing old presented themselves in a few ways on our trip. Part of this is a result of our borderline frantic approach to touring, but we wore out my parents, and eventually ourselves too. Most of our group ended up with blisters of one kind or another, and everyone was tired by the end. Dad’s fall in Versailles was disappointing, as he’s been riding bikes forever, but was just somehow kind of off that day. Mom’s hearing is sometimes a struggle, especially when dealing with a different language or an impatient son. Stephanie and I are older too, and the occasional guilt when thinking about our kids or work crept in a few times.
-Pickpockets: it really sucks that my dad was robbed, pretty aggressively, and more less in plain sight in the middle of the day. That made us all pretty mad and sad. There were also several other attempts, although less bold, and more annoying than threatening, throughout our trip. It sucks to have to be super vigilant when touring anything in Paris.
-The rude French: to be clear, most of the people who served us in various capacities were kind and patient with us, but not everyone. Also to be clear, there are rude people everywhere, including in famously nice Iowa. But on occasion, we did run into people who came way too close to confirming the caricature of rude French waiters who clearly don’t want Americans in their establishment. I promise I tried very hard to converse as completely in French as possible, but sometimes that wasn’t cutting it, and I guess maybe it doesn’t matter. This one was not a big deal, and we completely survived these situations.
-Bugs: some of us, but especially me, fell victim to a whole bunch of some kind of biting bugs. We think it was in Bruges, and we mostly think it was bed bugs. I’d show you pictures of my arm, but we didn’t take any, and it’s gross anyway. If it wasn’t bed bugs, it was flying insects that invaded our apartment, when we opened most of the window to help with the heat, which brings us to:
-The famous lack of air conditioning in Paris: upon our return to Paris, we faced a record breaking heatwave with unprecedented high temperatures for June. I really hate to join the chorus of Americans blasting Parisians for not being able to handle the heat, but it was pretty oppressive most of the places we went. Nights with a fan were absolutely tolerable, and we did find some cooler places to tour and rest, but it did sap some of our already waning energy to be sure. The heat also meaningfully detracted from a couple restaurant experiences that otherwise would have been superb. When you have to seat through a meal then wait 20 minutes for the check to escape to the relatively cool 85 degree evening air, it’s a little harder to enjoy the truly exceptionally cuisine.
-My lack of patience with all of the above: I’m not proud of some of my reactions to a lot of what went wrong. I was snappy, impatient, and selfish. Everyone in my family was very kind and handled things quite well, but I was too often grumpy in response to things going wrong. Sorry guys, and thanks for putting up with a whiny teenager of a 34-year-old.
-Our lack of creativity in sight-seeing: I’m starting to fell bad about how much we revisit the same sights in Paris. I’m sure we’re missing out on some fantastic new adventures. This one doesn’t fell too bad though, as we really like the sights we like.
Fin - the end. These are the bad things. Our trip was truly great, and I’m very glad to have shared it with these three companion travelers.
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