Читать книгу Our House is Not in Paris - Susan Cutsforth - Страница 9

Like couples the world over, we tend to argue the most on car trips. This is never a pleasant experience, but it’s particularly unpleasant when it occurs in a foreign country. We had organised to pick up our hire car from Rennes, a few hours from Paris on the TGV. Originally, Stuart had planned to collect a hire car in Paris and start our trip from there. This was one of the few occasions I decided to override his decision. I could picture it clearly: Our first drive in France would be in one of the most chaotic, challenging cities in the world. Stuart was already very fond of saying merde whenever possible. It didn’t take much stretch of the imagination to predict the excessive use of merde and the escalating arguments from the moment the car was in first gear.

After our five days of luxury in the Melia Colbert Boutique Hotel, a style to which we were definitely not accustomed, we set off on the Métro with several changes before catching the train to Rennes. By then we had already accumulated a lot of extra luggage. Sometimes we behave like novice travellers. We arrived in Paris with suitcases already packed to the brim. What were we thinking? That we wouldn’t shop once on our six-week trip?

We of course arrived in Rennes in time for the two-hour déjeuner break. Laden with luggage, we ensconced ourselves in a café near the station for a few hours. By early afternoon, as we crammed ourselves on a bus headed for the industrial outskirts to collect our Citroën, the sun was beating down ferociously. There were many instances of Excusez-moi, merci beaucoup as we gripped our assorted pieces of luggage and swayed in the aisles while afternoon commuters attempted to get past us.

Finally, the car rental company. This was just one of many occasions on which I was both naïve and the source of considerable amusement. We were shown the red safety cones that we were to display on the side of the road in case of a breakdown, emergency or accident. I grasped that; it certainly made sense. Then there were the bright yellow safety jackets. I foolishly — and a better grasp of French may have been a considerable advantage — assumed that we were to wear them in the car at all times so we could be identified as tourists. I was surprised that Stuart didn’t try to convince me that, indeed, it was just the passenger who was to wear it at all times.

Finally, after the extensive instructions about our Citroën, we attached our friend Dave Toogood’s borrowed Sat Nav to the dashboard and we were on our way to our rented house in Rignac in the Lot. We looked forward to our apéritif in the jardin once we arrived in a couple of hours. It would in fact be five hours before we arrived.

We had got lost. We got lost at the very first roundabout. We continued to get lost; very lost. The miles ticked away, the hours ticked away, the tempers rose in equal proportion. This is where we were different; very different. Stuart is always determined to do everything with complete independence. He rarely asks for help. This includes all our many renovations, when I had to help lift and haul and hold any number of items such as huge slabs of concrete. Me? I always ask for help whenever I possibly can and for whatever I need. Invariably my technique works.

By this point, as the sun was sinking in the sky, I was adamant that his way was not working. We needed help and we needed it soon. There were no service stations, no villages; we were in the middle of nowhere. There were cars, however. And so we pulled over to the side of the road. Once again, my improvising and dramatic skills came to the fore. I grabbed the large road map, stood behind the car, pointed at the map, raised my free hand in the air and gesticulated wildly to indicate that we were lost and needed help. The eighth car pulled over. The driver had two squabbling young children in the back seat but conveyed that, if we followed him, he would indicate the road that we should have been on. I gathered that we were quite close to Rignac after all. How I grasped all this, I’m not quite sure, because once again I certainly didn’t have the French to convey our predicament and the driver did not speak English.

Nevertheless, it worked. We followed him a short distance along the main road, turned off and stopped at a church where he pointed us in the right direction. He turned around and headed back to the main road to continue his journey. Once again I was astonished by the kindness of strangers, for I had assumed that he was going the same way as us. Non, he had gone out of his way to help us.

And so we arrived in Rignac.