En Grève

... That means "on strike" in french and it is a phrase and activity that is verrry popular in France. Our first week here, there was a big strike that had to do with protesting the government-sanctioned increase of retirement age for public transport employees (I think?) and it put on hold all public transport in the city of Nantes – I think select few bus and tram lines ran, but not at regular intervals and not for the entirety of the day. My mom drove me that day because it was something like my second day in the city and there is no way I could have figured out that puzzle. Which was nice.

Today was the second strike that involved public transit, but this morning and throughout the beginning of the day it affect mostly off-lines (i.e. less commonly used lines) of the tram, which I don't use unless I'm going to the university to swim or take my psychology class.

After our classes today, my friend Amy and I went out for an afternoon coffee date to boost our energy and catch up on each other's life history in high school college (where I ordered a drink that was called the "chocolat maison" with "café" flavoring, but tasted suspiciously like it contained brandy... My friend tried it and agreed with me, but I didn't feel it afterward so it musta just been a weird combination of other flavors. Interesting though!) and on the way back we had to squeeze our way through a huge group of strikers in the street to get back to the IES center. Then when I was walking to my bus stop to go home, I had to wait at a crosswalk for 12 police cars and two police motorcycles to pass in front of me.

Literally twelve and two, I counted.

The counting to two was a challenge.

Just kidding.

And these cars weren't like wimpy, pull-you-over for speeding police cars, they were like big vans and SUVs with french policemen WEARING ARMOR inside! I just stared like a typical shocked tourist, my head swiveling back and forth like a tennis spectator's as each new car passed in front of me. After they all passed and I started to walk across the crosswalk, my eyes still glued to the pair of bullet-proof, geared-up policemen on motorcycles, the cars all began starting up their sirens. It was so crazy!

Then a few streets down, I saw a huge group of people holding signs and making a lot of noise, shouting in french and chanting things and tweeting whistles and blowing horns. I made it to my bus stop, which I hoped was running, and there was a bus sitting by the stop but as I got closer I saw that no one was getting on. I asked a lady if we were allowed to get into it, and she told me it had been there a while and the driver wasn't inside.

Deserted buses? People marching and chanting in huge masses down the busiest drag in Nantes? Vast amounts of policemen prepared to be shot at?

Dang, France. Anything else?

Finally the driver of the abandoned bus came back but then he just drove off without anyone inside. Before too long another bus came and we all got inside and it wasn't the normal bus that goes on my line, and all the digital read-out signs on it were saying the wrong things, but it seemed like the other people at the stop were alright with it so I just pretended to be too.

Then the driver turned the bus off and we all just sat there for about ten minutes before he started it up again and started driving through our regular route.

We stopped at a couple of normal bus stops but traffic was really backed up and people kept just running up to the bus and knocking on the door and the driver would open it up and let them on in the middle of an intersection, acting like the whole situation bored him. All the other passengers were completely unphased by the situation and I put on my best "I'm a french student and I don't make any facial expression because I see this kind of thing all the time" face and pushed the "stop" button when i saw my stop coming up, despite the lack of digital sign indications and overhead friendly french woman announcing my stop.

I hopped off the bus and an old man standing at the intersection near my stop stood directly in front of me and said, "Bonjour mademoiselle..." with the intention of telling me something, but I muttered a "Bonjour monsieur, pardon..." and shrugged past him like a true french student.

Finally I made it back to my house and was all hyped up on my chocolate/coffee/brandy(?) drink that I was so excited to start telling this story and then halfway through I lost steam and had to listen to music and check my facebook and email, etc.

I think I'm developing memory-loss-induced AD(H?)D here. My friend told me today I remind her of the fish from Finding Nemo who has short-term memory loss. I can't remember her name. (The fish's in the movie, not my friend's.) I guess that's further evidence to support to my friend's point. Oh well!

In unrelated but just-as-exciting news, I bought two plane tickets this morning! One is to Dublin and one is to Geneva, and my friends and I are hashing out plans to go to Rome in mid-November as well. I'm such a world traveler! This weekend we're going to Mont St. Michel and next weekend I'm rendez-vousing in Paris with Amelia who's in Sweden this semester! And after our weekend in Paris she's coming to Nantes to stay for a few days before heading off on other worldly excursions.

We're gonna have such fun adventures, I just can't wait!