The Day That Almost Was

I almost rowed on the Seine today, almost. I didn't want to say anything too soon because the way things go here it's best not anticipate anything. Basically my goal each day is to have the lowest expectation possible so that i can be pleasantly suprised when things actaully work. Basically if I had a basket with 20 eggs- I'm assuming great plague will kill every chick before it hatches and then the eggs will begin to rot and smell something like line 10 of the metro.

going back in time to wednesday- I had managed to get in touch with a rowing club through the director of student life in Paris and she told me to go to this rowing club at 2 o'clock with a medical certificate, 2 pictures (everything in france requires 2 pictures) and the fee for the club- which was not actually decided on- so i was just supposed to show up with large wads of cash. I was not really given any indication of what this would actually mean: when i would be able to row, with whom, where, etc- so i just showed up at the building hoping things would become apparent once i arrived. Instead i found myself surrounded by 12 year olds wearing various rowing clothing. There were two guys who seemed to be in charge so I tried to explain that i wanted to sign up to row- they told me that the Secretary would do that they arrived, but they were running late- so i just stood about, trying to stay out of the way of the 12 year old rowers (apparently training for some big deal french rowing cup). Another man showed up and wandered into the secretary office- I thought the secretary (named Claudine I knew) was a women- but decided perhaps my cultural blindness had misinterperted the gender of this name- so i went over and asked if he was Claudine- at which point he laughed, said no, and that she should arrive soon- apparently Claudine is definitly a woman's name. I essentially walked up to a man and asked if he was Issabelle- awesome work.

When the secretary did show up I was handed a form to fill out - and when I kept attempting to ask questions about what i would be able to do if i signed up and gave here large sums of money- she just said we could discuss "all that" after i filled out the form... If it hadn't already taken me 4 weeks to just reach this point and i didn't understand that this was just a general french thing to make you sign up for things before you really know what you're signing up for I probably would have been more turned off- instead i merely sat down and filled in the usual.

She gave me a brochure that listed hours for the practices - and having explained to her that i was not a beginner she pointed me to the hours for experienced rowers- the first being today from 2 to 5.

So today i arrived- in full rowing gear- eager to discover what exactly i had signed up for- When i went back in the club I found one of the coaches i had seen the other day- he informed me that the adult "leisure" rowing had gone out half an hour before and that the group going out then was actually the beginners. He offered to let me row in a skull (single person boat) but i tried to explain that i'd never done that before - a point at which i realized my rowing vocabulary in french was non-existant. I was then directed towards an english speaking coach who asked how much experience i'd had. This man has told me to return tomorrow at 9am to row with people who actually know what they're doing. So I've dared to elevate my hopes to actually getting to get in a boat tomorrow.. hopefully all will go well. I'm thinking of showing up an hour earlier just in case.