I tend to change my purse every day to match whatever outfit I am wearing. (Yes, I am that girly.) I keep my purse pretty tidy, so it's not that hard of a task. I move the metro pass from its pocket in the former purse to today's purse. I move my wallet, my girl-scout/be-prepared bag, my pens, my fan or umbrella (depending on the weather), and my reusable grocery sack. No problem.
Well, this morning, I had a problem. The metro pass pocket was half unzipped...and the metro pass was not in it. I looked around the house very quickly, and then in frustration thought, "Someone must have pick-pocketed me and took it out...thus, the half-unzipped pocket." I grabbed my passport and an extra photo (the two necessary items needed to get anything done in France), and ran out the door, hoping that getting a replacement pass would not (a) break my bank and (b) take too much time.
At the metro office, they kindly looked up for me whether it had be returned...it had not. So the woman informed me that I just needed to go to the machine outside, click a certain button, pay, and bring the slip back in. Then, she'd give me my new pass.
Since in France it must be customary to carry a minimum of 10 euros of coins with you at any given time, I began shelling the coins into the machine. 7.50 worth of coins. When I'd gotten 7 euros in, and had only 50 cents left to go, my 50 cent piece rolled back out to the bottom. I picked it up and immediately dropped it back in...and it rolled back out to the bottom. I looked in my wallet...and saw that I only had 40 cents left.
Suddenly there were two gypsy children by my side, ready to help me. Allow me to insert a back story here, because I am learning that reactions to certain things are quite often connected to pas experiences.
Same situation, only 1o years ago...I am standing at a ticket vending machine at a train station in Portugal, and a gypsy child appears. When I do not give them money, they proceed to try to rob me of my change in the bottom of the machine. And then, when I politely, gently push them away from the machine and tell them "No," they yelled a curse at me. Not a cuss word. A curse. And while I do believe that the Spirit of Christ in me protects me from curses...I do not trust gypsy children hanging around me when I am handling cash at a machine.
So there I was, having paid 95% of my ticket, with a non-functioning 50 cent piece and a gypsy child at my side. She reached into the machine, grabbed my coin, and began scraping it against the machine. She then popped it in the machine and it rolled right back down to the bottom. As I tried to tell her thank you, the operation timed out, and all my money began rolling back to the bottom. I told both the kids thank you, and gently put my whole body between them and the machine while I scooped all my change out.
I asked a man next to me if he could make an exchange of coins for me since the machine wasn't accepting my coin. He said, "Of course, in just one second." So I restarted my operation while he bought his ticket, and popped my 7.50 of coins into the machine. When I got to the fateful 50 cent piece, it went in fine...but one of the 1 euro coins rolled back out. FRUSTRATION. The gypsy child stepped back over, reached in, grabbed my coin, rubbed it against the machine, and put it in the coin slot. It went in...but the 50 cent piece rolled back out.
She reached in her pocket, pulled out her own 50 cent piece, and put it in. It worked, and the machine gave me my ticket. I looked at this sweet little gypsy child who was not trying to steal, not calling down curses, but just trying to help in hopes to earn a few coins in return. I looked down in my wallet, and pitifully apologized for only having 40 cents left to give her. She happily took it and thanked me.
Eating humble pie, I went back into the office and got my new pass to replace the lost one...which fell out of my pants pocket onto my bed as I was getting ready to do laundry tonight.
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