My ability to make friends was just to funny to not recount in this instance. Please note no harm is intended toward this person, she was odd indeed, but most people are and Ive always liked the odd ones better.
Let me mention our hostel room mate, who's name now escapes me. All i remember is that she was Romanian and she was crazy. She also seemed to have a funny love hate relationship with me.
If not previously mentioned our hostel in Paris was a hole... a large elevator-less, oven baking hot hole. As you can imagine this girl arrives with a flourish in our room after carrying her ridiculously heavy suitcase up 5 flights of stairs on a 40degree day. And so, the party began.
She was obviously about to drop dead of dehydration so the poor thing asked for some water, i gave her a spare full bottle I had. No thanks needed. Once her thirst was quenched however, she vehemently thanked me again and again demanding the right to buy me another 40 cent bottle if i would allow it. I politely said it wasn't necessary and she seemed to take offence and began demanding to buy me a new one. I relented and said she may do as she pleased- which shushed her finally. She never actually bought me anything in the end, i think she just wanted me to give permission for her to do so... if she ever felt like it...
Let me regale you with other funny things about my Romanian friend :)
Being so very distressed she asked if we could not speak to her and let her gain a few moments of composure as it was hard to switch from Romanian to french to English etc. etc. We all said she could take as long as she would need to herself. And we continued doing our own things, it got to the point however where she was very intensely staring at me and i started to feel awkward, like i should perhaps be including her in the conversation, i didn't at first. Only because i was mindful of her request to be left alone. It got to the point of ridiculous however, she was clearly following the conversation, staring at me like a bear sizing up a salmon leaping out of the stream, wanting to be included!!! or so i thought. I then asked her some nice pleasantries like name, reason for travelling, how was her flight blah blah blah. And she was quiet some time and then impossible as it was- her stare intensified and she said- "I'm sorry but did i not ask you to not talk to me for a while?!"....
I was so shocked! So shocked i had to hold in the laughter at the hilarity of it all, so i ''coughed'' apologised and began talking to Joanna once again. Im laughing right now remembering it haha. I'm sure Joanna and I have never had our mouths drop open so fast before hahah.
She later joined in the conversation- rudely interrupting with an opinion that made me grimace in an attempt at keeping at straight face. haha.
NEXT...
She was very interested to know what time the sun set in Paris and what times stores closed. She would not accept an answer from any of the other 9 people in the room and so i was left to answer. Using all my powers of logic i deduced that Paris- being at least within the same time zone as Amsterdam or one hour in front of said time zone- would see the sun would disappear completely between 9.30 and 11pm on a clear summers day. I was then argued with about the sun not possibly d such a thing 'as in Romania the sun always sets at 7.30 pm. therefore the sun will set this evening at 8pm sharp'! It was already 7.30pm in the evening and the sun was not even casting shadows. I was kind enough not to point this out and diffused the situation by talking to someone else.
I was then argued with about the closing hours of stores; having been in the store around 6.45 and noticing the staff pulling in the articles from the street and cashing up the tills i began to suspect it was close to closing time, the final clincher however was that i was asked to leave soon after arriving in the store- and not nicely may i add. I'm not one to complain about the french i think they are all hilariously sexy but in this instance the cliche was proven.
Having forgotten about her second question (after our first debacle) Miss Romania quickly reminded me of her need to pick up a new blouse or some shizz. I mentioned stores close around 7pm and quickly turned back to the other conversation at hand... now imagine the immense patience i had to summon- especially after my shopping experience- when i heard the words 'But Emily, I'm sure you are mistaken, shops should still be open at this time off day!'
I really really wanted to be smart and reply 'what so close to the sun setting' and pull a shocked face but i didn't, i merely remarked i could be wrong and then- having perfected my escape already a few times before- returned back to the conversation at hand.
The next few encounters with her proved only slightly odd;
- a changing story about why she was travelling
-constantly adding another day onto her stay
-walking about naked in a room full of people
and so on and so forth...
Then comes something i will never forget. And i cannot remember my reaction to this situation. I think i may have laughed aloud or giggled, but i cannot be sure. All i remembering is the line WTF MATE running on loop through my head for half hour afterwards. Anywho i am getting ahead of myself!
So its late all the occupants of the room are lying about trying to catch the breeze from the open window and chatting amongst ourselves. Miss Romania is once again naked but surprisingly absent from the conversation. The conversation was situation around an American girls tale of presidents and such other American trivia when we began talking about Jackie Kennedy. Now i remember my dad telling me of the fabled 'Kennedy curse' and so i then brought up the poor ladies misfortunes and personal tragedies in the conversation and we each had something to add, after a lull in the talk i see Miss Romania sit up on her bed and state my name- i knew something good was coming- But i had no idea she would come out with the line "let me tell you something about those people, they are not even worth the breath you are wasting on them and they are all blah blah blah" basically to the tune of why we should not idolize the famous and how everyone really is worthless inside themselves. I wish i remember he exact words because it was such an off topic rant that it once again rendered us speech-less and killed the conversation.
You could feel the silent groan of everyone in the room and hear the eyes rolling in their sockets but Miss Romania was so sincere as to her knowledge of Miss Kennedy's terrible character that we all came to the conclusion that Miss Romania must have been a Soviet Spy and was no doubt recording our chatter for government purposes back in secret Headquarters. Such was the amount of crazy in her sentences!
What a funny thing she turned out to be! I mean it wasn't her poor English skills, She spoke it well and her French was good too. So she knew what she was saying or maybe she didn't. Perhaps she was just suffering heat stroke, or was an eccentric, or perhaps, just maybe. She really was a foreign spy, trapping us into politically explosive conversations and ideas.... Nahhh!
Haha, It amuses me to admit that we actually did think she was a spy and thats why her story and stay kept changing, what was only meant to be a long weekend turned into us waving her goodbye on our way out of Paris. Never have I met such an impressionable person!!!
Just another photo of me at the eiffel tower, so you dont get bored of all the writing :)
