The Post Office

This post is for Christophe, who knew it would be like this

The post office in Levallois-Perret is open until 7:00 p.m, which would be quite convenient if I didn't get home from work until at least 7:30 every night. So the only time I can really get to the post office is during Saturday hours, 8 - 12. Unfortunately, that's the only time the rest of town can go, too.

So I rolled out of bed early this morning, grabbed my box, and walked three blocks to the post office. I had been there once before and was in and out within 5 minutes without incident. However, today the line was exeedingly long. So I took my place and waited.

I was in line for about 30 minutes, wishing I'd brought my ipod. At one point an older woman rushed in with a dog on a leash and said something to me I couldn't understand, then pushed her way forward in line. I thought maybe she was looking for someone. She said the same thing to a few other people, they shrugged, and she kept on moving forward. Eventually I saw her near the front of the line, standing there like she'd waited for half an hour like the rest of us. I wondered how she got away with that.

When it was my turn to step up to the window, I tried to be as charming as possible to make up for my bad French. Didn't work today, though, as the guy at the counter frowned at my cute package with its address written in green marker and little drawings on the front and obvious destination of the United States. He asked if I wanted something, and I wasn't quite sure what he said, but based on his facial expression (I rely a lot on facial expressions) I nodded yes. It really didn't help that he was talking to me through a plate glass window and standing at least 3 feet away.

He slid a form through the slot at me and I saw that it was for Collisimo. The guys at work had told me that Collisimo was another delivery service and not regular mail. So I pushed the form back at him and said no. He said "normal?" and I nodded yes again. He shrugged, like "ok, I hope you weren't planning on this getting there any time soon".

Next he asked me about the contents. I said "chocolate".
Another unamused look and "that's all?"
I said "yes, lots of chocolate" with a smile. It still didn't work.

He handed me another form, which was quite similar to the forms back home where you list the contents and value of the package. I hate these forms because they really ruin the surprise. So I wrote in French as best I could to hopefully throw off the recipient a little bit.

Next I paid, not as nearly as much as I had prepared myself for, and he proceded to put a bunch of stickers and stamps on the box. I asked him to stamp "fragile" on it, and he shook his finger at me and pretty much said (from what I can tell) that in "normal" mail, you don't bother stamping "fragile" because it's going to get dropped, kicked, and thrown around anyway. To appease me he took a big black marker and wrote fragile on two sides, which made me think that maybe it was code for "kick this one extra hard".

THEN he took a pen and scratched my cute return address out. What was that? Don't they use return addresses in this country? At the post offices at home they demand a return address. It's not like I wanted a box of broken chocolate back anyway, but it unnerved me that if my package was undeliverable, the post office (be it American or French) would throw it in a pile and possibly incinerate it someday.

Anyway, that was the post office.

Now the big question is: Which of you lucky people is about to receive a box of chocolate? ;)