qui a ferme' les lumieres?

Who turned out the lights??

Right now I’m sitting in Charles de Gaule airport waiting for my 12 hour flight to Mexico. It should be interesting, cause flying West during the day, the sun never sets! Thus I take off at 1pm Paris time and land at like 5pm Mexico time, but that’s y’know like 1am Paris time! So, uhh, no sleep “tonight.”

Obviously when I post this, I’ll be in Mexico, but I’m just trying to make the best of my ample time at the airport. Since there’s a metro strike in Paris right now, EVERY TAXI WAS BOOKED for this morning. The logistics people couldn’t get me a car! Luckily Jose gave me his guy’s number and I arrived about 3 hours early :p

So Wednesday (17 Sep) was an interesting day.

I was getting ready to meet one of my new friends for a drink (will tell you about my friend adventures, friend-ventures, in a subsequent post) and wanted to listen to some music in my bedroom. Well, I figured I’d just get that handy world power adapter mom bought me before I left. The way it works is you plug in one half to the wall outlet anywhere in the world (there are like 6 or so possibilities), and then the second half is a universal female side, fits anything. So I look at all of the possible wall pieces, and two looked like legit possibilities. I tried the first, but I was plugging into a French extension cord, and the adapter wouldn’t fit quite right (kinda like the recessed headphone jack on 1st gen iPhone – ask Uncle Bob or google).

Next I tried the second, and it went right in, and ZAPPITYY ZAPPP ZAPPPPPPP ZAP-ZAP-ZAPPPPPPPPP.

Yeah. I got electrocuted. Bad.

Threw everything on the floor I was so shocked (pun intended) and sat on the bed for a moment thinking about what I could do, touch, etc. I settled on the plastic blackberry, and shot a quick email to Seth and Vishal (a fellow biophysics major at GW). Seth told me I was probably fine, and Vishal said I should touch everything not metal to try to ground myself, and that I was an idiot, and GW should take back my bachelor of science.

I was so freaked out too cause this summer at the hospital internship, a trauma surgeon spent an hour showing us pics of patients he’d treated, and one or two were of electricians who didn’t quite know the proper way to test a live wire. When electricity goes in, it comes out someplace else. ANYWHERE else (often between toes, for example). And the exit wound is ALWAYS worse.

Luckily I must not have been electrocuted so bad, cause I haven’t been able to find an exit wound yet :)

Well, a little shaky but not deterred, I still wanted my music. I figured out that it was best to assemble the two pieces of the adapter BEFORE plugging half into the wall. Duh. They SHOULD take away my BS, ha!

With this assembly in place, I noticed that the adapter piece lit up, so I figured that somehow indicated it was cool to plug anything into it, without the 8 pound transformer I have (I am a little resentful of the transformer, cause I think it bumps me into excess baggage territory every time I travel, and those fees are EXCESSIVEEEEE).

To err on the side of caution, I thought it a wise idea to plug in my American strip to the adapter, so as not to blow out my favorite little $10 bathroom speakers. So I plug in the strip first, and all seemed well. However I noticed the switch wasn’t lighting up.

I flipped the switch, and BOOMM!!!!!!!!!!! POOOFFFFF!!!!!!!!!

Yeah. The thing BLEW UP in my face. There was a flash of light, an audible explosion, and a poof of smoke that smelled awfuulllll. (Turns out I exploded the bulb, which is rated only for 110V and not 220). My idea to use the strip was good though, as it DID save my speakers in the end :)

Again I was startled, and still thought I couldn’t really touch anything from the electrocution 5 minutes earlier. I was running a little late, wanted to shower, but didn’t want to blow up from touching the knob.

I grabbed a magazine, rolled it up as though to strike a dog (no, I’ve never done this, I just don’t know how else to describe a rolled paper…), and tried to flip the light switch (there was no way I was touching THAT – what am I, a sadist?). Nothing. Shit. I tried the hallway, bedroom, other bedroom, living room, kitchen, WC, nothing. Crap. Dumb American.

Luckily it was still light out, so I just washed my face in the dark (obviously now I couldn’t shower at all…) and left before I couldn’t find my way out. The light in the hall wasn’t working either, so I started freaking that I blew out the power in the whole building, but it turned out to just be my floor. This is actually the worse scenario, cause I think I’m the only person on my floor, so no one was calling LIPA or ConEd on my behalf (which is to say that I have NO idea who to call, I’m in France!).

I was a little nervous that the digicode (door code entry security thing) wouldn’t work and I’d be locked out in the cold all night, but that wasn’t the case (probably would have been better off that way so someone else would get the electricity back on).

After meeting up for my drink, having dinner, and keeping sh’ma on repeat in the back of my head, I came back to a dark apartment, despite my prayers. I used my bberry as a torch to navigate before sleep (its good for one thing at least!), and went to bed.

Next morning, of course still no electricity, so no hot water. I tried to take a cold shower since I hadn’t been able to shower the night before, but it was too cold. I got dizzy after about 5 seconds so I just got out and washed my face in the sink again.

The logistics guy at work couldn’t figure out how to get the electricity back on and I was freaking out that I’d have to pay like 1,000 EUR out of pocket for an electrician. But when one arrived, it turned out he just needed to press this black button extra hard, and that’s all it took!

Moral of the story, ALWAYS shower without music in Europe.




A bientot,