Day 74: En Route to New York: Part I.

The first half of my day started off blissfully. The sun was peeking through the clouds, Sébastien had picked up custard filled pastries for breakfast and helped me clean Phil's apartment from top to bottom before taking me to the airport. Sun, French Sweets, Cleaning and an airport ride from my French Sweet? This was going to be a great day. I felt it. What could possibly go wrong? Anyone who travels to Charles de Gaulle Airport knows better to not say that before the aircraft is airborne. 
We packed up the car with my suitcases, stopped at Comptoir Turenne for a pre-flight allongé before hitting the road. We hit some expected traffic but were running on schedule and enjoyed our last moments together. I flipped through the radio making sure to stop at all French Pop songs to get my last fill while he scoffed at how horrible the lyrics are. 
We arrived at the antiquated Terminal 2 of Charles de Gaulle where Sébastien with my suitcase in tow, escorted me to the overwhelmingly crowded airport. Once settled in line, I stretched my arms around him where we said goodbye for what seemed like only several minutes. While we were 'saying goodbye', I opened my eyes to see if there was any movement in the line and was startled by a prepubescent Chinese brother and sister staring at us. A bit embarrassed, I unlocked myself from his embrace and looked further down the line and noticed that everyone was Asian. As in every single passenger. It didn't seem right that I was the only caucasian traveling to New York from Paris. I gently tapped on the shoulders of the peeping-sibling's parents to find out where they were headed and as it turns out, I had been waiting or rather smooching on the line to Beijing for 15 minutes. I took this as a queue to send Sebastien off, I gave him a big hug told him I'd email him once I got to New York. I admit, it felt nice to have someone to say goodbye to before a long trip.
I made my way to my correct line which was moderately shorter and where the passengers corresponded a bit accurately with the trip; irritated New Yorkers ferociously rolling through their blackberries. I was right at home. I had about a 10 minute wait ahead of me and comfortably dazed off on what I will drink on the plane and what magazines I will buy when my thoughts were interrupted by a tap on my shoulder. It was Sébastien, he came back to say 'goodbye' one more time. Being on the right line and away from small children and I presume small animals, I surrendered to shameless goodbye slobbering. 
I got up to security, passport in hand and proceeded to answer the routine questions promising that I was didn't take anything from strangers and that I was the only one who packed my bags. I got my boyfriend to pick up breakfast, clean and drive me to the airport but getting him to pack my bags would have been pushing it. Besides he would have seen his battery operated replacement wrapped a Marc Jacobs handbag dust bag. When I first was traveling in and out of France, I used to foolishly use the airport as the perfect forum to practice my French to only find myself agreeing to having arms and sharp weapons in my bag. This happened happened on two different occasions where the officer was beyond irritated and I was embarrassed that my French was that bad that I now do all airport transactions in English.
I showed up at my gate and sat down with my new book, a going away present from Sébastien 'The Good Life' by Jay McInerney when I was distracted from page 1 by the piercing voice of the 14 year old girl sitting next to me. Presumably someone I would be flying with. "When I get home, I am going to go straight to Mc Donald's and get a burger with fries and ketchup." she declared to her mother while putting emphasis on the ketchup. Her mother promised her that as soon as they got home they were going straight to Mc Donald's. The rest of her family showed up and were talking about all of the things that they were going to do when they got back to The U.S. Someone was going to microwave food, someone was going to watch 'Who Wants to be A Millionaire?' and someone else mentioned that they were going to drive. You would think that these people had spent 5 years in a refugee camp. For the benefit of the doubt, I'm going to say that they were and were just transferring through CDG otherwise these people were horribly tortured by their Paris family vacation. A possibility for fist timers in Paris. The 14 year old girl who I felt was now talking into my ear mentioned McDonald's. Again. "I'm going to have a hamburger with fries and ketchup." she announced at octave volumes. 
Ça Suffit! There are McDonalds' here! Not only in Paris but 'here' as in the airport where it is a fantasy land of fries and ketchup to meet her all of worldly desires. I couldn't resist, I had to say something. I passive aggressively closed my book with a dramatic exhale and in a slow motion almost Linda Blair head turn looked at her and said "You know there is a McDonald's downstairs, right?" She stared at me in horror that I started speaking to her and in a barely latent irritated tone. "And they have all of the same things as they do in America. Like Ketchup. You know that? Right?" I continued. Her mother saw my irritation and defensively said "Well that McDonald's was before security and she didn't want to go to that one." What? This girl is acting like she had been dying for McDonald's as its all she has been talking about since I've been trying to start my new book and is going to snub the one that is presently available because its before security? It was either that or Mom  dropped the ball on her daughter's dreams and didn't stop. I gave up reading my book due to the McDonald's crisis 2011 and pulled out my mini Elle Magazine that I had just purchased.
Suddenly, I heard a second voice and a second child appeared. A second child who looked like McDonald's girl. A twin! There was two of them. What was she going to demand? KFC? I couldn't help but wait with baited breath what the hell was going to come out of her mouth. She seemed concerned and asked mother why there were children wearing little hats on the other side of the terminal. Her mother said with a whisper and hand covering her mouth "They're jew-ish." which prompted this creepy child to say "Ew." These people were obviously not from New York and am I wrong for wanting to smash that little girl? I was horrified. Who were these were the maniacs I was going to be flying with? A "security approved" McDonald's freak and an anti-semetic? 
God must have heard me because the flight was over sold and took these evil children as a sign to fly out tomorrow...