Paris : A Cautionary Tale

The true story of our arrival in Paris...

The Two Brothers

They were so similar that they must have been twins, though we did not inquire after the fact, and they sat side by side in the unglamorous reception area of the small hotel lobby as we entered, distinguishable only by the faded black dinner jacket one of them wore over a thin white shirt whilst the other preferred a rusty-coloured jacquard sweater. Their dark and identically unkempt hair fudged the lines of their soft-bodied faces so that, with their sallow complexions, they looked as though they needed defining with some exercise and a dose of sharp country air. They were clearly taken aback by our arrival and their confusion was compounded when we produced, in still confident expectation, our two booking slips for our three separate rooms. With barely a word to us they began to converse at a pace too rapid for my long-neglected Comprehensive School French to fathom so, as they rolled into a fervour of exaggerated discourse, I leaned over the edge of the high counter in the hope of gleaning some clue as to the cause of their consternation from the printed paperwork they waved at eachother, occasionally throwing me round-eyed beleaguered looks to which I responded with what I hoped they would interpret as an enquiring but resolute smile.

Having stood back patiently for two or three minutes my parents and RJ began to make anxious enquiries of their own, asking me in short urgent Welsh what was being said, to which I could respond with no more reassurance than a shrugged “I think there's been a mix-up with the rooms...” Naturally the concern on my parents faces took a step towards panic and a growing awareness of the fraught situation prompted self-disturbing questions from the children so it was fortuitous, and a relief to them, that a very competent-looking and pleasant young woman - who spoke excellent English with a beautifully intelligible accent - arrived at that moment and proceeded to listen with great interest to what they had to say about our plight.

Meanwhile, no doubt provoked by the arrival of their compatriot with her capable air, the brothers' exchange spiraled into obvious argument. RJ and I looked at eachother with adrenalin-buoyed control, mutually understanding that she with her P.R. experience and I as the only member of our party with even a modicum of French had to somehow elicit a satisfactory outcome for us all.

Quite suddenly our agitated hosts seemed to reach an impasse and rather short-temperedly one of them handed me two sets of keys – one for my parents, one for myself and the children. They had no record, they explained without apology, of RJ's booking, and hence for her there was no room, although they were prepared to go o the great trouble of giving myself, the children and RJ a four-bed room, and weren't we grateful for that?

“Not good enough at all” RJ remonstrated, pointing out the line on her booking slip that said in bold print single room booked and payment confirmed, at which point the jacketed brother threw his hands in the air as if to say “Save me from these clients with their impossible demands, Mon Dieu!” RJ however rose splendidly to the occasion, fixing the pair of them with her best P.R. look that told them, in calm but unequivocal language-barrier busting terms, that she was going to see this thing through all the way to what she considered to be a satisfactory end.

Which is what she did achieve, but it is a long story involving unpleasant rooms and much comedic wandering of the corridors by RJ and myself and the jacquard-sweatered implausibly unapologetic brother. Eventually we were all settled in clean and comfortable enough rooms, RJ with a double all to herself. The brothers did exert a lot of energy trying to meet their obligations to us and although we never did establish exactly who was to blame it seems most likely to be the booking agency. The rest of our stay was pleasant enough, marred only by the noisy location, but then we had chosen to stay in the center of Paris so we can't grumble at that. The brothers relaxed a little and said Bonjour and smiled occasionally, and we remembered the old adage : You gotta laugh or you'll cry, so we chose the funny side to remember it by . The booking agency will be getting a letter, not about the hotel but about their “emergency contact number” which wasn't an emergency contact number or, indeed, of any help at all except that mentioning it to the brothers brought them to the brink of despair and the ultimate resolution of the affair.

As for the woman with the splendid articulation, she showed great concern but offered no practical assistance that I am aware of – other than relieving some of the strain with her engaging conversation, for which we say Merci.