Thursday 1/19: X-RAY!

This morning I took the 10am train to Bordeaux for my appointment and the Office of Immigration and Integration. Eek!

During the few minutes I was waiting in Dax for the connecting train, I noticed two girls on the platform and for some reason, I just knew they weren’t French. I made a pretty good assumption that they were headed to Bordeaux for the same reason I was!

And, sure enough, when I got off in Bordeaux, there they were—headed into the Tourist Office! When I walked in, the guy at the desk was saying “You’re the 4^th group that’s come in today asking where that office is! Is there a party? Where are you from?” One girl said “Argentina” and the other said “the US.” I chimed in that I was from the US and that I would just ask them for directions! They invited me to hang out with them until our appointments (the train schedule forced us to get there way early). We walked all the way into town and then wandered for a bit. Around noon, we stopped at a pasta place to have some lunch. It was fun hanging out with Paige (US) and Fernanda (Argentina), who are working in Dax! Perhaps I’ll get to see them again sometime, since that’s not far away!

Fernanda’s meeting was at 1:30pm, so we walked her to the office and then Paige and I headed to an English-language bookstore that we’d seen earlier. Our meetings weren’t until 3pm. After checking out the bookstore (which was really great, but—not surprisingly—expensive), we stopped at a little café to have coffee/tea. I was shocked with how much tea cost! 2.50 euros!! For a pot of hot water and a tea bag! I guess that’s why I never go out!!

Then we headed to the appointment. It wasn’t too bad…just a lot of waiting. I checked in, then waited. I went into a room where a nurse measured me, weighed me, and checked my vision. Then I waited. Then I went into a tiny room where I was told to take off all the clothes on my top half, and wait for the nurse. When she arrived, she led me into a big room with a giant X-ray machine…I had to stand inside of it and press my chest against the wall of it while they took an X-ray of my lungs. Then I could go back and put my clothes on. It was weird just walking around top-less, normally (in the US) they give you a little paper covering or something! But they let me have the X-ray, so that’s a pretty epic souvenir! Then I waited for a while. Then I was called into the doctor’s office and he looked at the X-ray (apparently I don’t have tuberculosis) and then did a check-up (also requiring me to be shirt-less) on my breathing, heart rate, teeth, throat, etc. And he asked when my last tetanus shot was…I said it was around 2009…in reality, I have no clue, but he’ll never know that! Ah, jumping through hoops…

Then I waited some more and finally went in to hand in my paperwork and have the necessary stamp put in my passport. YAY! I was glad that there were a bunch of us there at the same time because we got to chat during all the waiting time!

I had about 1 1/4 hours before my train left, so I wandered around, taking my time getting to the station. I stopped to look in the cathedral (it’s immense!), looked in a few shops, and stopped to buy a flan! I spent the last bit of time waiting in the station, enjoying my flan and reading.

I got back to Tyrosse around 7:45pm and had dinner at home. Then Catherine came up to watch a movie…but we ended up skyping with Maria first! Her internet died at some point, and then we watched the AAA Theatre version of “The Odd Couple: Female Version.” Ah, such good times! I loved doing that show!!