An American in Provence

On our final bonus day of flying, we woke up at 6 and caught the shuttle to the Amsterdam airport. Trying to get through security with my two bottles of Korean liquor, I started to get hassled and finally had to go check them. As I didn't have my luggage, I had to just put them in a bag and hope for the best. Our flight back to Marseille was uneventful, and we finally arrived around 11 am. My father-in-law came to pick me up as Alain was at a karate competition. As soon as I got my luggage, I could smell the broken bottle of sake. Argh. We went to the car, he opened the trunk and put my luggage in, closed the door and said "Where are my keys?" In the trunk of course. We called MIL, who called SIL who came and brought the extra set of keys. While waiting, we asked the office in charge of the parking lots if they could open the car with a hanger. They tried but were unable to, so we waited for about 45 minutes for the extra set of keys. We then drove back to their house had lunch, then Alain finished his karate competition (he was just refereeing). Alain and I left to return to Marseille. Got home, I went to take a shower. About halfway through, the water turned icy cold. Turns out the hot water heater decided to go on vacation. We tried and tried but could not get the pilot light to turn on. So, no hot water and no radiators until Tuesday, when the repair guy was able to come and fix it. Welcome home! On top of it all, my digestive system continued to be in an uproar until Wednesday, when I threw up at work, came home early, threw up again, went to bed at 6:30 pm and missed Thursday of work. Not eager to go back to Asia any time soon but I am glad that I went at least once.