True story(s)

Once, I had a really horrible teacher. Of all subjects, he taught Indian philosophy and because of that I thought he was going to be this cool, levitating guru who wore a loincloth sitting on a spike chair and would show me the path to Nirvana. Oh, how disappointed I was. He was (and still is) this snob of an academic with a bent down nose and crooked, tight lips that gave the inward effect of a black hole suction in the middle of his face. What I first thought to be a smile was a lift of the cheeks that turned the eyes into two slits and a slight nodding of the head, which was obviously not the regular nod of compassion that you get from people, as it reeked of disdain and superiority.

He would hold us captive for 3 hours in a small, airless classroom where no one dared to open the windows. During the supposed break in the middle I would run downstairs to have the quickest pees in my lifetime, get two machine coffees and run back up again, only to be the last (as I was the only one who dared to venture this far) that walked into the wall of non-oxygen space we had created during the firs 90 minutes.

He would talk non-stop for the whole time and after my inbuilt 45 minutes of concentration was up I would go on my regular out of body journeys until he'd stop jabbering. No one dared to ask any questions as he would take that student and thoroughly belittle her/him in the ultimate condescending tone with accompanying body movements: he would pull maniacally at his ears to indicate that we should listen better as he had already said it before, so the student's question was made instant-redundant, or he would fiercely point between the blackboard and the questioning student as the answer was of course already written up there, you imbecile! He was (and still is) the most disagreeable person I have met.

I hadn't been this sad with a teacher since my maths teacher 14 years ago. I left both those classes unfinished, with no regrets.

Once, I lived in Toulon for a semester. As a francophile, I was excited to try the Mediterranean side of France. Although the school was not promising, I did not care so much about that since it was my Erasmus semester and all I wanted was to live by the Mediterranean sea for a few months. Toulon is a nationalist city located between Marseille and Nice, between the mountain and the sea - it is neither like Marseille nor Nice, it is not a bird nor a fish. It is nothing.

It has a navy school and a library, a zoo on top of a mountain and a few cinemas. And a ton of hairdressers. The school was in the middle of an industrial zone far outside of the city centre and there was one bus that went there, once an hour. Getting there was an extreme nuisance, but finally when you got there, things would be worse as their Erasmus program was fucked, mildly put. Needless to say, I spent all my time elsewhere, except for my weekly walk across town to the library where I would pick up cartoons and French films. I would hang out with Buddhists in Fuveau, a tiny village inland, or with sober addicts in Aubagne. We would drive down to Cassis with their famous calanques cliffs, some 5 meters high and we'd jump in half naked/naked.

I left that city gladly and with no regrets.

Last week, I though destiny had called me on a mission to Nice. So I went. Had a lovely time with an open heart, mind and eyes – on the lookout for what was supposed to cross my path and change my life forever. After a whole week of 'same shit, different day' I realized that me being in Nice was not supposed to be life changing for me particularly (maybe I should have given that weirdo a time of day when he approached me walking the Promenades des Anglais one night?), but I still held on to that thought as I boarded the train coming back to Paris. Maybe someone smart, cool and funny would sit next to me? Well spoken, well dressed with BO's under control? Maybe even a boy! (with that, I mean a man).

As the train choo-choo'ed along the coast I silently watched people getting on, families from vacation, teenagers on their fist solo-trip, wondering who would finally occupy the seat next to me. The train stopped at Antibes, Cannes and St. Raphaël, but no one claimed the seat and I was starting to think that I would have all this space to myself the whole train ride. Then the train stopped at Toulon and I felt a twitch of nostalgia as I hadn't laid my eyes upon that city since I left it three years ago. I looked out on the platform and to my horror I saw a very familiar black hole suction face. Isn't that my old Indian philosophy teacher? 

Oh. My. Ganesh.

“Please don't sit next to me, please don't sit next to me, please don't sit next to me” went my silent mantra and I thought my prayers had been answered when he walked straight past me. I was breathing out in tremendous relief when I found him standing over me nodding disdainfully at my handbag in what seemed to be his seat, lifting up his cheeks so his eyes turned into slits of superiority when I apologetically moved my handbag for his royal academic ass.

"God, you're such a joker", I thought, as I left my body, with no regrets.