4:48 PM

Bonjour

It couldn't be that difficult. We had a map, we had an address all we needed to do was ring the doorbell and we would soon be giving hugs and bestowing God bless you's on one and all. Peering cautiously over the gate we were confronted with a certain sense of foreboding. Where was the van? Where were the 100 pairs of shoes in neat rows on the front porch? We were desperate, so soon we were straining our ears for sounds of children screaming in the backyard.....Nothing.
Something was definitely wrong, and there were only two possibilities.
1) These people were NOT living the standard
2) We had the wrong house
With no VS to turn to we decided to investigate. No sooner had we begun drawing lots for who would be the one to jump the gate when along came our would be savior.
Sporting a solitary gold tooth she looked like a woman who knew the back roads pretty well(if you know what I mean) so when she offered her assistance, in remarkably good English, we figured it couldn't hurt.
"What are you looking for" she inquired with a chuckle...With some apprehension I told her we were looking for the residence of a Frenchman by the name of Christian.
With scarcely more than a pause she opened that gate and proceeded to peer into every window she could find screaming "Hallo, hallo". After about 30 seconds we heard a reply. Coming to the door was a boy of about 11 or 12 followed by what I presumed to be his sister of a few years younger..
Firing off in Romanian the woman asked if this was the house of Mr. Christian. This seemed to stump the children who started yelling for their mother . By this time I was feeling decidedly uncomfortable. The woman who came to the door was something of a surprise. She looked to be in her mid thirties, she was dark but not gypsy. I'd almost say she was attractive, I'll settle with handsome.
But I'm getting sidetracked, after ascertaining that yes, I was an American and yes, I was lost in Bucharest in search of a Frenchman who's last name I was not in possession of ,the bottom line was that while she was amused to no small degree the answer was no he did not live here.
Damn.....Just my luck
Baffled and somewhat at a loss we made our way back to the road and told the old crone "multumesc" or as we like to say in English "thank you"
"Cu plecere" came the expected rejoiner but as she turned her back on us and started walking away we heard her say in a slow drawn out voice "With PLEASURE"
We looked at each other and shuddered. That was the last we saw of her.
Sam( our drummer, who coincidently is also French) went look further on down the road and in no time at all had located the house we had been looking for(which confirms my suspicions that the French can smell each other a mile away).....THE END