Having my "continental" breakfast at the hotel this morning. (Cafe Americano, Crisount, Roll with jellies, FRESH squeezed OJ a small bottle of Viton mineral water and some of the best scrambled eggs I have ever had! I think they have a chicken laying eggs and a cow for milk in the kitchen)! The fire alarm went off. I went to the foyer noting where the fire extiguesher was located and the manager, a lovely middle aged french woman came running up to the few of us that had actually gotten up and said, in her french accent, "Sorry, someone takes a hot shower, opens the door quickly and the alarm sounds. So Sorry"! In my best American accent I said, "That must have been some hot shower"! The,"Is the Fire Dept on the way"? To which she said, "No, they only come if we call them".
Then, at the Musee De' Orsey a few hours later, I just got into the Post Impressionist area, Van Gogh, etc...and the FIRE ALARM goes off. This place is packed with 30,000 people. Over the alarm is a star trek sounding voice saying, in 60 languages that "There is a technical difficulty, Please exit immediatly and listen to the staffs instructions. It only took about 10 minutes to clear the place, very orderly, no panic. The orientals look like they go through it every day. Again, no fire dept anywhere but Armed French Army Soldiers with nasty looking automatic weapons. I did not think it was a fire but there is a Metro station connected to the Museum, which automatically shut down. I thought maybe poison gas, I did, I thought any minute I will be laying on top of some Italian or Russian gasping for air. No problem, I went outside, had a French version of an ice cream cone, Glee something, and went back in. There is a long wait for security check at these museums, like at the airport but you can keep your shoes on. What a pain to go through twice. Of course I could not find my ticket, I like to save those for souvieners so I can throw them out a year later. When going back in, They wanted me to buy another ticket. I said, "where is your supervisor"? to which she said "No, You are not talking to my supervisor". I said fine and went off looking for one. At the information booth, I explained, in American what happened. I even told them about the Audio guide I had which was beeping like crazy as soon as I walked out of the place, I gave that to one of the museum staff when outside. The only proof I had of being inside was the crumpled up, useless map of the place. The information lady, led me to a side ticket area and told me to go to the Audio area and explain. Just the way it should be. I wanted to go back to the original girl who refused me re-entry and wave my passport in her face but the army guys were already looking at me to much. When I was in the line to re-enter, I was behind some jabbering Arab's with the head covered and all that stupidity, I wanted to say, "This is your cultures fault you know". But I kept my mouth shut even though I knew they were talking about me.
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