26/12/2023
TravelOops!
Bought Adhesive instead of Toothpaste.
They always say do as the Romans while in Rome. I learnt the hard and expensive way. You see, in the earlier days of travel, pre-whatsapp and tiktok reels travel was hard. Sorry kids, travel is easy nowadays. In the Greek translation ‘gíbandī gīakwa nī gīa tene’ meaning I’m an old dog.
There is this town in the south of France I visited, beautiful by the Mediterranean sea, sun and good breeze; but one thing was amiss, my French was very rusty and I paid for it dearly.
So one afternoon, I had an important meeting and needed some grooming to refine my looks. Off I went to the streets looking for a shop. In France smoking is a big thing and there are signs everywhere ‘Tabac’ so I hurriedly entered one that had a curtain at the entrance which reminded me of the ‘chai and mandazi’ hotels back home. Maybe the curtain was meant to keep cold and idiots out, I thought.
Once inside, my first mistake was to salute the short gentleman in english. ‘How are you?’ He replied grumpily in French which left me alarmed. If you ever visit France, at least say Bonjour or a few french-ish words as a greeting. Never use english to start a conversation especially in small towns. Leave that to Paris, Lille, Lyon and other big cities. The man stared at me and I stared back then he raised his hands smirking and I raised mine trying to signal to him I needed toothpaste, mouthwash and sim card. He proceeded to mind his business oblivious of my presence. You know how tempered short men especially shopkeepers can be?. It reminded me of my neighbour back home called Peter.
As a wanderlust, I wandered around the tight shop in hope of finding the items and was interrupted by foot scuffles of the man walking towards me. He was holding a packet of toothpaste,a bottle of mouthwash and a sim card which he gave me and I thanked him in English as I hurried back to my hotel ready for my meeting.
It was at this point things got worse. As I applied the paste and poured the mouthwash ready for grooming, I felt lightning strike me as soon as I tasted the combination and the toothbrush got stuck in my mouth. I whispered to myself ‘ Hum you can’t come all the way to get choked in France’ To rescue myself from the trauma, I grabbed the leftover cola from the table to try to remove the adhesive which, to my surprise, worked. On confirming the packaging, the only thing I could comprehend was that small sign of fire, meaning it was flammable. How did I miss this?
I wondered, what kind of man could do this to an enterprising young man? I couldn't even go back there and confront him due to the language barrier. How do I even protest in french? I thought of using my mother tongue; the names of body parts and some animals.
To save my day, I dressed and proceeded to the meeting which I was conspicuously quiet as I reflected on my agony earlier. My host did notice and I narrated to him with embarrassment and being a diplomat, he agreed we should go to the shop and confront him, at least the man to apologise.
I suspected the shopkeeper was a former bad boy or an undertaker and on being asked why he gave me those things, he answered that I spoke to him in english then I made a hand signal across the mouth which he thought it meant to seal things.So he understood I needed adhesive and industrial cleaner. He apologised, refunded and we shook hands.
As we left he shouted. ‘Have a nice day’
I will never forget the City of Toulon. At least the beaches were very beautiful.
Humphrey Mumita’s Diary
