I fought crime today. Really. I did.
I was standing in the RER (Paris's rapid subway line) and this guy was jostling me. This is not strange because guys are always jostling in the Metro. He was really giving me trouble though. I was trying to move out of the way so this girl could get off and this guy basically blocked me and pushed me forward into her so she couldn't really get off. I was trying to frantically to move out of her way because I know what it's like to be trying to get off the subway and not be able to get through to the door, but this guy kept pushing me. I tried to move but I felt a tug on my bag, I figured his bag was stuck on my bag or something. Keep in mind that last night I ended up in my friend's room, the only non-Russian person there, playing cards til 4 AM, and sleeping on Julia's floor in a sleeping bag. I was kind of in a haze. So this guy pushed me and then squished past me and got off the train. I'm not quite sure how my brain put all of this together in that state, but the tugging feeling on my bag and the flash of green as he got off the train (my wallet is green) prompted me to look in my purse. Which was wallet-less. I freaked out for a second, and a few things went through my head very quickly.
1. Resignation. "Crap, this guy took my wallet and now he's gone and now I have to replace everything in it."
2. Laziness. "I really do not want to go through all of that hassle."
3. Indignation. "Why should I have to go through such a frustrating process just because some jerk thought it was okay to practice his less-than-refined pickpocketing skills on me?"
Some stupid adrenaline-filled part of my brain took over, and before I knew what I was doing I pushed through people (shouting "Excuse me" because I was too freaked out by what I was doing to remember French), made it out of the train before the doors closed, and chased the man. I literally just ran after this man as if chasing criminals is part of my daily schedule. Now I realize that chasing down the man who stole your wallet is potentially a bad idea, but this guy was pretty harmless. Anyway I just ran after him, and he didn't realize that I'd seen him and followed him, so he was just walking. So before he got on the escalator, I stopped him. I was in this weird, sleep-deprived, adrenaline-charged alternate reality where I chase criminals, and I just said to him, in English, almost yelling, very quickly, "EXCUSEMECANIPLEASEHAVEMYWALLETBACK." I think yelling in English confused him because he was just like, "Huh...." and I saw that he had it under his arm and was trying (badly) to hide it under a newspaper so I just grabbed it and gave him a look and walked away. I was surprised that he just gave it up so easily but looking back on it, I must have looked kind of insane because my hair was a mess and I was really angry, and the police are pretty easy to access in Paris. I'm guessing he was just relieved that I didn't try to call the po-po. I should have. Woulda served him right.
Anyway then I had to wait for the next train and I was all pumped up with adrenaline (which I'm not used to outside of anaphylactic episodes) and I was shaking and freaking out, even though it was a pretty unremarkable moment, not scary or anything. But the adrenaline that had allowed me to make the uncharacteristic decision to chase this man (I don't even make them take back my food at restaurants when they bring me the wrong thing) was still in my system and it just all felt very weird.
Afterwards Erin came over and we went to our tutor meeting at the school where we work and along with Julia tried to plan our next event, but of course almost none of the other tutors wanted to listen to us or cooperate or help, so it just ended up being very frustrating. But our boss did request that we re-enact the theft and recovery of my wallet. Ashley and some other girl played the train doors, Vaune played the girl trying to get out of the train, and Julia played the thief. I played me. It was pretty funny.
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