A Tunisian Adventure

So, everything is going well--chugging along as usual. In my newly acquired street French, you might say "ca roule."
Lately, (seeing as it's December), I've been trying to fit in some Christmas shopping from time to time. Tuesday morning, classes were cancelled, because the church where we meet was using our room for a Christmas play. So, Tuesday morning found me in the middle of such a Christmas shopping activity.
I took the bus out to Pontault's centre commercial, and I picked up a few odds and ends. Fifteen minutes before my bus was to leave to take me to the train station (I had a visit to make to one of the ladies from class), I headed back to the bus stop. The 12:11 bus pulled up, and I walked inside, but the driver said, "This bus isn't taking any passengers."
Completely dumbfounded, I asked, "Why?"
The driver said, "Listen. We're just not, okay?"
Still not quite wrapping my mind around this, I persisted, "But if the 12:11 bus doesn't run, I can't get to the train station and I'll miss my train."
He shrugged and said, "Dommage." Too bad.
Apparently, the distress of one person isn't quite enough to force the bus to the train station.
So, I stepped off the bus, and almost ran into another man who looked just about as distraught as I felt.
"You'll miss your train too?" he asked.
I nodded.
"I can go home and get my car," he said. "I'll drive you to the station."
But even though he seemed like a nice man, I've seen enough episodes of Criminal Minds to know that you don't hop into the car of any old stranger, so I replied, "Thanks, but I think I'll just try and catch the next train."
He must have heard my accent, because he said to me, "Norway has really contributed to the world in the last few years."
I looked at him, confused, and he added, "They've been providing a lot in the way of agriculture."
I still really had no idea why he was telling me this.
He then put his hands together and clapped as he walked away.
I realized, with a smile, that he thought I was Norwegian. Secretly, this always makes me happy when people confuse me for a German or a Brit or a Norwegian. I like knowing that I don't have a twangy American accent. I like being just a little mysterious.
What I don't like is waiting at bus stops for buses that never come.
So, I walked around the centre commerical, licking the windows (the French expression for window shopping...) Finally, a half hour later, another bus showed up. Incidentally, it was the same man who'd refused to take me to the station earlier.
He waved at me, indicating that I could now mount the bus.
"You're going to the station?" I asked.
"Yes," he said.
I got on the bus, walked to the back, sat down, and was reading a novel I found called The Boy Who Loved Anne Frank, and the driver walked back to sit beside me.
"Do you work here?" he asked, meaning the centre commercial.
I put my finger inside my book, and said, "No."
"In Paris?" he asked.
"Yes."
"What do you do?" he asked.
"I teach immigrants to read and write," I replied.
"Oh?" he asked, his face registering surprise. "But you aren't French."
"No," I said, stating the obvious.
"Do you have any Tunisians in your class?" he asked.
This made me smile. I was, in fact, sitting on that bus, waiting to be taken to the station so I could take my train to meet with one of my Tunisian woman. "Yes," I said. "That's where I'm trying to go right now. To a Tunisian's house."
"Oh?" he asked.
I nodded. "Really."
"Well, in that case," he said, walking back to the front of the bus, "we'd better get going."
(I so wish that buses followed their appointed departure and arrival times...)
But in any case, he took me straight to the station, flying past all the stops with people smothered in their winter hats and scarves, shivering as they hailed the bus. The bus that flew past.
He wished me luck as I ran out of the bus. He blocked the pedestrian path from all the other cars, allowing me to pass first.
And then, an hour later, I showed up at the woman's house. Then, of course, I had to explain that I would have been much later if she hadn't been a Tunisian. We had a good laugh out of that.