People stop me on the street and ask me for directions. A Lot. The first time I remember it being a thing is when we lived in New York City. I would get stopped and asked for directions. Luckily, that isn’t so hard in NYC¹There is a recognizable patter to the streets and the subway..

I wonder, however, what it is about my face that makes me appear safe and knowledgeable. Because, I think you need to project both of those things for people to ask you for help.

It became quite obvious that whatever signals I am giving to indicate I would be able to help you with directions²And to be clear, this is not ALWAYS true was in full force when I was in Paris a few weeks ago. One night, as is usually the case, my group decided to go out for a group dinner. Since it was Paris, the dinner had lasted 3 hours, and I was done³Even tho they hadn’t even asked about coffee or dessert yet.. I was flying home the next day and the light was starting to fade at 20h30⁴European time is complicated., so I decided to head for the RER and back to my hotel.

First, someone stopped me when I got to Gare de l’Est to ask me where a train was. I couldn’t help them. I was having trouble finding MY train.

Then, on the platform, another person started talking to me excitedly in French. My French is good enough to order a glass of wine from time to time⁵Je voudrais un verre du vin rouge s’il vous plait.,⁶Although, it is probably the desperate look in my eye combined with pointing to the bottle., but a complicated story being told very fast with waving arms is way over my fluency level. I shook my head sadly and said, “Je n’ai parle pas Francais.”⁷I don’t even try to say that with a good accent.

I had hoped I was done for the night. Or, maybe my face would stop giving off the impression I know what I am doing.

At Gare du Nord, I transferred for the RER to the airport. There are two types of trains that go towards Charles de Gaulle airport from Gare du Nord – Express and Local. Unfortunately, they only way I have found to figure out which type of train you are is to either: 

1. Look at the monitors on the train platform for the next stop or
2. Look at the lights in the train car you are about to step in and see which stops have lights on them⁸The lights don’t always work and the stations lit up are not always accurate on the train cars, so I tend to trust the monitors beside the train platform.

I grabbed a seat and started to read a little after we departed when a woman, who was with her husband and two year old came up to me to ask, “¿Cuándo llegamos a Villepinte?”⁹Villepint is a stop on the RER B between Gare du Nord and the airport,¹⁰I had to ask Google translate what she might have said. I really don’t speak Spanish.

I REALLY don’t speak Spanish¹¹I tried to speak Spanish to a person from Chile once and he laughed at me, called me stupid and asked me not to. That was the end of me trying to speak Spanish., but I could see her distress so we went over to the map with the lights above the door. She pointed to Villepinte. There was not light in front of Villepinte. I tried, between English and French to explain she would have to go past Villepinte to the next station, change the train, and go back south one stop. Not horribly hard. I used a lot of gestures and I thought she got it.

I went back, sat down, and thought about whatever people think they see when they see my face, they are probably wrong. I am not that good at directions.

However, the more I thought about it, the more I thought about what they would have to do when they got to the stop where they could switch for a train going south. It was 22h30 now, and I didn’t want them to have to do this again – go all the way back to Gare du Nord before getting on a local train.

And then, I looked at my phone, and opened Google Translate. I typed in, “Look at the monitors and see what the next stop of the train is before getting on the train going south. If it doesn’t say, “Villepinte” do not get on the train.” Google translate did her thing and she said something in Spanish.

I didn’t understand.

She grabbed my phone and typed whatever translated to, “Look at the monitor beside the train platform?” And I said, “Si.”¹²This is about the extend of what I remember about college Spanish classes.. She smiled. I smile. She explained to her husband and we nodded at each other.

Honestly, I thought about getting off the train with them to be sure they were safe, but I thought about how I have that face and lots of people ask me for help – especially with directions. I needed to get to bed as I was leaving the next day, so I let it go and sent a prayer out to the universe that the family got to their destination without any further trouble.

The thing about having “that face”¹³Or whatever it is that makes people think I can answer their question about directions is that I start to feel responsible for other people getting to their destinations. And, I can’t. People get to make their choices and that the journey they want to take, so I do not get to be responsible for their journey or their choices.

The thing I can do, and I try to do it, is help them on their way when someone thinks I know how to get where they want to go.