Fate sometimes is good to you -- in spite of yourself. As events unfolded the time we were traveling from London to Paris, by train via the Chunnel. The three of us had just boarded the train, and were very excited to take this mode of transportation. We found this better than taking the ferry across the Channel, as some of us suffered from seasickness.
Anyway, we made ourselves comfortable and as we kept busy talking about our plans for Paris, we kind of lost track of time, and before we knew it -- we had arrived. This kind of threw us out of sync, and we just hurriedly grabbed our stuff and ran out of the train. We got into a taxi and made our way to the hotel. As we go to the front desk to check in, we found out -- to our shock and horror -- that, oh no! my friend, the one who had our prepaid hotel vouchers, had left her handbag on the train. That handbag had all her important papers like her passport, Eurorail pass, money, and all the prepaid vouchers for our trip across Europe.
Naturally we went into panic mode. Luckily, my friend had made her trip arrangements with a travel agent back home, who very wisely, had kept copies of everything we needed for the trip, including the hotel vouchers and our passports. So my friend explained to the concierge at the front desk what had happened, and asked if she could call the travel agent from the hotel's phone. So that the agent could fax the required voucher and the passports information to confirm that yes, we were who we claimed to be, and that indeed the hotel had been prepaid.
The concierge, very kindly, let us do that and -- thank goodness -- the travel agent faxed all the papers and we were able to check in, once the concierge verified that everything was in order. My poor friend, though, was besides herself, thinking, oh no...now I'm going to have to go the Embassy, now I have no money, what am I going to do?! We calmed her down and told her that we should rest and leave that for the next day. She reluctantly agreed.
Bright and early the next morning, we ate a quick breakfast, determined to do what we could to go to the Embassy to get my friend at least a copy of her passport. So we go to the front desk and ask the concierge how to get there. But before we could even ask him, he calls my friend, and tells her that he has a package for her, brought by messenger early that morning. She's puzzled, who could have sent her a package? So she opens it, and lets out a scream, what's wrong? we ask, what's in there?
Look! look! she say's, I can't believe this...oh wow! thank you good angel, thank you. There in the box --was her bag with all its contents intact, nothing missing, not even the money. And pinned to it was a very brief note: To the lovely young lady, who was so excited to arrive in Paris, that she forgot this very important handbag, I looked inside and found the voucher to your hotel. As I don't want your vacation and enjoyment of our great city to be spoiled, here it is. Happy vacation! Your train conductor.
We just stood there in disbelief, we never -- in a million years -- thought that my friend would ever see that handbag again, much less with its contents intact. The anonymous train conductor did not even leave his name, but we made sure to write a letter to the company that runs the train, praising him and telling them to thank him for us. It certainly made our trip to Paris a more enjoyable experience.
