(This is a true story that happened when I was eighteen-years-old. The blond girl in the photo (me) became an abused migrant worker and learned the hard way how much of the rest of the world is treated.)

French the Hard Way

by Lisa Alpine

“Vide la poubelle et ferme les volets!”

A squat, ugly woman hovers over me, poking me in the arm to wake me up. Again, she shrills in harsh Swiss-German-accented French, “Empty the waste basket and close the shutters!”

Rising from the somnambulant depths of a bone-tired sleep, the clock beside the bed glows neon-green, indicating it is four in the morning.

Who is this nasty person with spittle spraying from her mouth as she scowls at me? Perhaps a really bad dream with a sharp pointer finger?

No, unfortunately, she is my new roommate and threatens, “You had better get up and do what I say,” followed by more emphatic pokes.

Hoping she will disappear, I empty the wastebasket and close the blinds and crawl back in bed to catch a few more hours’ sleep before I have to go to work. I still don’t know her name.

Mon dieu! As if my life isn’t difficult enough at this moment. Trapped in a job that is one step above slavery, anemic from a diet of liver and peas (dietary hell for a vegetarian), and depressed over being treated like a second-class citizen. Now this—a troll-bitch roommate.

Life had been peachy just a short while ago.

Dreams of moving to Paris and living la vie bohème had come to fruition ten months earlier when I flew to the City of Light two weeks after my eighteenth birthday. I had never been out of the United States but my parents, who thought this was a fanciful Moveable-Feast-inspired pipe dream, gave me their blessing wisely woven with a few contingencies. I bankrolled my exodus from Sunnyvale, California and arranged all the travel plans plus came up with a study program that would give me some semblance of student life.

Accomplishing all of the above, I lived in Paris, studying art history at the Sorbonne. One morning, as I sat through another boring lecture given by a wizened professor (which I barely understood due to my rudimentary French), I looked out the windows onto the sidewalk. It was spring and chestnut tree blossoms delicately floated through the gentle, warm breeze. Like a restless caged animal, I rose from the hard wood seat and abandoned my moldy textbooks. Wanderlust had awakened and sent me hitchhiking all over Europe for the next six months until I ran out of money in Greece.

Rumor had it on the European backpacker trail that there were seasonal jobs at the Swiss ski resorts. As the Aegean waters chilled and my cash diminished with the shortening days, I optimistically journeyed north, even though I’d never seen snow or knew how to ski.

The first rent in the fabric of my happiness was the telegram I received from my parents at the American Express office in Vienna. “Your best friend Jan Russell died in a head-on car collision this week. Her parents want to know if you ever discussed her religious beliefs or burial preferences. They do not know if she would like to be cremated or buried.”

Sobs racked me as I collapsed on the marble tile floor.

No, we had not discussed these existential quandaries. We talked boys and Paris.  I lay there on the concrete, the telegram crumpled beside me. She had been saving her money waitressing at a diner so she could join me in Europe.

My heart was heavy with grief. I would never see her again. In shock, dazed and confused I continued hitchhiking to Switzerland.

Things lightened up a few days later when a plush Rolls-Royce stopped to give me a ride on the road skirting Lake Geneva. This was a first. Most times it was students in dented Citroën deux chevauxs or workers in mini delivery trucks who gave me lifts.

“I’m going to Villars-sur-Ollon. Throw your pack in the back seat and hop on in,” said the youthful driver, who sported a black chauffeur cap, Hawaiian shirt, and jeans.

“Where are you from?” he asked in an American accent.

He was my kind of good-looking with black hair, blue eyes, and a big smile.

I sat in the front seat with him and chatted about job options for vagabonds like myself.

He said, “You should come to Villars with me. It’s a hoity-toity ski resort in the Vaudoises Alps above Montreux and overlooks the Rhône Valley with views of Mont Blanc. They probably need ski instructors.”

“I actually can’t ski. Maybe I can find another type of job?”

He looked at me and laughed because I was going to a ski resort but couldn’t ski. “Well, my boss is looking for a nanny. Interested?”

My only experience baby-sitting kids as a teenager had been a nightmare, so this didn’t seem appealing until he said who he worked for.

Nodding in a non-committal way, he continued, “Yeah, I drive for Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones and his family. It’s pretty easy as they don’t go out much. I was working at a gas station in Villars after bumming around Europe for a year and they offered me a job while I pumped gas for them.”

The nanny job suddenly had appeal. I said, “Sure, sounds good.”

As we wound up the twisty mountain road, he said, “Keith and Mick come here every year and get full blood transfusions from a famous doctor.”

I had no idea what he was talking about but it didn’t matter.

We drove straight to a classic-looking Swiss chalet at the end of a valley surrounded by dairy farms. Red geraniums in flower boxes lined each windowsill and snow blanketed the roof. He parked in the circular driveway and went inside to ask them about me and the nanny job while I waited in the Rolls.

In less than five minutes he waved me into a grand wood-paneled foyer that opened up into a cavernous living room accented with Persian carpets and splashy floral arrangements. Hand-hewn beams rose above the stone fireplace you could stand in and piles of toys littered the room. It was a little overwhelming after living out of my backpack and staying in cramped hostel rooms for seven months.

Keith’s Italian girlfriend and mother of his two children, Anita Pallenberg, waltzed in barefoot in a sexy lace vintage dress and shook my hand. She was sleek and beautiful, though she had dark circles under her eyes and her fingernails were chewed to the quick. We sat on overstuffed leather sofas and the job interview began with questions about where I was from and did I like kids. She didn’t seem bothered by the fact that I was barely past kid-hood myself.

Then she got more specific about the job requirements. In a flawless proper British accent she said, “The entire family usually stays up all night while Keith and his musician friends party and write music. You will need to keep the same hours.”

I nodded my head in agreement.

She continued, “We also travel to an island in the Caribbean where Keith records and you will be expected to come with us.”

Yes, yes, and yes! I kept nodding my head.

Anita didn’t seem interested in conversing with me—just giving me the job rundown. She stood up, yawned, and looked directly at me for the first time and said, “Well, do you want the job?”

Startled, I said, “I do. When do I start?”

As she walked out of the room, she turned slightly and said over her shoulder, “Tomorrow is fine. The kids’ names are Marlon and Dandelion.”

“Looks like you got the job,” said my handsome chauffeur savior who was waiting for me in the driveway as I hopped into the seat beside him and planted a big kiss on his cheek.  “My wife will be thrilled. She was offered that job so we could work together but it didn’t pan out because of the hours, the kids were a bit difficult, and she’s pregnant.”

Oh, a wife. Well, at least I had a job.

He dropped me off in town, where I decided to check into the youth hostel for my one night before working for the stars. I went to the ski bar for a glass of celebratory champagne, spending my last two dollars. On a stool nearby was the rubbery-lipped profile of Mick Jagger sipping a Scotch whiskey. Feeling upbeat, I nodded in his direction. He ignored me, but I knew that soon Mick and I would be on a first-name basis.

My euphoria continued as I strolled in the dusky afternoon sun down the main shopping street in Villars, admiring all the fancy store windows displaying luxuries like diamond necklaces, French perfumes, cashmere sweaters, and boxes of chocolate all far beyond my budget but lovely to look at through the plate glass. I pulled my Greek wool fisherman’s sweater tighter around me as snowflakes lightly dusted the sidewalk.

Looking up, I saw the highly polished black Rolls-Royce coming toward me. It stopped in the middle of the road. Just as I was about to go over and say hello to my chauffeur buddy, wondering at the coincidence of seeing him again today, the passenger door flew open and a hail storm of glossy designer shopping bags were pitched onto the cobblestones, bouncing and skittering across the street. Then a high-pitched scream emanated from inside the limo. With tanned long legs, and her dress pulled up to her thighs, Anita sprung out of the car, howling at my driver friend in completely incomprehensible Italian, her perfect English evaporated.

She didn’t notice that everyone—drivers, pedestrians and shopkeepers—were gaping at her hysterical display. My bewildered friend begged her to get back in the car, though it made no difference as she continued to shriek at no one in particular. She picked up her pile of bags and flounced down the street toward me. The chauffeur, looking as confused as everyone else, got back in the car and drove away, shaking his head.

As Anita approached, I backed away before she could recognize me. I realized there was no way I was going to work for such an out-of-control maniac bitch.

Well, back to the drawing board with less than a franc in my pocket.

Returning to the bar/restaurant where I had just been celebrating my new job, I smiled wanly at the bartender and inquired in halting French if they were hiring.

He nodded and pointed to a door behind the bar and said to go talk to the boss.

The room was dark and smelled of cigar smoke. A large, bald man in a cheap suit sat at a wooden desk and asked in French what I wanted.

Once again, on the same day, I found myself being interviewed.

Mr. Choca introduced himself in choppy English once he realized I was American but didn’t shake my hand or invite me to sit down. He told me there was a waitress job available immediately at his crepe house a few kilometers up the mountain at the ski lodge. He did not ask if I had ever waitressed before and didn’t seem to care that my ability to speak French was extremely limited.

He asked for my passport and put it in his desk, turning the key to lock the drawer, and mentioned something about getting a medical exam. He assumed I had accepted the job, though I had not even had time to nod my head affirmatively or say oui.

I did manage to find out it paid $150 a month and included room, board, and a ski pass. Mr. Choca then briskly told me meals were served in the basement and I would be escorted to my lodgings after dinner by one of the other waitresses. He waved me off toward the door and went back to his bookkeeping.

I practically skipped out of his office, imagining myself learning French while serving Chantilly crepes to happy, well-heeled, rosy-cheeked jetsetters. Plus learning to ski and eating fondue while drinking schnapps in my off-work hours with handsome, debonair, world-wise men.

Early that evening, definitely hungry, I sussed out where dinner was being served to the staff. Down a flight of stairs behind the bar was a long, dark hall with a trestle table where a dozen employees already sat down in front of their meal.

Might as well start practicing my French. I nudged onto the plank bench in between two older women wearing babushkas and said, “Bon soir, je suis  Américain. Comment allez-vous?”

Maybe I didn’t say the greeting correctly but no one responded or looked at me. Then a surly, bearded man plopped a metal dining plate in front of me with a clank. On its scratched surface was a mound of overcooked military green peas accompanied by a thin, grayish slice of liver.

“Dinner?” I asked my sullen companions, who still ignored me.

This was not good. I was a vegetarian. A young and hungry vegetarian. The van Gogh painting “The Potato Eaters” of peasants eating a meal in a dimly lit room was coming to life before my eyes.

A cute kid seated across from me, no more than fourteen years old, who looked like he might be a Gypsy, winked and stuck his finger in his mouth to imitate gagging. I laughed and tried to start up a conversation with him but he spoke only Spanish. Everyone around me looked tired and rough around the edges, all eating in leaden silence. They, too, seemed to speak only Spanish, or Italian. No Swiss and certainly no Americans.

By the end of the meal, which I didn’t touch, I patched together the story behind this collective of downtrodden workers, who came here seasonally year-in-year-out to work menial jobs for Choca. They were migrant workers—not students like me, cobbling together pocket change for their next backpack adventure. They weren’t here to ski or learn French. They were work slaves expecting nothing more than minimum wage, slop for food, and fourteen-hour work shifts.

And now I was one of them.

Shown to my drafty bunkroom by one of the non-communicative babushka women from dinner, stomach growls sang me to sleep.

First item on the agenda the next morning was to visit Choca in his office. He was very surprised to see me again. Right off the bat, I decided to set things straight. “Mr. Choca, I am a vegetarian. I do not eat meat. How about if I cook my own food at the dorm and you give me a food allowance since I won’t be eating downstairs?”

A calm silence followed as he digested my request. Then he laughed and said, “You want me to pay for your extra food? You’re nuts!”

Ha ha ha. He continued to chuckle.

Miffed at his complete lack of regard for my needs, I shuffled out of his office and continued up the mountain to the crepe house for on-site job training. Maybe I could eat some crepes during the slow periods.

A stocky, commanding woman with wiry salt-and-pepper hair that sprung straight up from her head greeted me at the door and threw an apron in my face. She huffed that I was “trop tard!” Too late!

If she had had a broom she would have hit me with it. In fast and furious French, she ordered me about with utter disdain. I understood only ten percent of what she was spitting at me. In between trying to figure out what she was telling me to do and attempting to ignore the hunger pangs triggered by the buttery-skillet aroma of crepes, I wondered if she hated blonds, Americans, or everyone that Choca sent her way.

From setting tables to folding napkins, I could not do anything right. At least in her book. By the end of my shift, I was so upset at being yelled at in a language that I didn’t understand that I collapsed in the stock room, hidden from sight, and sobbed uncontrollably. The only thing I wanted was my mom to hug and feed me, and for this nightmare to be over.

By the end of the second day on the job, I had become überwaitress. I’d intuit what the customers were ordering and smile and rush and deliver. People seemed happy with my service and the bossy training lady had disappeared. This wasn’t so bad. I marveled at the sweeping views from the floor-to-ceiling windows looking out on snow-topped Alpine peaks. I’d sneak bites of Gruyére cheese crepes and strain to learn the French that was spoken to me. The customers were initially cold toward me, but once I laughed or joked—my language skills were accelerating out of sheer need for survival—they warmed up and would ask where I was from.

Every time I handed them the menu, though, a pang of annoyance coursed through me because at the bottom of the laminated menu placard was a lie—a single phrase that stated, “Pourboire inclus.” I had deciphered what it meant: Tip included. Well, I never got a tip.  The management was pocketing them.

My resentment toward Choca was escalating.

Then, a week later, the roommate from hell appeared in the middle of the night and things spun totally out of control. Not only did Choca have me waitressing at the crepe house but also bartending at the discothèque located in the ski lodge at night—another job I was unqualified to do, as I’d never made a drink in my life. Luckily, the ski crowd seemed to only guzzle Johnnie Walker Rouge or Noir. Pour the golden liquor in a glass and push it across the bar. At first I was psyched to work in the disco because I loved to dance. It didn’t register that I would now be pulling fourteen-hour shifts working both at the crepe house during the day and the disco till the wee hours, with not a whole lot of energy left for dancing.

The other downside was that the club was empty, cold, and boring, and I was by myself doing all the work—bartendress, DJ, and dishwasher. No one came there because the drinks were too expensive and the bar was perched too high up on the mountain on a narrow, windy road above the village of Villars, which twinkled far below.

Nightly, I trudged in a tired trance down the hill back to my dorm in town. Sometimes, though, the half-hour walk was magical with the moon and stars sparkling on the crystalline snow banks. I had never been in the snow before so this captivated me. I’d sleep till noon and then wake too fatigued to use my ski pass. And my charming roommate snored. Loudly, like a guffawing circus clown.

She was from poor Germanic peasant stock and had zero social skills. She looked like she was in her thirties but, I found out later, was my age. Not only did we share accommodations, but she also waitressed at the crepe house. Probably because she spoke passable French.

She was a lousy waitress and customers, scared of her perma-scowl and surly nature, would push their tables over the invisible line of demarcation to my serving area. This did not endear me to her and also doubled my workload.

After several weeks of this, I’d had it! I wasn’t learning to ski. I was being abused by the ornery and envious troll bitch—though I was getting a handle on speaking French, but a lot of it was derogatory phrases from being yelled at. This was not how I was used to being treated.

Maybe that baby-sitting job for the famous heroin addicts was still available. Staying up all night long corralling spoiled children and fending off the tight-leather-panted rock-and-rollers suddenly wasn’t sounding like such a bad work option.

Again, I marched into Choca’s office in the back of the bar/restaurant and announced, “I’m quitting.”

He swiveled his head toward me, a snide smile spreading across his face, and said, “You will work until the end of the ski season. I have your passport. You will get it back in March.”

“What? I didn’t agree to this slavery.”

“Too bad.”

“So you aren’t going to let me leave?”

He picked at his cuticles and without looking up, curtly said, “Mais, non.”

In disbelief, I stomped out of his office.

Okay, bastard. If you won’t let me quit, I will make you fire me.

As I stood on the sidewalk pondering how to liberate myself from Choca’s chokehold, a jingly, horse-drawn carriage passed by in the street. It was Rafi, a vagabonder from Israel on the seasonal job trail who I had befriended earlier. He was on the clock, taking tourists for scenic and slightly cheesy drives around town.

Suddenly, I knew exactly what would be my salvation. I hadn’t worked for Choca long but I knew his Achilles’ heel—he was cheap. A penny-pincher. A miser. Think Scrooge. Liver and peas.

I flagged down Rafi and said, “Come up to the disco tonight. Drinks are on the house. Invite all your friends and anyone else you run into.”

As he high-fived me, I smiled to myself. Rafi knew everybody in town. And Israelis can’t resist something for free.

That evening, I lined up the shot glasses on the polished bar, put on a Spinners tape, and activated the disco ball. Pin pricks of red, gold, and blue lights orbited around the parquet dance floor.

Drumming my fingers on the bar, I wondered if anyone was going to take me up on my offer when suddenly there was a draft of frigid air and a pack of young people tumbled in, shedding their ski parkas. Soon the place was jumping. I didn’t even lift the bottle lip when I poured drinks, just swooshed it over the glasses, filling them up in a cascade of Johnnie Walker. When I poured the last golden drop from one bottle, I grabbed another from the stockpile in the back room.

I was having so much fun dancing and laughing and cavorting while pouring drinks nonstop that a twinge of regret hovered inside me—this might be my last, and only, night as Queen of the Disco.

When I showed up the next evening for work, I expected Choca to greet me at the bar entrance with my passport and marching orders. No sign of him, but because I had extended the free drink policy indefinitely, there was a large crowd lined up to enter the club.

Overnight, the club had become the most popular nightlife spot in the canton. Some of the fur-coat-clad partiers I was handing drinks to looked rather movie-star-ish. Apparently jetsetters liked free drinks, too!

Choca finally made an appearance a few nights later wearing an ill-fitting shiny polyester suit, his chest puffed up like a banty rooster’s. He had brought an entourage of friends—all of whom looked like they belonged in the Mafia—to show off his star-studded, glamorous clientele.

By now, the disco was stuffed to the gills with a weird hodgepodge of seasonal workers rubbing shoulders with rich international boarding school brats, and the likes of Mick Jagger, Timothy Leary, high-cheekboned super-
models, and pro skiers, all elbowing up to the bar and twirling on the dance floor.

Add to this the Grand Prix race car drivers who were in town for the internationally renowned Ollon-Villars hill climb, and it was a Vogue magazine wet dream.

My nightly blistering-cold thirty-minute walk home was cut down to five minutes when the famous race car drivers took turns giving me lifts back to the dorm after closing time. One night it would be an Italian in a Ferrari, the next a Brit in an Aston Martin. All gentlemen who gallantly opened the door of their fancy, super-sonic cars that sat one inch above the icy tarmac. They’d buckle me in, the engine would roar to life, and in a blurry streak I’d find myself down the mountain delivered to my doorstep with a kiss on the cheek and a “Bonne nuit!” before they zoomed off into the pre-dawn night.

Oddly, Choca left me alone but showed up every evening with his posse. It seemed his ego was willing to pay the alcohol bill in exchange for popularity. His group would sit at a table far off in a dark corner and leer at all the mini-skirted babes on the dance floor. He was the only one I had to deliver drinks to and, of course, there was no pourboire. He never said a word about the new free-drink policy.

I did finally get a gratuity. Jackie Stewart, the Grand Prix world champion nicknamed the “Flying Scot,” passed me a dollar bill across the bar when I served him his drink. As he did so, he said in a thick Scottish brogue, “Thank ye, lassie. You’re a fine dancer.”

I was having a ball but working fourteen hours a day and partying was taking its toll. One particularly bustling evening, in an exhausted daze, I rushed from behind the bar and through the door with a tray of drinks to serve Choca. I was wearing my apricot silk gypsy blouse that I had had custom-designed in Paris for $20. The long bell sleeves fluttered and caught on the door handle, bringing me to an abrupt halt, but the drinks continued their trajectory through the air in a free fall. As I watched in horror, the glasses and their contents splashed across the laps of the brutish men sitting with Choca.

I was terrified yet relieved. Maybe now I would finally be released from this wheel of work captivity, but no. Choca, miraculously unscathed by the flood, pointed and laughed at his soaked friends.

Then, one morning, a week later, I awoke in a stark-white hospital room with a bandage around my head, tortured with a blazing headache.

Confused, not recognizing my surroundings, I drifted off in a hazy slumber. The next time I woke up, there was a nurse fiddling with the IV tubes sticking out of my arm.

“What is your name?” she softly asked in French-accented English. “Are you American?”

“What am I doing here?” I asked.

“One of your lodging mates carried you here late last night. She found you unconscious on the bathroom floor. You have anemia and a concussion. Do you remember passing out?”

“Not at all,” I said.

Incredulous, I then asked, “The short, mean, ugly girl carried me here?”

The nurse laughed and said, “No. She was tall, strong, nice, and Spanish. She didn’t know your name.”

She felt my pulse and added, “You also appear to be suffering from mild starvation and dehydration.”

I was so bone-tired and achy that what she said meant nothing. The clean bed and warm, quiet room lulled me back to sleep. The next time I opened my eyes, a policeman was standing at the foot of my bed holding a notepad.

He smiled kindly and asked in clipped English, “Mademoiselle, we are very concerned that you are so malnourished. Who is responsible for this and why have you not your passport or any identification?”

“Good question!” I said, and then filled him in on who had my passport and why.

The next day, I was still hooked up to the IV drip but felt much more myself. Rafi and some of my other friends I’d made at the disco had stopped by to visit. They really missed me and the free drinks. They all agreed Choca was an ass but probably missed me too, as the club had been empty since my accident.

Rafi said, “And guess who is the new barmaid?”

“No, not the troll!”

He was laughing so hard he could only nod.  He asked me what I was going to do next, and when he saw a copy of Exodus by Leon Uris on my bedside table, he told me about an airline that sold a cheap flight from Zurich to Tel Aviv. The book had ignited an overwhelming desire to go to Israel, and my mind began to race with the idea.

Two days later, I was getting antsy. The nurse had removed the bandage from around my head and the IV tubes from my arm and affirmed that the doctor was ready to discharge me. There was only one minor detail left, which was resolved when Choca suddenly strode into my hospital room, tossed my passport onto the bed, and said, “You’re fired!”

As he turned and walked toward the door, I said sweetly, “Aren’t you going to pay me my salary? I could ask the police to collect it for me if you are too busy right now.”

He froze, spun around, and glowered. Rustling in his coat pocket, he pulled out a wallet and counted out 1200 Swiss francs.

Just the right amount to get me the student airfare that Rafi had told me about, with money to spare for my next adventure.

As I made my way to the main road just outside Villars to hitch a ride to Zurich, images of parting seas, Bedouin tribes, and desert crossings in my mind, I passed Choca’s bar and fingered the thick bundle of francs in my pocket, humming a Spinners’ song.

This true story is published in Wild Life: Travel Adventures of a Worldly Woman