What to expect when taking the the Eurostar from London to Paris... on a bank holiday

Maybe you are planning a trip for an Easter weekend in the future. For those in the US, this is a glorious four-day weekend that seemingly everybody gets off (in Europe?) and maybe you've planned to do your first bit of international tourism, like I have. Suppose you are having questions about the experience. Well, my friend, let me tell you all about it by way of my many errors (or, errata.)

First, chaos is what to expect. If possible, embrace it. It is going nowhere, the rest of this trip is going to be in a foreign language and that will probably also feel quite intimidating. Try to avoid that feeling and just go with the flow.

As detailed in my last post, I missed my first train. But let me get to more logistical notes for anyone really wondering how this will all play out.

1. If you miss the train for any reason, call customer service immediately. In my case it was good that my train hadn't actually left yet so I could rebook. I was too afraid to ask what would happen if I wasn't so lucky with the timing. They were able to rebook me on a much later train: options were 1:30pm for £130 and 2:24 for £80. £80 is $100, so okay 2:24 it is.

2. When I got  to the station, I first had only slight difficulty figuring out where to go. I found signs that pointed me to "international," since I'm traveling internationally. I thought I had the luxury of extra time and was keeping an eye out for Harry Potter, but it never jumped out at me, and with a heavy bag and uncertainty about the future of my trip, I didn't look for it very much.
So 2 is really: find signs for international trains, and go there.

3. Ticketing
There is a line/queue of people waiting to talk to humans. Behind that, there are kiosks. The kiosks don't have a line, the humans have a super long one, and more so the humans don't look very interested in expediting their service. If you aren't sure, go straight to the kiosk. I cannot emphasize this enough. Don't lose valuable time.

4. Get used to poor customer service.
Surely this is not reflective of every Eurostar employee, but the situation was apparent that they aren't overwhelmingly interested in solving your problems. Do you have troubleshooting skills? Try to use them.

5. Okay so you have your ticket, this is where you'd expect to find security at an airport. Not yet, it is in reverse order here. First you queue for your train, which for me was very easy to find, and actually started queuing basically when I got there even though it was so far in advance. You slowly proceed on this line, a few steps forward here and there followed by pausing, your standard line experience. This meanders TO security. You scan your ticket to get through to security.

5. Scan your ticket
In my case I didn't have an assigned seat, so I had to go talk to a human, but fortunately he was close by and there was no line. He just told me that I don't have an assigned seat, so I'll have to go talk to the guy on the train. Okay cool whatever.

7. Border control/security
I had a bottle with a small amount of water in it. This is me at most airport checkpoints, getting my last chugs in since you cannot have liquids with carryon. So I did that here, but there was not one sign explaining if that was necessary or not. I looked, a lot! Got through that without having to remove shoes.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is where I got my first passport stamp!!!!!!
Or second because maybe I got one in arrival to U.K., probably but I can't remember.

8. Waiting area: same as gate for airports
This is a confusing place because it doesn't feel like the destination. But it is! This is the place you can chill until they board your train. Have a seat. Even on this bank holiday I was able to get a seat, mostly since I got there right after they boarded the train for Brussels.

9. Boarding
They will announce this overhead and there are also electronic status boards. I had my doubts upon sitting down, like that maybe I would miss this train due to not understanding the system, but it was not a problem. It was loud when they announced boarding, and very obvious by the huge crowd of people exiting onto the escalator. Relatively straight forward, all in all.

10. Getting a seat
Okay so I got to the guy at Carriage 15 and they're telling me the train is overbooked. I asked if that means I'm not guaranteed a seat? And they said you're not. I asked what happens if there are no seats? And they indicated there are these foldable seats in the emergency exit vestibule. Okay, for me the threat is no longer a threat. My concern is getting to this Moulin Rouge show at 7pm, I don't really care what seat, though a real one would be nice. You know, you put forth money to do things and then you fuck up the alarm setting so you lose hundreds of dollars in tickets, it's not a good feeling. I'm getting on that god damn train.
Survival skill that would be useful here: flexibility. No joke. Trying to not lose your shit is more for yourself than those around you. The men telling me the train was overbooked: it's not their fault! Not at all. They are train managers and they didn't engineer the system that overbooked the train. They may be responsible for getting things running, but it's not going to help to give them a hard time-- for you more than for them. Don't waste energy. It is what it is.

About 20 minutes into the train ride, during the writing if this post, I was upgraded to an actual seat. Now I have back support and am sitting at a comfortably reclined angle.

And I'm going to freaking Paris!!! Finally!!!