Photo Opp

What does it take to get a photo for the french "carte de sejour"?

Normally it is very easy, much easier than in the US. There are Photomation booths in many metro stops that take photos that can be used for passports, school photos, ID cards (museums, etc). You enter the booth, sit on the stool and smile. In 30 seconds the sheet of photos pops out.

Today, we needed photos and we found a booth at the metro stop at Hotel de Ville.

I sat on the little stool, pushed my Euro 5 note into the machine and smiled. Out rolled the euro note, rejected. I took it, smoothed it out and tried again. Out. I smoothed some more and tried putting it in the other way. Out.

I asked Terry if he could try to get change for a 20 Euro note at the kiosk where they sell metro tickets. No dice. He then tried all the little stores that are underground near the photo booth, negative. We resorted to buying a metro ticket to get the change but the woman wouldn't give us the necessary change and yelled at us, basically for being pests.

We need the photos. So, off we went on the metro; Line 1 to Concorde, change to the 12 to rue de Bac where our bank is located. We had to stand in line, inside the bank, but we got Euro 20 worth of one and two euro coins. Photos, here we come!

Except, there is no Photomation kiosk at rue de Bac. I wracked my brain, where had I seen one? Pasteur! Back on the metro Line 12. Off at Pasteur where we found the booth.

In go the coins, out comes the pictures. It only took 1-1/2 hours from start to finish.

Addendum to this post: When I went to get the Carte de Sejour, the "fonctionnaire" rejected my photos. In one set (yes, I tried it twice), I was smiling too much and in the other set, the top of my head was slightly chopped off. So she made me go (3rd time, now) to the Photomation booth outside the office. A man was working on it and it was out of service. I dash around inside the prefecture de police and finally find another booth. I fix the stool, don't smile, check that I can see the top of my head and get the photos. The foncitonnaire exclaimed that I looked too serious, but she accepted them. Euro 15 for photos.