Shopping cart

On Saturday, in my newfound independance I drove to Meridien shopping in the outskirts of Tarbes. I wanted to take advantage of my time-out (my husband and I agreed that on his off day, he will take care of Lucas while I get my own time to do whatever I wanted) to slowly browse through the array of foods at LeClerc (something I must have taken up from mom who loves to browse the aisles of grocery hypermarkets slowly also...). When I shop with Fred, we are in and out of the place in 30 minutes tops!
When I arrived and parked my car, walking to the shopping cart I realized I didn't have a 1 euro coin. There was an elderly lady returning her cart so I asked her for change ( with my coins). She had a plastic "coin" and asked me to go to her car with her instead, where her daughter looked everywhere for a 1 euro coin. After fruitlessly searching - she emptied her handbag and her car coin compartment, she brushed my "c'est pas grave" aside and gave me a plastic coin. She waited by her car to see if the coin worked (I also had a plastic coin of my own but it didn't work) and her coin didn't work, she rummaged for 2 more plastic coins and waited again while I walked the length to the shopping carts and tried out the coins. Thank God one worked :)
This lady was a total stranger and went out of her way to help me get a shopping cart and waited for me to see if I managed to get a cart!
I don't know many people who would bother searching her handbag and the car. I don't even know if I would try so hard to help. This one incident made my day. There are some really nice french people after all!!!!