On June 14, 1940, German Nazi troops marched into Paris, and the city fell to German occupation. Only days before, the embattled Prime Minister of France, Paul Reynaud, had declared Paris an Open City in a last-ditch effort to save it from destruction, thereby allowing soldiers to march in unhindered.
There was a moment, at the latter end of the first six months of my life in Paris, when I woke up and simply began to cry. I only cried for 5 minutes, staring out at the cute little Parisian street view, wiping my tears and allowing myself this little
You knew this was coming. So much has been written about the bureaucratic processes in France; what an absolute nightmare the system is, and how it is virtually impossible to get anything done. I am happy to add to this discourse as I have some serious trauma. I find it
And I’m back! It is a New Year, and snow has descended upon Paris to the great delight and simultaneous exasperation of Parisians (the métro inevitably has major issues if it snows), and I would like to share with you a little holiday tradition I have with my boyfriend.
I am not going to lie to you, getting through the winter slog in Paris is really hard. Starting around November and certainly by the end of December, the days morph into a perpetual gray. Not only does the sun completely disappear, but the sky starts to feel claustrophobic as
It was the morning of October 12, 2019 and I was sprawled out on my spacious and quintessentially American queen-sized bed, very much still in the actual United States, wearing yoga pants and sipping coffee. I was about to go on a run and mindlessly scrolling through YouTube when I
In the spirit of winter and perhaps also piggybacking a little bit off my last posts, I am writing today’s post with two very sore arms, freshly vaccinated with the latest Covid booster (left arm) and this year’s flu shot (right arm). The vaccinations are widely available all
It was October 2021, one year and three months since I moved to Europe, and after much desperate job searching and taking on some short-term roles that led to nowhere, I finally landed a much-coveted CDI position in Paris. CDI, the most sought-after type of contract, stands for contrat à
When I was 4, my father had decided he wanted to try living in France, preferably close to Paris, and asked his company for a transfer, resulting in us relocating to Chartres. It was just in time for me to start French kindergarten at age 5. I immediately fell profoundly
I was sitting in seat 24K on an Airbus A380 destined for Europe and I was angry at myself because I was crying. The plane itself was nearly empty and I was one of the only passengers; out of some 509 seats on the airplane, maybe only 30 were occupied,