-Minimize bureaucratic confusion-to-research ratio.
-Find something useful in all (most? some?) of the sources I know of but have yet to read.
-Meet the French Jews. Not all 600,000 of them. Some will do. Here, Facebook is, not surprisingly, useful.
-Speak tons and tons and tons of French. Meet French people, of any persuasion, who don't know a word of English. (Nothing against French people with perfect English! I'll hang out with you too!)
-Keep daily flan consumption to a one-per-day maximum.
-Limit clothes-shopping to Petit Bateau, a slightly pricey t-shirt store where I've given myself free reign (no, rein, thank you dave s.) to buy everything I see that I like, which should not, combined, exceed the 100-euro range.
-No new shoes! Not necessary! Repetto ballet flats are much cheaper in NY, and Bloch > Repetto as far as ballet flats are concerned. If I keep repeating these facts to myself, the mystique of Paris shoe-shopping won't return.
-No new books! Just kidding. Lots of new books, including but not limited to used books. But not so many I can't get them back.
-Do not become one of those Americans who had a transformative experience in Frahnce and doesn't shut up about it. If I end up returning simultaneously - paradoxically - slimmer and a better cook, that's something I can live with, but I'm not counting on it.
"I've given myself free reign to buy everything"
ReplyDeleteThe Queen of tee shirts! dave.s.
I thought transformative experiences abroad could only happen under the influence of foreign alcohol among a group of fellow American students studying abroad? If it didn't happen for you in college, you might now be immune.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure there will be wine, but the centrality of that to my experience may be lessened by the fact that I'll be 27 for most of my time there, as versus 20 and a half. And while UChicago in Paris was great, we had far too much homework to come back with notions about Frahnce.
ReplyDeleteIf you see a tap-dancer or hear poetic monosyllables, run.
ReplyDelete