(Some photos feature in this post, but you can access the full gallery here.) The school holidays began only three weeks after I started my role here as an English Language Assistant. Between doing prep work for classes and studying for my end of year exams, for my French classes…
La France, c’est different !
When you move countries, you know things are going to be different. There are some things you know beforehand, that you hear through the grapevine (which, these days, mostly just means the internet)- you know, stuff like driving on a different side of the road, or, in the case of…
Beginnings in Normandie | The Weekly (-ish) Lookback
Well friends, I thought it was time for a bit of a chronological update, since I have been in my town in Normandie for over two weeks now. (Side note: Normandie is the French spelling, otherwise ‘Normandy’ in English generally.) I took the train from Paris and one of my…
Are the French Rude?
The titular question is not usually a question I get asked- rather it is a statement often said to me. I have heard it quite a number of times, in many ways, from many different sources. Some people dial it in and say “Parisians” instead, which is at least a…
Paris, Slowly | The Weekly Lookback
Well, my friends, a lot has happened since my last blog post. Time continues to feel like a lie. I have slept eight nights in Paris, but it feels like much longer. Starting at my layover in Doha, I have journaled 65 pages in the last nine days, not…
Pre-Departure & Hobbits
Every day, I wake up and see the countdown widget on my phone. And every day, I am shocked and betrayed. Time marches on, without any regard for my health and sanity. We have always held each other in contempt, Time and I. Time thinks I don’t pay him the…
The Palpable Opposite of the Multiverse
Do you ever feel the weight of all the choices you didn’t make? All the lives you didn’t lead? Some people believe in a multiverse theory- the idea (in simplest form) that there are other universes where the choices that you didn’t take are lived out. I think the main…
Phoenix Rising: On Restarting
I have always loved the idea of the phoenix. I’m a bit of a sucker for rebirth. There is just something about the idea that after the fire, something is reborn from the ashes. Something new, yet something ancient. Something that has been here a thousand times before – but…