What Living in Paris is REALLY Like
Paris is a city curated to artists and those who strive to live a life where quality is prioritized over quantity. After years of trying to understand what it is about living in this city that continues to caress my heart – I’ve finally realized that it’s just that: the simplicity in the art of being.
Walking along the Seine in Paris in November 2021
Good food, chatting for hours over a coffee in a café with friends, and artistic expression of all kinds are highly valued here. When I was living in New York City, I often felt like I stuck out like a sore thumb anytime I pulled out my journal to write and people watch.
Walking along Saint-Germain boulevard in Paris, France in December 2021
Whereas living in Paris… I seamlessly blend into the background that is this beautiful city. I love to feel like a flower on the wall, free to digest and contemplate whatever I see however I want to.
Discovering the Christmas decorations in Saint-Germain Pres in Paris, France in December 2021
But living in Paris isn’t as glamorous as the Eiffel tower, croissants, and cobblestone streets all of the time. Well, it is – but the terrible rumors you’ve heard about French bureaucracy, and their painfully slow personality is unfortunately, absolutely true.
Eiffel Tower lit up at night in December 2021
It took me over six weeks to get the internet set up in my apartment. No one has called me for my OFII medical appointment. I’ve been living here in Paris for 3 and a half months, and I still can’t get anyone to give me a bank account. I’ve gone into the same branch 10 times, called 20, and signed the same documents over three times. Every time I ask to ensure they have all the papers needed to open a bank account, they say, “It’s good” and “it should be open in a week” – and it never is.
There is a lot of frustration to being a foreigner living in Paris. Finding the coveted CDI job contract is nearly impossible, and the constant worry of which visa to switch to or renew hangs over your head like a raincloud ready to thunderstorm at any minute.
Honestly, living here has been very stressful as I’ve started to set myself up for a life here in Paris. So, why do I decide to stay and not live somewhere else?
View of Tour Montparnasse in the 6th arrondissement of Paris in December 2021
Life is a collective scrapbook and the smallest of moments are the one that stain your heart the strongest. Every time I walk by a bakery and am suddenly overwhelmed by the strong scent of melted butter, or watch birds oscillate in the sky around an intricate old building, or communicate through a soft smile with a French person who cannot decipher my American tongue… reminds me of a certain beauty.
View of iron gate fences in Paris
Paris has always felt like a million miles away from everything and everyone. It somehow hides in the center of the world’s spotlight, sharing its alluring architecture at every possible corner.
Paris is beautiful on every corner
When you live in Paris, you are lucky enough to be graced with the opportunity to reconnect with the present moment a thousand times a day. All you have to do is look left to the motorcycle blazing by or look up to an iron gate fence to realize that even if nothing else is going right in your life – that something superb is indeed happening this very instant right before your eyes.
View of Invalides in Paris in November 2021
The epiphany, that this indecipherable charm far outweighs the potential hardship that life in Paris as a foreigner may come with – is what makes living in Paris all worthwhile.
And that is what it’s really like to live in Paris.
Want to see life in Paris in action? Watch my Youtube video linked below!
Looking for things to do in Paris? Click here.
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