Paris

Paris City Skyline

I just returned from my second spring break trip in Amsterdam which is why I am only posting now. Amsterdam is a city I strongly advise going to. There are few cities that touch you the very first time you go there, great cities, both physically beautiful and spiritually alive, and Amsterdam is one. New York is another. And Paris is a third, a truly great city that, after all the traveling I've done in my time abroad, still remains one of the most wonderful cities in the world. There is a quality about a great city that grabs you, pulls you into its life, envelops you inside its spirit, moves you with its current. Walking the streets of Paris is being inside a thousand different lives at once, and feeling it in high living color moving all around you. The air is different, full and scented, and every person has a face you feel is impossible to forget, lined and rigid and beautiful. Living in a city like that, it is easy to lose sight, become dulled to the glory of its face and fall into routine, but traveling and returning has refined my appreciation for the beauty and art of the city; I no longer walk around blind. And now Paris is more wonderful than ever.

I would highly recommend coming to the city for a study abroad site. The place is full of life, color, neighborhood spirit, and light. The restaurants are classic, their terraces packed and smoky and covered by green awnings; the bars are black and beautiful, the bartenders are smiling, the pubs are packed and swinging; the parks are vast and spotted with couples on red blankets; the air is blue, the skyline cutting it softly across its knees, the familiar plie of the Eiffel Tower standing boldly upright at one end. It is beautiful. And not only does the city itself provide a lovely backdrop for a new life adventure, but the location facilitates travel across the continent. I have visited five different countries while studying here and it has been some of the most exciting travel of my life. Of course there are negatives, as there are wherever you go, and some of Paris has left me missing home. First of all, the cost of living here is far more expensive than in New York, and I thought New York was expensive. Second of all, the rumors about French arrogance are not entirely false--there have been moments I've felt shamed by the snootiness of certain Parisians, in conversation or streetwalking, and that makes me long for the detached modest demeanor of busy New York pedestrians, wrapped in their own lives, leaving me peaceful in my loneliness. I also wish that fewer people spoke English in Paris. It is hard to become fluent in the language when I am accosted with broken English every time I try to order off the  menu in French. It is one of those classic French underhanded insults.

Still, I would say that my time in Paris has been rather incredible. I have made friends, Americans, Parisians, other Europeans. I have seen places in the world I always dreamed of seeing but never had before. I have come to appreciate the slow pace of life here, a nice break from the over-enthusiastic fast paced self I had come to be in New York. I have created a life here. I have a neighborhood, a grocery store, a favorite bar, a favorite local restaurant, a weekly job, a tired routine, a home. I honestly cannot imagine having spent the past four  months anywhere but Paris. And I know that Paris will always be with me, wherever I go. I will never forget, never lose the city, because, as Hemingway says, Paris, this magical city and its incredible spirit, is "a moveable feast." And I will never let go.