The beginning.

I've jumped on the bandwagon and made myself a Year Aboad blog as everyone else seems to have one, though mine will probably be awful in comparison as so far I've been getting by on luck rather than months and months of planning. For those of you that don't know, I'll be spending the next six months in Paris interning at an advertising company, and the six months after that I'm doing something in Italy (but, true to form, I haven't even started thinking about that yet).

Everything to do with the move over here  has been last minute (I got my job 3 weeks ago!) and incredibly stressful. I very rarely cry, and yet last night a lingering glance at the dog's happy face as he received a tummy tickle reduced me to a sobbing wreck as I struggled to think of a life without Insurance forms and Roger's urgent emails. I ask myself, is it worth it?

10 hours in (the day started at 5am because for reasons I cannot fathom a 7am flight was a really good idea), my time in Paris has been pretty uneventful, but I'm going to write about it anyway as I have a lot of time to kill.

First was the hellish wake up call and subsequent half-conscious, 'pissed-off-at-everyone' airport boredom. A ball of fake fur drifting amongst a sea of suited-up business people, I got pointed at by a little girl who proclaimed me a "bear woman" very loudly. My coat's usual reception is something more along the lines of "you look like a tramp, please stop dressing like that Katherine," so I welcomed "bear woman" as quite the compliment. So far, the YA was going well.

I've never been to Paris before. I haven't seen enough of it to fall in love with it yet, but I'm sure I will soon enough. At the moment I just feel generally weird towards the place. I'm really disappointed with the food though. I spent far too much time in Gare du Nord (where I'm storing my luggage until later) and I had a very average sandwich there. I then searched high and low for a patisserie but couldn't find anything. The dream was shattered. So upsetting for a near-food addict such as myself. To make matters worse, every encounter with French people confirmed my spoken French is just mindbogglingly awful, and I had to resort to English with every single one. I then decided to wash my face with my new duty-free cleanser to make myself feel better, but quickly realised I had no towel, and a very wet and soapy face.YA was starting to go downhill, and fast.

So far the best thing to come out of today was that I visited a lovely woman (again, the language barrier was excruciating- how I got a 2:1 this year is a farse, a mystery, an ongoing saga) who is letting me rent a tiny flat for 2 weeks, starting next week. I was not prepared for how difficult and demoralising looking for a flat or a homeshare in Paris is, and I'm essentially a nomad until I can find something concrete. I sincerely hope I learn from my mistake and search for Italian accommodation a lot sooner than the week before I leave.. I will tell you, it is pretty petrifying turning up in a foreign country with nowhere to live.

Til then I'm staying with Gracie, so excited to see her place and have a night in with a takeaway. It'll be good to see a friendly face as well, as so far French people have been so irritating. As I type, a man is talking on the phone at a volume about 10 times louder than needed, in a tiny corridor, just outside a library where people are working. Whataknob. (Also I don't know how I ended up here in this strange university place... I'm so excited I've been darting around everywhere and now I'm a bit lost..).

Anyway, that passed a lot of time. Keep your eyes PEELED for another RIVETING entry filled with further REALLY EXCITING ANECDOTES!!!

K x