Throughout my childhood, teenage years, and even into young adulthood I was constantly called shy. France is the place where being discreet is the penultimate. Have you noticed that most of the time, you could hear a pin drop?
Take a moment to really think about it. Now, have you ever been on the subway in New York City? The shock of just how loud the subway was hit me like a ton of bricks. Almost immediately after I arrived, I got on Meetup and Facebook and got out there to meet people.
I was lucky in that I was an au pair , and similarly to international students , au pairs flock together. Just two weeks after stepping foot on French territory, I had found a group of girls with whom I really bonded.
But le sigh , we were all American. I started meeting more people and they were, second spoiler alert, more English speakers. Australian, Irish, English, and even some German people, but all Anglophones. In some way, it felt good to be surrounded by this comfort of a shared language because I was so far from home. I came here to learn new things, meet new French people, and, to be honest, I was struggling to do so.
Fast forward to my second year as an au pair. At this point, my group of friends had dwindled down to a solid six people, all English speakers. Once you start living the life of an expat, you realize that other foreigners come and go and you have to be ready to adapt and make new friends at all times. The group that I became close with was also interested in sticking around for the long haul, which is why we gravitated toward each other. After 2.
