Back to Work or How did I manage to pull this off?

About 5 years ago I came up with the bright idea that I wanted to quit my job in 5 years and live in Paris for 6 months. Yes, I'm not at a retirement age but the house would be paid off and the kids mostly through college.  Or course I talked this over with Richard and it seemed like a nice dream.  It was 5 years away.

My job allows me to work from home but in exchange I only have 2 weeks of vacation time a year.  That's a rant I'll save for another time.  I love to travel so I maximize a loophole with working from home: my home is where ever my PC and I are.  In the past few years, I've taken several weeks where we go somewhere, my companions spend the business hours doing stuff while I get my work done and then my PC goes off and I join them for evenings and weekends. 

Cut to Christmas time 2017 and that 5 year mark is rapidly approaching.  It was obvious that I wasn't going to be able to quit my job (because healthcare but that's another rant for another time).  That doesn't mean the dream is dead.  Rich wanted to take a music cruise but I just could not afford the vacation days off.  We have other plans that I needed to save my days for.  He suggested he take his cruise and I go to Paris in the summer.  I love that man. 

So we made our plans.  He went off and had a grand time, listening to his favorite genre of music and meeting band members. And I booked a ticket for Paris starting July 1 until August 11, 6 weeks. Once I clicked that button for the airfare, this dream started to get legs.  This could happen. This was happening. I could do this.  I could go and live there.  It seemed so simple.  All I had to do was book an airline ticket and then suddenly a dream could become a reality.  The magnitude of this washed over me and gave me chills.  I'm going to go live in Paris.

Next step, where to live.  Six weeks is a long time in a hotel room and I needed a living room and a bedroom.  It really wasn't a big question; I was looking at AirBnB.  There are so many options and so many choices.  How do I pick one?  I made my list of must haves: WiFi or I can't go and this whole idea is shot, quiet during the day so major tourist areas were out of the question, whole apartment to myself because I wasn't dealing with room-mates possibly making noise or problems while I need to be working, and near a metro stop as I would not be having a car.  That narrowed it down to only about 300 choices, Oy.  I looked over so many listings, debating choices.  It took me several weeks and then when I narrowed it down to about 5, I just picked one. 

This is my first experience with AirBnB and it has been most pleasant.  However, I will say that the owner of this flat owns 17 other properties listed on AirBnB and due to the "vanilla" nature of the apartment, it's obvious that this is what he does for a living: he buys up properties around Paris and rents them out.  Knowing that apartment prices in Paris are more often than not 7 figures, just whoa.  And this guy has 17 at least.  I wish I had that kind of money :)

Plane ticket, check.  Apartment, check.  Passport not expired, check.  And all of the rest are just details.

And then it was time to get on a plane.  I took the first week as a vacation week.  Rich, Libs and I spent it doing the tourist thing, seeing all the sights.

My first Monday back at work was a time shift.  Now all of my morning meetings were in the afternoon. At home, I have my first meeting at 7AM and I need to be ON, so that adrenaline jolt every morning is an eye opener.  Here in Paris, that meeting is 1 PM in the afternoon so I have time to wake up and ease into my day.  I'll have to say it has been a welcome respite. My Indian colleagues were available in my mornings now and I didn't have to juggle meetings just so I could find a few minutes to talk to someone in Bangalore.  I now had morning hours to complete tasks when back at home it's my afternoons when I have time to work on items.  My workday turned upside down.

At the end of the day, I shutdown and I am in Paris! Time to go play.  My list of things to do and see is long and I'm not sure 6 weeks is going to be enough. 

Disneyland Paris

Tuesday of vacation week with Rich and Libs.

Hey Disney, you let me down.  Can't say it was the best of experiences.  Lucky for me, this is my 3rd visit and one more planned shortly.

Two things, not Disney, that colored our day.  Even though we left at 9AM for the hour ride to the park, we had to switch trains a couple of times and one of the exits we needed to take to switch trains was closed.  We got turned around and ended up on the wrong train.  So we did not arrive until well after 10.30AM.  Not too terrible but we had two parks to see in one day so every minute counts.

Second, it was hotter than Hades. Who turned up the heat?  Who knew it was going to be a major heat wave in Paris this week?

OK, that out of the way, Disney you could have done better.  There are several E ticket rides that are a must for this Disney fan.  Why, oh why would you close both the Phantom Manor AND the Pirates of the Caribbean ride for refurbishment at the same time?  Seriously Disney -- bad planning! It appears Disney has permanently "temporarily" closed the Jules Verne walk through.  It was closed last October and it was closed now.

We went to the Studios park first and made a beeline to the Ratatouille line.

The three of us went as single riders and got on within 15 minutes.  Hurrah!  Great start.  This ride uses glasses and 3D imagery but one of the scenes had a screen stuck.  Not a big deal but I took off my glasses to check if it was me or the ride.  It was the ride.

Next Libs wanted to ride the Tower of Terror.  The Disney app said the wait was 45 minutes so we decided to take a chance.  Bad choice.  Libs and I waited nearly 2 hours when all was said and done.  Of the 6 elevators, only 2 were running and they kept putting all the fast pass people on those elevators so the standby line (half of it in the blazing sun) was barely moving forward at all.  After having spent so much time waiting we kept thinking, OK this time.  A disappointment.

But wait, the disappointments keep coming...

We were hungry so we stopped in the large dining area - fast food burgers and such.  FAST food, right?  45 minutes later Rich and Libby got their meals, they did not get my order and then when I complained, I got a "chicken" burger instead of beef.  OK, moving on...

Time for the Magic Kingdom!

We went into Sleeping Beauty's castle and found the dragon.

Rode the Snow White ride and the Pinocchio ride. Found a great spot in the shade to watch the afternoon parade, which was awesome.

The way to the Indiana Jones roller coaster was blocked so had to find the other way in to discover the ride was temporarily out of service.  We decided to wait 15 minutes on the clock ONLY and luck finally shined on us and the ride opened.  It's a jerky ride and although the theming is great, the ride gave us all a headache.

Time for future world.  I really wanted a fish and chips dinner so those two headed off to Star Tours and I went to the English style pub to discover -- you guessed it -- it was CLOSED.  In fact it seemed like well over half of the food establishments were closed or only running one register with the corresponding 45 minute wait.

Don't French Disney fans eat????

We were not going to miss the Illuminations show so we headed back to Main Street and found the hot dog stand was still serving food -- Go figure! We found a table in the shade and ate with a view of the castle. We could see the clouds starting to come in.

  Then Libby and I did some souvenir shopping.  We came back to the table with about 15 minutes before showtime. Cast members had closed all the umbrellas and then it came.  The lightening and the thunder.  And then a little rain.  And then a lot of rain.  And then the sky just opened up and poured down buckets of rain.  We were not allowed to open the umbrellas.  So we debated the question if we should leave like everyone else but by golly we were here and wet already, what difference did it make?  The illuminations show went ahead, minus the fireworks.

And then, my friends, we saw magic.

Along with the projections from many of Disney's movies being shown on the castle, there were lasers shooting out and the rain showing up through the lasers was one of the most spectacular sights we've seen.  Watching the illuminations show in the downpour was a magical way to end the day.  With the rain coming down so hard, I did not risk getting out my phone to take pictures.

Public Transportation tickets

Still struggling to figure out Paris metro tickets.

Oh, getting around is easy.  Each metro line is a color and a number combo. We are near the Jasmin stop so it is line 9 and an olive green color.  You need to know the end point so you can figure out which direction to go and then of course, the station name that you want to get off at.   That was fine, no worries.  We only made one error and that was because the exit from the platform to the line we wanted to switch to was closed and it was not clear how to get where we wanted to go. 

Google Maps is my friend. I would punch in where we wanted to go, and GM would tell us exactly which trains and stops and how much time it should take including the "2 minute" walk from one platform to the next.  It was awesome

The thing that Paris is not consistent with is what to do with your ticket later.  You buy the tickets from a machine (does have a languages choice).  You can buy a book or carnet of tickets but it just means you get 10 individual tickets - not an actual book :)

You put the ticket in turnstile and follow the signs to the platform.  The thing is you are supposed to hold onto your ticket to use to get OUT of the metro station as well.  Except there is no rhyme or reason as to which stations have an exit turnstile (requiring your ticket) and which just have a door.  And sometimes, they simply turn off the exit turnstiles and let everyone through.

Still trying to figure this one out.

Oh and how do you tell if your metro ticket is good?  Most have no indication that it went through a turnstile.  I have a collection of tickets on my dresser now.  I think there is one or two that did not get used yet but I can't tell by looking at them.

Advice I was given:  Hand the ticket to an agent and have them check it out.  You can't.

Note:  Decided to get the Navigo card.  It's weekly or monthly (by calendar). I did the math and decided weekly was my best bet.  I got one last Friday and will refill it for the next 3 weeks.  Works well and now I don't have a stack of paper tickets to figure out which, if any, are still good.  Oh and I did read an article this week that said they are going to do away with the paper tickets for good sometime next year.

Eiffel Tower

Our first full day in Paris and we all slept in until noon! That's really unusual for Rich and me, not so much for Olivia :)

Everyone having showered, it was time to forage for food.  There is a cafe a few steps from the apartment building so we went there.  Due to the heat, and that fact that it was lunch time, we all opted for salads - me a Caesar salad and Rich and Libs had Caprese salad.

Note about payments:  compared to my visits from years ago, bank cards are much more accepted than they used to be.  And here's the thing, every waiter or establishment we went to that do accept cards, has this small gizmo that fits in their pocket to run the transaction.  EVERY SINGLE ONE.  The waiter comes to the table with the gadget and the whole thing is done here -- no handing off your card and the waiter disappears with it for 10 minutes.  However, my American Express card is still not widely used so we ended up using the debit card.  If a place did take Amex, they either had a minimum charge or added an extra Euro or two to the bill.  Hey American Express -- bring your fees down so more places will take it!

Rested, clean, fed -- ready to take on the world :)

My AirBnB said the Eiffel Tower was just a 15 minute walk away - yeah, maybe for a 20 something who runs daily.  There is no way that is true.  However, Google Maps -- by the way, best invention ever - said it was 30 minutes.  Did I mention the heat?  I'm sure it is a very pleasant walk when the temperature is mid 70s with a cool breeze.  We took our time, we wanted to get our bearings anyway but by the time we got there, we knew we were taking the metro for the return trip.

We arrived at M. Eiffel's masterpiece.

We have all been to the top on previous visits so it wasn't on our agenda.  We went down the steps to the boat dock and bought water bottles and ice cream bars. 

We timed it just perfectly because after we finished our sweet treats, we got on a boat that was just about to get underway.  We took the hour river voyage from the Eiffel Tower to Notre Dame and back.

The heat was brutal so we slowly made our way back to the Metro stop near the tower.  We went back to the apartment but Rich left to go find that fan I mentioned before.  When he came back with it, he said it was the last one the shop had and it was the window display model.  We've since gone past the shop and see they have stocked up.  Yeah, I saw a number of folks toting around new purchases of fans in the intervening days.

Yes, it was early and yes, it's because we're US Americans but we went out for dinner at 7 pm.  There were several cafes we could have stopped at but Libby chose the very french Donner King.  Sandwiches and fries.  Worked for us.

Air Conditioning

 So, let's talk about the heat for a moment.  OH MY WORD, it's hot.  All of June back in Ohio, it was 70s F and sometimes I was still in my long jeans.  It appears that the first of July, THE day I come over, a major heat wave has hit Europe and is expected to hang around for quite a while.  It never even occurred to me that it would be this hot.  And, here's the kicker, the apartment is not air conditioned.  In fact, that new-fangled idea from the states just hasn't caught on big here in Paris or much of Europe.  Europeans just don't understand US Americans love affair with cool air.  I knew the apartment was not air conditioned but I figured it wasn't going to get hot enough for me to worry about it.

The apartment has two large floor to ceiling windows and a large window in the kitchen.  When Fatima first brought me into the space, it was pitch black! I was a bit taken aback until she opened the blinds.  They are on a switch on the wall.  This is one of the tricks Europeans use to combat the heat.  The blinds should stay closed during the afternoon hours to keep out the sun but I like the light!

The apartment has one fan in the bedroom but that just wasn't going to cut it.  Richard went out and bought another fan for the living room.  I tried the ice cube trick but the ice melted immediately and was ineffectual.  Libby put wet sponges into plastic baggies and froze them.  That actually worked OK. 

But yeah, this is going to be a LOOOONG summer.

Paris!

So, the original plan in 2013 was for me to quit my job in five years and go live in Paris for 6 months to write the great American novel.  OK, not a novel idea but, yeah, that was the plan.  Every time I've been to Paris, I've stayed 3 days or fewer.  So, I've seen the big tourist attractions but that hasn't been enough to feed my soul.  I want to live in Paris, go grocery shopping.  I've never lived in the big city; what is that like? I want to sit down in a cafe over hot chocolate and not feel as if I'm missing out on something because I only have 18 more hours before I have to leave.  I want to improve my foreign language skills.

Well, here it is 5 years later.  I can't quit my job yet (if we had universal healthcare I could, but that's another post).  But I'm a dreamer.  And to quote my husband, "we do things".

How can I make this happen?  Well, I am making this happen.  I work from home so for the next 5 weeks, my home is an AirBnB apartment in Paris. 

I got up a week ago Saturday morning for the grand adventure.  My ride to the Cleveland airport was scheduled for 3 pm so I took my time all morning to pack for 6 weeks.  Put this in, take that back out.  The apartment has a washer/dryer so I planned for about 10 days of things to wear, but I hate to do laundry so LOTS of underwear and socks!  I managed to get everything in one suitcase, one carry-on and my backpack.

The first week I took off from work as vacation and Rich and Olivia joined me.  They took a side trip to Germany to see Julia so they had already left Cleveland several days before me.

Everything went according to plan.  My ride arrived 10 minutes early.  Checked in and through security quickly with 90 minutes to kill before the plane left for Newark. 

<<Me at the airport -- still doing a bang up job with selfies >>

 Boarded a non-eventful journey to NJ.  Had a two hour layover then got on the flight to Paris. Yes, it was a long haul in Economy but I did manage a couple hours of fitful sleep.  Touched down at Charles De Gaulle airport on time.  I sent a message to the owner of the apartment and he arranged for me to meet Fatima to let me in.  A 50 Euro taxi ride later and I had arrived at my temporary home!

Fatima does not speak English but we did manage to communicate and figure everything out.  I did talk with Arno.

The apartment is wonderful.  Really spacious by Paris standards. It has one bedroom with a king size bed, a living area with a fold out sofa bed, dining table with 6 chairs and a nice sized kitchen.  What is really nice is that Arno thought of everything that a person could need.  First aid kit, sewing kit, full kitchen gear (plates, pans), salt and pepper, all the cleaning supplies you can think of.  There is even a printer, which we ended up using to print out boarding passes later in the week.

It's far away from the major tourist areas in the 16th - I chose that on purpose as I wanted it to be quiet during the day - but it is only 2 minutes from a metro stop.

I arrived in the apartment at about noon and as soon as Fatima left, I fell on the bed and slept! Yes, they tell you that you should stay awake the first day and go to bed early.  But I know myself.  Without my sleep, I am crabby and miserable and I cannot enjoy anything -- I need my shut eye.  After about 3 or 4 hours, I felt human again.  I took some time poking around all the nooks and crannies in the apartment, put all my things away in the dresser and stowed my suitcase.  I moved in! I took a short walk around the neighborhood and found a grocery store.  Bought a few supplies and the store closed while I was in it.  The proprietor got mad so I paid for my things and left quickly.

Eight o'clock on a Sunday night, I was still tired but Rich and Libby were due to arrive around midnight so I had to stay up.  I had a good book and that's how I spent the time waiting for them.  No problems, I brought them inside and we all went to bed.