New places, favorite haunts, and to-do lists

It's the final countdown. I'm leaving Beatrice's (and Paris--both I think equally hard) in only five days, boarding a plan on Friday evening. In a way I'm getting anxious to leave already, only because the goodbyes to both Paris and to my friends have been long and many--I just want to get it over with. Kind of. I've taken advantage of finally being free from school and the amazing weather (the closest we've come to spring this entire month) and haven't been in my apartment for more than a few hours at a time. After saying goodbye to Meaghan and Alena, it's only Amelie, Maria, and me that remain, and we've been revisiting our favorite places in Paris (L'As, the Marais) as well as crossing off things that we have yet to see (various parks, museums). I've been hesitant about breaking out my camera (known to all as Betty) these last few days, and I've finally realized why: I don't want to think of it as my last week living in Paris, my last week to take pictures of my life here--I'm making sure, in a way, that I'm going to return.

Last week British Airways emailed about the possible strike that their crew is threatening to have--well, it looks like they're having it. Every flight from Paris to Boston on Friday has been cancelled except for mine. How's that for fate, or luck, or what have you? I guess I'm meant to leave after all. I've been saying to my parents this entire semester that I'm going to return, and I've asked as many people as possible to describe their expat lives here in Paris, but while writing this post I'm only a mere 80% sure that I'll actually live here after graduation. That might sound like a lot, but I need some definite answers to cling to as I board my plane to the States. There are a lot of options for me to choose from--there's being an au pair, there's working for NYU, there's getting my masters at the University of Paris...I've done my research. But the thought of leaving again for not a semester, but possibly years, is daunting. I'm thinking too far ahead. Hell, I don't even know what I'm doing this summer!

I went to Amsterdam with Amelie and Maria on Tuesday morning, and we returned to Paris Thursday night. It was amazing. I had the best pad thai in the entire world, ate a warm belgian waffle covered in chocolate, actually had to pay for my water at restaurants (I forgot that not everywhere is it illegal to refuse to give people tap water--it makes me love France and the US), bought tulips at the flower market, drank ICED coffee to go (both ice and "to go" are foreign concepts in France), went into every single cute bookstore we saw, went vintage shopping (something that I never do in New York but actually liked here), napped in the park under the sun, went to the Anne Frank house, paid the vultures at the Van Gogh museum a whole 14 euro to get in, and pretty much walked around the entire city. One thing that I refused to do though: ride a bike. You know me and bikes--I love them. I rode one for five days. I rode my bike with Ece in New York a couple times last semester. But I absolutely hated the bikers in Amsterdam. Never in a city have I felt so unwanted as a pedestrian. That might sound weird to people who have never been there, but you can pretty much walk the entire place, and yet I never knew if a sidewalk was really a street or a bike path or whatnot, and I was constantly in danger of getting run over by bikes or cars or trams. Every time I heard that little bell behind me coming from the biker, I wanted to throw that person off their bike. The first day I had no doubt that I would get run over on that trip. By day three I stopped looking before I crossed the street because I wanted to take back my pedestrian pride that I've gained in both New York and in Paris. I'm used to getting the right-of-way--taxis hate me in New York for demanding that right. But in Amsterdam, it felt like the bikers were an infestation. Of course I'm being overdramatic, but that's just why I stubbornly refused to ride a bike, something that everyone says you have to do if you visit.

The city is beautiful, though. I'll give it that. Amelie and I figured out how to describe it in two ways: the first is that every street looks like it could be Main Street of a small New England town. The second is that it takes all the perfect, quaint parts of Boston and puts them into one city. It's quaint but metropolitan. And the people there are just freakishly nice. Of course I loved it, and I had to admit that it was a drastic change from Parisians, but as Amelie and Maria were reveling in their kindness, I felt like I had to stick up for the French. Sure, they're not as bubbly as the Dutch, or smile as much, and they don't do as many outward acts of kindness to strangers, especially tourists, but that's just their charm. They're fun and combative and you have to get in their good graces. It's like the differences between Northerners and Southerners. Being a proud Northerner, you see why I'd choose the Parisians. But I want someone to live in Amsterdam so that while I'm in Paris I can go visit--I loved it enough that I'd definitely go back.