Bonjour Paris!

Paris....je t'aime!

I thought I would begin with my background and where my travel bug stemmed from. 

Finding out I was going to be leaving my homeland as a typical British 8 year old was somewhat of a shock… What was this far off land they spoke of?  Were all my friends coming too?  Would I immediately forget how to speak English?  (The latter was probably my biggest concern, as I had never met one of those bilingual sorts, and any memories of previous holidays abroad seemed to temporarily evaporate).

There were tears, I begged my parents to quit their jobs and open a restaurant in our living room, I vowed to stay behind as a lodger at my friend Katie’s house.  But my protests were fruitless, and I got bundled into the overly crammed car and off we went down to Dover. 

Fully expecting to immediately forget how to speak my native language the minute we disembarked in Calais, all my worries dispersed as we arrived at our exciting new home in the outskirts of Paris, and I dove head first into the amazing experience that is life as an expat.

My home for the next 7 years, Paris is where I would do the most important part of my growing up.  It is here that my love of new places, cultures and languages grew, and it is because of this experience that I am writing this first post today, and will continue to write about places I have been to, am off to soon, and am saving hard to get to at some point in my future!