I lived outside of Paris, in a town called Chaville (it's closer to Versailles, but on the rail line to Paris), for a year. When I went there, I had had three years of high school French.
I was a fille au pair and lived with a family and took French classes at one of the local schools.
My experience of France and the French is "be polite." Attempt to use whatever French phrases you can, and ask nicely if they speak English. In the entire year I was there, I only encountered one jerk...and he was a bureaucrat, it was his job to make things difficult for me. :-)
Public transportation there is great...see this map of the Metro. http://paris.osac.gov/page.cfm?pageID=1378 It will all make much more sense when you're there. If you're going to be there for a period of time, you'll want to invest in a Carte Orange (which is now apparently a purple Navigo), but it's a transportation pass -- you can get them in weekly and monthly incremements. Here's the Wiki link on the Carte/Navigo...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carte_orange
There's a LOT to see and do in Paris. If nothing else, walking around it is just amazing. There're museums, parks, carousels, and cafes.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
regna
(no subject)
Date: 2009-10-30 06:21 am (UTC)I was a fille au pair and lived with a family and took French classes at one of the local schools.
My experience of France and the French is "be polite." Attempt to use whatever French phrases you can, and ask nicely if they speak English. In the entire year I was there, I only encountered one jerk...and he was a bureaucrat, it was his job to make things difficult for me. :-)
Public transportation there is great...see this map of the Metro. http://paris.osac.gov/page.cfm?pageID=1378 It will all make much more sense when you're there. If you're going to be there for a period of time, you'll want to invest in a Carte Orange (which is now apparently a purple Navigo), but it's a transportation pass -- you can get them in weekly and monthly incremements. Here's the Wiki link on the Carte/Navigo...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carte_orange
There's a LOT to see and do in Paris. If nothing else, walking around it is just amazing. There're museums, parks, carousels, and cafes.
Have fun!