Heigh-ho, heigh-ho...

...it's off to work I go.

Yes, just like the seven dwarfs, I've been busy mining the diamonds from the unforgiving gray rock of the Parisian job market. (Fun fact: in the French version of the "Heigh-ho" song, the dwarfs sing "Eh, ho!", which makes more sense in French, I suppose, but has the unfortunate side effect of sounding like "a-hole!" to any anglophone who happens to hear. If you watch the link, skip forward to about 1:15 to see what I mean.) Anyway, my roughly abillionty job applications have paid off, and I finally landed a position that satisfies my three conditions:

1) it entitles me to extend my visa and stay in France (to do so, I would either have to remain a student and work less than 17 hrs/wk, be a language assistant but not be permitted to take on another job to make up for the shitty pay, or else find a company to sponsor me and prove that no one in the EU is capable of doing what they want to hire me to do)

2) it pays (slightly) more than the teaching assistant position would have, and...

3) it forces me to use more spoken French.

To cut to the chase, I am now an administrative assistant at the Paris branch of IES, a private, study abroad company that operates in many different countries and caters mostly to American undergraduate students from upper middle class families. When my student status at NYU expires, I will be enrolled as an IES student, permitting me to extend my visa (and possibly audit some classes for fun...Arabic or film studies, here I come!). I'm also able to evade the hours of work requirement by the position technically counting as a "stage"--somewhere between a work study and an internship, meaning I'm (under)paid via a stipend instead of a salary or hourly rate, leaving me free to pick up a few extra hours of part-time work on the side (although in and of itself, the pay is definitely livable on a frugal budget).

I've now worked a little more than a week, full time (10-5 weekdays), as well as played tour guide a few weekends ago to a summer studytour group from University of Miami, Ohio just passing through Paris. Our two main student groups for this summer just arrived last week, so we've been busy with orientation and introductory programs. I am finding that I do a bit of everything, from answering phones, to helping students, to general office/secretarial work. It's not overly difficult, although the first week was a little stressful due mostly to insecurities about my French and a lack of familiarity with expectations, etc. However, I love my coworkers and the variety of the job, and I'm also using much more spoken French than ever before. I also absolutely live for the student interaction aspect, although more on that (and some specific experiences) later.

I've also landed a part-time gig on the side: English language 'tutoring' for an adorable French family of four girls. The family apparently spent a year or two in California, and the parents are now hoping to maintain/enhance their daughters' levels of English (especially that of the family baby, who is American by birth). The girls seem sweet, if not slightly over-involved (our lessons will be squeezde between school, piano and dance lessons) in the typical manner of children from upper middle class families (they live in a pretty posh apartment just off of the Grands Boulevards of Charles de Gaulle Etoile and the Arc de Triomphe). The emphasis will be on spoken English, reinforced with songs/games, and I will work separately with the two youngest (3 and 5 years old) and the two oldest (8 and 11) daughters. It's hard to gauge how things will go until we actually get started, but the girls seem absolutely adorable. When I arrived for my interview they greeted me solemnly in near-identical pink dresses and pink glasses (the whole family is near-sighted) and when I left, they rose from the couch and stood in height order to bid me farewell, reminding me ever so slightly of the VonTrapp family.

Penetrating the System

So I've already written several posts about how stupid, stone-age, inefficient, unnecessarily complicated every piece of French paperwork is. Little did I know that I had only barely brushed Purgatory, and that I would soon be made to traverse all nine hellish circles of French bureaucracy in the Inferno that is the Parisian rental market.

I've spent the last few weeks balancing my normal life with the full-time job of hunting for apartments in Paris. The first step is the search, which is done mostly by Internet these days. I start with pap.fr, the French real estate website of choice, then browse through leboincoin.fr, vivastreet.fr, FUSAC (Paris' anglophones magazine) and even paris.craigslist.org. When I can, I repeat this browsing do this cycle about five times a day, except for pap.fr, which I leave open (set to my search terms: one bedroom apartments under 1000 euros/month in the 14th, 5th or 13th arrondissements) and refresh as often as possible.

Next comes the call. In a market as competitive as Paris, the tenant has absolutely no value. If you want a shot at an apartment you have to call as soon as an ad is posted (literally--no more than an hour later you're often already too late), prove you're serious (and have money--landlords often screen tenants by grilling them about their job and salary) and be persistent (follow up emails/calls/texts, whatever it takes).

Parisian apartments are small, expensive, and bare. If you're lucky (and willing to pay more) you can sometimes find them with furnishings, but that's more the exception than the rule. And when I say bare, I mean BARE. In France, appliances like fridges, washing machines, and even ovens and stoves are things that you lug around with you each time you move, meaning that an empty apartment literally comes with nothing but the kitchen sink.

Then there are the visits. Which, for whatever reason, are usually during the middle of a work day--thank God for my flexible student schedule. This is your chance to check the state of the apartment (mold? double-paned windows? collective or individual heating/water? carpeted or wood floors?) and the landlord's chance to judge evaluate you. This is also when you're expected, if you're interested, to hand over your "dossier"--a fat, expensive-to-have-printed folder, consisting of a lock of your baby hair, the rights to your first born child, etc. In other words, pretty much everything that has mattered, ever, in your entire life.

In all seriousness, a dossier should include: your ID (passport and carte de sejour, for foreigners), your last three pay stubs (from a French job), your contract (for the same French job), your birth certificate, a letter of recommendation from your current lodging, your bank account information, and even sometimes your previous two years' worth of tax summaries. Multiply that by two if you're a couple, and by three if you need a "garant"--a guarantor who declares their income in France, and who must provide pretty much the same paperwork (or, at a minimum, the pay stubs, ID and tax statements). Keep in mind that this is all going to a complete stranger, who is likely hosting about ten more apartment viewings that day and may not even consider you a potential tenant.

If you don't have the time (or sanity) to spare checking ads and calling and waiting on landlords, the alternative is to use one of Paris' many localized rental agencies. The convenience comes at a price, however--stricter paperwork standards, an upfront fee (usually around 200 euros) and often a percentage of the rent as a sort of finder's fee. In short, it seems like a bit of a rip off, not to mention a surrender. I'm still looking on my own. But I'm running out of time.

I did my 8th visit this morning. Out of the 8 there are only two possibles, and only one that I'm in love with. As foreigners, Tom and I are at a distinct disadvantage when it comes to dealing with landlords. Even if I can muster good enough French to satisfy them, we are unable to provide the same standard of "Frenchness" as other candidates when it comes to our paperwork, in particular the garant. After trying to muddle through without one, we finally got Tom's supervisor to agree to back us. Unfortunately, he seems to be balking at the idea of all the paperwork he has to present (and I mean really, who wouldn't?)

I will end with the very high-tech graphic I made to illustrate the aggravation factor of this whole process. It shows all of the components involved in renting a residence. The arrows indicate the "price" needed to gain the "product" (i.e., the black arrow from the garant to the house indicates that you need a garant in order to get a house). The fuchsia arrows highlight the many catch-22s inherent to the system (i.e., you need a job for a residency card, but also a residency card for a job) that seem designed to weed out foreigners.
...mais, enfin, ce qui ne me détruit pas me rend plus fort...

hippo bird day to me!

Today I am 23.

As usual, my birthday falls at a less-than-ideal point in the academic year: right in the middle of two finals and three papers. Alas, but no worse than it has been in years past when it coincided with AP exams, then with college finals, and then with the presentation of my senior thesis. The result is that I'm not planning much of a party--perhaps drinks with friends after one of the finals, but that's about all I have time/energy for. Sadly, being éloignée from the States means I can't take advantage of the Mexican food and margarita benefits of being born on Cinco de Mayo (although considering my mixed reactions to tequila the older I get, that may be a good thing...)

Thank you to all the folks who sent me birthday wishes, especially via mail. It's always fun to get letters, and even more so when dépaysée. Your cards have been incorporated into my decor.

There are only two things I really want for my birthday: a summer job and a Parisian apartment. So far I've yet to get either, but the day is still young (unlike me...what a geezer I'm becoming! I'm already at my mid-twenties? Jeez) and I have a rendez-vous with a rental Madame this afternoon. Wish me birthday luck!

It's official...

...I'm staying in France for the next year! Heard back about the French language teaching assistant gig--got an offer for Paris, which are often hard to come by, so I'm excited in spite of the shitty pay. Also have a lead to apply for a position with a study abroad company, I just have to get my application together. Oh yeah, and look for an apartment. But before I get bogged down in the details I thought I should get this off my chest:

WOOOOOOOHOOOOOOO!