Merry-Go-Round

There is an ocean of difference between the days following your arrival, jet-lagged and lost, to a country across the Atlantic, and the week after your arrival, when it feels as if you have been here forever. The days become almost routine so quickly it is hard to remember what it felt like to arrive. I wake up, take a shower, have my very healthy French breakfast, and jump on the tram for 20 minutes to go to my lovely French classes. I even dare to think that I might not look so much like an outsider because by now I am familiar with the “French tram behavior,” such as using the ipod and gazing blankly out the clear windows in the amazing august sun. I believe I feel this way because I like my life in France, and I feel it will only get better. There is not a breath of regret, not in the food, or in the amazing host family, or in the annoying French classes. This program, so far, suits me.

The other nice part of living in France is that, as I suspected, few French people know my country exists! So I get to sit for about an hour a night to talk about my life with my host mother. It sounds so foreign to them, which is the complete opposite for me because I know my share of French history. The good aspect of it is, I am certain I will leave a mark in this house, and on every person that I have to explain where I come from. Yes, it is a democracy. No, we do not have dishwashers. Yes, there are poor people. The feeling is one of mutual benefit: I learn their ways and they learn mine.

The title of the blog is entirely due to the fact that life here has me going from place to place non-stop. “Del ping al pong,” as said in Dominican slang. One moment I am taking French classes as an intermediate student getting used to the language, the second I am meeting with the one-site director, the adorable Madame Price-Kreitz, and I am a total debutante again, bombarded with information about responsibilities unlike any other I have encountered. Interning at the International Institute of Human Rights, for instance, was all but a dream for me until it was offered as a viable option over tea. My head spins, literally. I feel, and I hope I am not exaggerating here, that this will be an unimaginable year for me.