Friends in Paris

One of the drivers of our trip was to visit our friends from San Francisco living in Paris.  Voya, Nina and their kids Ina and Nevin (also known as "Guy") took a year off from the USA, and enrolled their kids in an International School in Paris.  Ina and Laurel were classmates and friends from Burkes, so it was cool for them to reunite.  The family is Serbian, and are all really nice. We had a great visit.

 

Ina and Laurel

They are living in a spacious apartment, in a nice looking neighborhood.  Voya is a computer entrepreneur like me, and Nina is a marketing and branding specialist, so like us they can live and work anywhere.  Nina has some interesting insights into the culture of living here, including:

1. Nobody plans ahead in Paris.  It's unheard of to schedule a play-date two weeks in advance.  Example: They went to a birthday party this afternoon that was organized just two days before.

2. Nobody exercises in Paris.  But nobody's really overweight either.  Nina says the Parisiens know how to not overdo anything, so they eat sweets, drink, smoke, etc. , but not to excess.

3. Ina's school meets four days a week: Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, from 9 to 4.  They have a couple weeks off every six weeks.  But apparently Ina works like crazy while school is in session.

4. If Ina is late to school - even one minute late - the gates are locked and they have to go through an inconvenient process to get into the school.   Being late is apparently a big deal. Nina said they have never been late.

More will come to me, but I thought these were interesting.