First Impressions of France

I told myself that I would write this prior to my departure from the States. Moving down from Seattle Friday night and choosing to go out both later that evening as well as Saturday night put an end to that plan. The last few days were mostly a blur of me sleeping in and leaving the house while my parents told me I still had a lot to get done. Nonetheless, I was ready to go Monday and arrived in Paris via Amsterdam on Tuesday. The Oregon weather followed us the day we got there, which is especially frustrating considering it had been 80 and sunny the day before. Once we arrived, my friend Chris (who is staying in France for a week) and I were greeted by his cousin. We headed downtown to their apartment in Paris' 9^th district. We told ourselves we were going to hold off from sleeping to get a full night's rest but after lunch (and beer) we couldn't help it. Later that afternoon, we met up with a friend of ours who's a Parisian that had visited us in Portland a few times. After walking around the city for a bit, we eventually decided to call it a day. Twelve hours later we woke up, grabbed some food, and headed for the train station where I bought my ticket and am currently in route to Grenoble by train.

So far things have been moving extremely quickly but I have noticed a few things. One is that I am absolutely terrified of puzzled looks because they can only lead to one thing; questions. This is my biggest fear due to my low level of knowledge on the subject of the French language. Even at the airport where the customs official was speaking broken French/English, I still had no idea what the hell he was saying. Twenty-four hours into the trip the "smile and nod" move has gotten me almost across the country and I haven't starved yet. At some point I'm going to hit the point where I have to start pushing myself to learn which is going to open a lot of opportunities so I'm excited about that.

The next is that the French all seem like nice people. Considering the language barrier, I've gotten treated with nothing but respect from everyone. Coming from the East Coast, I would still say that I have had more trouble with people who speak my own language than I have had with those that I don't understand. I'm hoping that saying this won't come back to get me. Nation of France, don't blow this one. I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt.

Before closing this out I would just like to thank everyone at Boeing with whom I had the pleasure of working with this summer. I learned a great deal about developing as a professional. All the feedback I had received was extremely humbling and I value all of it. I am looking forward to keeping up the relationships that I made throughout my short tenure there. Translating that experience into this upcoming experience will certainly be interesting.

I hope to have another post up soon with more interesting stories. Feel free to take a look at some of the postings below from my trip through Uganda. The organization I was working on, MAPLE Microdevelopment, just recently received their Non-Profit status and has begun developing business projects in the town of M'Bale in Southern Uganda. I had a great time forming that organization and I encourage everyone to check up on what they have been up to. And make a now-tax deductable donation…

For those with Skype, you can find me on dougwgould. And if we aren't Facebook friends, send me those friend requests.

Take care.