I Moved From the US to Paris. It’s Not Always the Fairy Tale I Imagined.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Sarah Pardi, 35, who moved to Paris in 2023. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

I’ve been obsessed with France for as long as I can remember. I don’t even know where it started — there aren’t any French people in my family. Maybe I saw a movie about it as a kid. But I grew up very poor, so I wasn’t sure how I’d ever make it happen.

When I turned 18, I was like, “Okay, I’m going to figure out how to start traveling.” At the time, I’d never been on an airplane or even left my small hometown in Oregon. I just knew I wanted to see the world, especially Europe. I’ve always been drawn to its history and architecture.

I Googled — probably not the wisest thing to Google, even 15 years ago — “how to get paid to go to Europe.” That’s when I found out I could become an au pair.

I flew to Madrid in the summer of 2013 and worked as an au pair for four months, and I loved it. When I got back to the States, I started thinking maybe there were jobs in France like that. The very next year, I moved to Toulouse and taught English in the South of France on a temporary contract.

I wanted to stay, but had to return to the US after the job was over because I was on a temporary visa. For some time, I forgot about living in France entirely. It took another 10 years before I found a company headquartered in France that would hire me and move me there.

Paris is a bustling, walkable city

I moved to Paris with my husband in 2023. I’m no longer with the company that moved me here, but the city has become home.

I’m not sure if they would love me saying this, but Paris is like the New York City of France. It’s a big international city. So there were some cultural differences for me in adapting to a big city, like the pace of life.

I live in Montmartre, the 18th arrondissement of Paris — there are 20 arrondissements, and each has its own vibe and personality. The 18th is very famous; it’s where the Impressionist painters lived, back in the late 1800s, so it’s a really artsy area of Paris.

The neighborhood I live in is popular, with many young couples — maybe they have a child or a dog. It also attracts many tourists.

Buying property as a non-French or European Union citizen in France is a different process from buying property in the US. The mortgage options aren’t quite the same, so I’m renting a flat.

Finding apartments is also really complicated in Paris. One, it’s very competitive. Two, you have to make something called a dossier, which is essentially a résumé or file about yourself and your personal life.

I live in a one-bedroom flat and pay $1,770. It’s a little bit pricey, but Paris is much more expensive than other cities in France, from my experience. And in this other town I was looking at, I could get a five-bedroom flat for $1,770.

My day-to-day in Paris is a lot of walking. I think it’s true in Europe in general, but certainly in France, their cities were built for walking, whereas American cities were built, for the most part, around the car. I sold my cars before moving to France because I didn’t need them, and parking would cost a fortune here.

I’m one of the lucky ones who work remotely most of the time, so I don’t have a commute. I do take the train to Normandy occasionally to visit my work’s office and see my colleagues. Paris is great because no matter where you live in the city, it’s really easy to find a train.

The US and France have similarities and differences

Even though the United States and France are geographically worlds apart, I believe Americans and the French are more similar than we might realize.

From a political standpoint, we’re very long-standing allies. Socially, we also have a lot of similarities in the way we approach things — but with that said, there are definitely big differences.

In France, the working hours are actually quite long, but the pace is a lot more laid back. You have longer lunches, and when you’re off, you’re completely off.

Work and personal life are also much more segregated in France compared to the US. For example, you don’t typically meet your colleagues’ spouses in France. In the States, it would be entirely normal to have dinner and invite spouses.

Another — and this is mostly true for Paris; I think the rest of France is a little different— is small talk. If I’m ordering a coffee in the States, they might say, “How’s your day going?” or “Oh, I like this coffee, that was a good choice.” In France, it’s strictly business. It’s just a cultural thing.

Communicating can be hard, and I get homesick sometimes

I minored in French in college. Still, communicating with French people was tricky at first.

When you’re meeting new people, at a bar or somewhere loud, and they speak a different language than you natively, it can be really hard to connect, because you’re just thinking, “I have to translate this in my head.”

My husband and I did get kind of lucky, because he works at a bike shop that also has an English-speaking cafe. The owners are American, and for whatever reason, a lot of international English speakers come through. In time, we’ve built a great little community of immigrants.

Still, I do get homesick from time to time. There are three main things I miss about the US.

One, all of my family is on the West Coast, and even though we regularly FaceTime, I miss them all the time. Another is small talk. Americans are very friendly — I overlooked that, living in the States for so long. Lastly, I miss the food. It sounds so silly, but I often crave refried beans and jalapeños.

A lot of young Americans want to live abroad — and I don’t blame them

More and more people are moving abroad, especially young Americans. I definitely see it in my friend group. It’s funny — most of my friends here are American.

When I go back to the States to visit, a lot of people ask me, “How do you live abroad long-term?”

My guess is that people are interested in moving because they want a better work-life balance, or they’re not happy with either the political scene or the social services offered, and they think they can maybe get what they want elsewhere.

We always say “if and when” we move back. If we did, it would be because of family.

What’s keeping us in France is our love for the culture here. We also really like our jobs and the community we’ve built, and as I said, the social safety nets are great.

I’m about two years away from being eligible for naturalization, which just means I’ve lived here long enough — and paid taxes long enough — that I can apply for citizenship. So that’s our next goal.