Thursday, December 31, 2009

Getting to Paris

I'm leaving sunny Florida for Paris.  It is 32 degrees there, but I don't really care.  I've already decided that winter in Paris is better than winter in Evanston.  Since I'd already decided that winter in Evanston is better than being anywhere else, at least for the duration of my MBA program, then Paris wins.  It's like the math problems you did when you were little: if A is more than B, and B is more than C, then A is more than C.  Dorky, yes...this will be one of the challenges of learning parisian.

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Checking in at the airport there is a French family next to me.  There are some serious communication problems between them and the ticket agent, and though a little voice inside of me is telling me to help I can't seem to make French words.  Where did seven years of French lessons go?  And what about the Berlitz refresher course I just took?  On second thought, I also took several years of calculus...I couldn't do that on command either.  Eventually I come up with a mangled way of explaining airline overweight charges.  They understand.  I am relieved.

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Upgraded to first class for the US portion of my flight.  I'm going to agree with James that this bodes well for the rest of the trip.  Perhaps I will actually manage to master learning parisian.