Moving to France soon, what do I need to prepare?

September 7, 2007 9:45 PM

I applied for a year long university research position in France (Marseille, Aix-en-Provence area) and was chosen! Now I have 3 weeks to get ready and move. What should I do to get ready to leave the US of A?

Most of my belongings are already in storage, so that is sort of taken care of. I am traveling right now, but will be giving notice to my current employer when I return on Wed.

My first month of housing is taken care of by the school, after that I will be expected to find my own residence. The school will be helping me get a local bank account to get paid.

Apart from clothes, laptop, goodbyes and my passport, what else will I need? I have never lived overseas before (though I have travelled). Any advice on cheap airfares?

Also, I commute everywhere by bicycle and would like to take it with, or have it sent after I arrive. Is that a good idea?

Money will be tight (artistic research != big bucks), and while I am looking into grants to help me along my way, any suggestions on how to supplement income would be appreciated.

posted by tip120 to travel & transportation (12 comments total)

Get converters for all your electrical gadgets using a/c power. It would probably be cheaper to buy a bike once you get there, unless you have a really nice bike. Maybe you can be an English tutor for extra cash (or you can become a phone sex operator/give advice/be a psychic, if all else fails).
posted by HotPatatta at 10:08 PM on September 7, 2007

Acquire and load up a skype-out account with money, if you haven't done so already. French phone rates are in.fucking.sane. No reason you have to pay 'em if you can get around it.

I will ask my boyfriend (when he wakes up) what he found to be most useful when he made the same move as you're about to do. He did his postdoc work in Aix for two years and loved it. He didn't want to come back, even. I do know the skype thing came in mega handy for him, though.
posted by brain cloud at 10:17 PM on September 7, 2007

ooohh phone sex!

Though for that I'll definitely need to get my French accent on (and probably a less masculine.. everything).

Which reminds me, in addition to the above, I am rusty (at best) with my French. Seven years of classes from grade school - college, but haven't thought about it in over 12 years. Any hints on a crash course? The university provides classes for me, but I don't want to come in completely blank. Any recommend podcasts or audio teachings ?
posted by tip120 at 10:19 PM on September 7, 2007

Pimsleur isn't too bad (especially for the money)
posted by Burhanistan at 10:24 PM on September 7, 2007

Forget Skype. French phone rates have actually become quite fucking sane if you know where to get your adsl from.

You'll only need an adapter and not a voltage converter for most laptops. Mine says "Input: 100-240V."

Banks will probably try to sell you their student accounts, with credit cards and insurances and everything. You can get a more bare-bones type if you ask.

French public radio should help with the rust.

How much would it cost to get your bike shipped over the Atlantic twice? Here in Strasbourg, you can get a good second hand city bicycle for about 80 euros, a new cheap one for 120, a fancy new one for about 200.
posted by stereo at 4:45 AM on September 8, 2007

Those pimsleur lessons are the best on the market, although I should say that my mother helps make them. They start from scratch and are very good at building your knowledge cumulatively, so you can't really jump in mid-way through; so I don't know if they'd be right for you, unless your active French has dwindled to zero. Otherwise when you get there you can quickly find a language tandem partner by putting an ad in some sort of local paper, i.e. someone who wants to speak you English to you for an hour and is willing to be spoken French at for an hour in return.
I don't know what pharmacies are like in France, but here in Germany they're inadequate, so you might want to think about bringing an enormous bottle of ibuprofin with you and maybe some Sudafed; or whatever you might need in the course of the year.
posted by creasy boy at 7:31 AM on September 8, 2007

I worked as a private English instructor to make ends meet while living in Paris. The best way to do that is to make friends with someone who has children in high school who are getting ready to pass their graduation exams (le bac). I worked with several students this way and it was pretty relaxed as it was mostly conversational English.

If you're like me and addicted to peanut butter, bring a jar. You can find it in France but it's really expensive.

A pocket knife/all-purpose tool is great to have whenever you're traveling.

Get any prescription medications you need in order and have enough to get you through a couple of months. Bring documentation of your prescriptions.

Ditto for Skype: works great.
posted by heatherbeth at 8:07 AM on September 8, 2007

P.S. For cheap airfares I've had great luck with Kayak.com and Kayak.fr. Although hypothetically they are the same company, I found cheaper rates on the French site. Odd.

There are also several AskMe discussions that have lots of information.
posted by heatherbeth at 8:12 AM on September 8, 2007

You might want to consider an inexpensive Zoom Airlines flight to London followed by a cheap flight or cheap advance Eurostar ticket to france.

Definitely look into the cost of taking the bicycle with you as an extra piece of baggage. This may be free or quite inexpensive. I know people used to use this option when taking bicycles to Germany from North America to study abroad.

Be aware that opening a local bank account (even with the university's help) might take some time. I don't know how long it takes in France, but it could easily take quite a bit longer than in the USA.

Make sure you have enough of any prescription medicines that you take. Also be sure to have all of the banking, identification, academing and housing records that you may need for purposes of getting an apartment, bank accounts, etc.

Get a wireless card for your laptop if you don't already have one.

Is the university handling any necessary visa paperwork?
posted by sueinnyc at 8:22 AM on September 8, 2007

The first thing that came to my mind also was visa, passport, similar paperwork.

A friend of mine is leaving for france in a few days. If you didn't know, passport applications are terribly backlogged. Do you have yours already. If not, start the process, like now. My friend applied months ago, and just recently got his. He had to contact one of his US senators' office to have them advocate for his application being moved up so he could get it on time.

Getting a visa can be similarly frustrating. Find out exactly what your university is helping you with as far as getting one. Find out exactly what type of visa you will need, and exactly what paperwork you will need to get said visa. Contact the french consulate more than once to get these answers. Sometimes different people will overlook different requirements, or interpret the requirements differently. If possible, get answers in writing. Gather all information and paperwork that could conceivably be relevant and have it ready for your application. It looks like you live in New York, and I'm guessing there's a consulate there. So it should be feasible to go to the consulate yourself, instead of getting a consulate courrier. You app will have to be delivered IN PERSON by someone though. Try to get a whole day off. Go early in the day so you have plenty of time to take care of any issues that arrise. 3 weeks is not a lot of time to secure a visa and passport. If you're lucky, it won't be a problem. But don't be surprised if it's a major pain in the ass and requires you calling 10 different government and school offices and having office A tell you to call office B, only to be sent back to A, then to C, then being told, oh you don't need form 1, but you do need form 2, which nobody mentioned until one week before you leave and that normally takes 2 weeks to process.

I am serious. If you currently lack a passport or visa, find out NOW what you need to do to get one.
posted by gauchodaspampas at 10:31 AM on September 8, 2007

you'll probably find cheaper convertors or adapters there, so only bring two. bring one month of toiletries and buy the rest once you get there.
posted by k8t at 11:28 AM on September 8, 2007

Pretty much what everyone said. One thing you absolutely, positively must do is gather all of your important paperwork (taxes, utility bills, bank statements, etc) and be prepared to provide copies of this stuff at any time. You'll need it if you rent your own apartment, open a bank account, etc.

Keep handy many passport photos, both in color and b&w.

About power adapters, buying the outlet adapters in France is fine, as they are only about 10€ each, but DO buy any step-down converters in the US (220->110v). They are about 3x the price here in FR.

Pimsleur is good, but I found Michel Thomas to be more fun and useful.

Finally, prepare to live in a country which manages to be both incredibly efficient and head-slappingly inefficient at the same time. Bonne chance!
posted by DefendBrooklyn at 12:50 AM on September 9, 2007