The Difference with Paris Style and Why I'm Proud to be an American

I never knew why Paris was called the City of Lights, given the number of fluorescent signs in other cities like New York or Tokyo or even Las Vegas, but I finally realize Parisians love to put cute, sparkly lights on just about everything. Every night the Eiffel Tower is totally sparkly, as is the Hotel de Ville across the Seine. The Eiffel Tower even shines like a lighthouse (borderline cheesy) across the city. The sparkly lights aren’t glaring and seizure-inducing like other urban centers—it’s just cute.

Paris should rename itself from the City of Lights to the City of Scarves. Scarves are truly an integral part of living here that I have fully embraced. My roommate Marie in Boston while helping me pack for Paris (i.e. watching me freak out while I put everything I own into boxes) would only let me bring one scarf. She said, What is Paris if not a place to buy scarves? I’ve yet to buy more, but I desperately need to. Scarves here aren’t just something you wear outside to protect from the cold—you never take them off. Not in a restaurant while eating or in classes or in a bar, your scarf is a crucial part of your outfit that’s both stylish and totally cozy. I’ve been wearing my same one every single day.

All the stereotypes about Paris are true. Everyone eats baguettes that they pick up on their way from work, no one smiles in public places like the metro yet you’re expected to be very polite when dealing with strangers, and everyone is really, really chic. Not so much fashionable as they are chic. Parisians really do have that “je ne sais quoi” that even when they look totally blah, they just look so COOL! I can’t explain it, but I’m jealous. I see 6-year-old boys all the time that are dressed so much cooler than I ever will.

But everything in Paris is so expensive. It’s no mystery why everyone looks so chic when there literally is no option to buy cheap clothes. It’s just not even an option here. I wanted just some cheap Hanes undershirts, but I really think I’d have to go far out to the burbs to get them. Maybe that’s the way it should be, though, to take away the option of looking disgusting. The world would be a much better place.

New York and Paris have such different styles. There really isn’t much diversity in fashion here, it’s all about dark colors, clean lines and looking chic. Everyone looks pretty much the same here. New York has so many different styles, a lot more streetwear, and a general rebelliousness not found here. In New York, you always know that wherever you go, there WILL be someone weirder than you, so you can go as crazy as you want in dressing and it won’t even be shocking. Trends exist much more in NY, where there’s more of an emphasis on what’s in style right now. I think in NY, there’s kind of a survival mode and people dress much tougher to project that image, while with the quaintness and grandeur of Paris, people here are much more simple and chic. Sometimes Parisians even wear the same outfit a few days in a row.


But this is a very exciting time to be an American in Paris. This Tuesday, I, along with the rest of the world, celebrated Obama’s inauguration into the White House. My family all warned me before going to Paris that the French did not like Americans, but this event marks a real change for how the French view us in almost a decade, and it’s pretty special to feel proud to be an American while living here. I first went with some friends to a New York-style bar here that was celebrating the occasion with Obama-themed shots, but it was so crowded that they weren’t letting people in. My friend who did get in, though, actually made it to the CNN website (Image 7) of celebrations around the world. Instead we went over to another friend’s apartment, who is half American and half French, and it really got me thinking how anyone of any background can connect to Obama’s status as an outsider. It bothered me at first that he’s half-black/half-white, and everyone was referring to him as the first black president. But in retrospect, his not belonging completely to either group makes him that much more of an underdog, and any person around the world who has ever felt like an outsider (which I can safely assume is the majority) can relate to him. It’s a very exciting time.

Being at AUP, there are people studying here from around the world, and they often ask where I’m from. They’ll be Swedish, Polish, Saudi Arabian, and it’s a very strange sensation for me to identify as an American. I know I am one, but whenever I’m asked where I’m from, I’ve always answered Atlanta, Georgia. Or, that I go to school in Boston. But never, I’m from America.

So far, in my almost two weeks here, I’ve found that it’s really easy to live an American life in Paris. That’s definitely not my goal in my time living here, but it’s easy to surround yourself with other Americans, use English in stores and go to English-speaking bars. Often in shops, I start to use my poor French and they immediately break in with English just to end the awkward conversation. That’s not the case for my grocery store, though, where everyone--both employees and customers--definitely think I’m retarded. I fumble with French every day, but I finally bought a French-English dictionary and it’s given me a new lease on life. Now, next time I need to go to the post office, I’ll stay up all the night before memorizing the simple words I need to use by heart before going to buy stamps (which France does not use stamps anymore! Hello! Was anyone going to tell me??)

I haven’t really felt the recession here the way it was so all pervasive in America. No one really talks about it and it’s not really brought up on the French news like it was nightly in the States. Paris is a really cute city, but I can’t help but compare it to New York. I’m enjoying my time here, but it’s really validating my love for New York.