The Bold Soul - Paris

The Bold Soul is Lisa Taylor Huff’s blog about (and I’m sort of going to use Lisa’s own words here)… deciding to move to Paris, having hit her 40s and found herself labeled “Over 40 and Still Single”!

Everyone thought she was crazy or at least full of shit.  But she did it anyway at the age of 45.  She sold half of everything she owned, put the rest in storage, packed her suitcases, rented an apartment and got on the plane.

A year later, out of the blue, she met  THE Guy, and a FRENCH guy no less. The Coup de Foudre.

They were married on July 12, 2008 — her first marriage at age 47, and the LAST marriage for both of them.

And Paris is now her home: her, him and his three kids, together in a quiet little house behind the big hill of Montmartre.

Oh, isn’t that sweet?

Now, The Bold Soul is a very positive blog and I’m sure that it contains much that we can learn from Lisa, so let’s find out….

What does Lisa have to say about becoming an expat?

Lisa tells us that The Hardest Part of Living Abroad is leaving people you care for.

Sure, there are bound to be many Small Challenges and Small Victories but Lisa seems to have coped with them all.

After all, it’s just a question of Redefining Normal, isn’t it?  Although I do have to take issue with the idea of “walking to the market or the stores in my neighborhood with my  little pink cart with wheels.”

I tried that once, in Brittany;  I got lynched!  Anyone want to buy a slightly mangled little pink cart with wheels?

Lisa does realise that she’s not quite French during a visit to the Gynecologist.  After all… “French women routinely and without batting an eyelash strip down to their bare skin with the doctor in the room, then they hop up on the examining table as nonchalantly as can be.”

And American girlies don’t?  Shame!

Getting your leg over – or….. the Dating stuff!

Perhaps Paris changes mens’ attitude to women.  After all, they don’t have La Chasse to take their mind off carnal matters?

I do agree with Lisa that, if you want to attract a girlie, you should keep it zipped up.   After all, No one needs to see THAT!

And perhaps The Direct (and potentially painful) Approach isn’t always the best one to use either?

Certainly, it’s never worked for me!

And men, if you want to get to first base… remember to wash at least once a week.  After all, as we read in Public transport would be fine if it weren’t for the public! the girlies do notice if you twitch a lot and smell like a really bad soup!

The caring and sensitive part of my psyche does feel a tiny bit sorry for Twitchy Soup Guy.  I wonder how he’s getting on?  I wonder if he’s pulled, yet!

Little animals; edible or not….

Apparently Lisa doesn’t like mice.  Personally I don’t have a problem with them although I do admit that the one thing worse than finding a dead mouse in your shoe is…. finding half a dead mouse in your shoe! Yes, I’ve got pussies too!

And, on the more edible side of things, Lisa isn’t so fond of Moth Pasta.   I wonder why?  Full of protein, or so I’ve heard!

And as for not so little animals… Lisa is Feeling rather guilty now when, during a visit to the zoo, a kangaroo looks accusingly at her.  Yes, he knows; he knows that she ate kangaroo meat the other day at Kiwi Corner.

Mummy, that lady’s just eaten Skippy!

But then, Paris is another country, isn’t it?

When she is Noticing her new (at the time) surroundings, Lisa comes up with a lovely list of the things that are different about paris; the things that make it special!

And what better way to discover Paris than through Lisa’s own eyes (or, at least her camera lens.)

Because sometimes a picture really does tell a thousand words….

1).  L’Accordéonist spotted outside Eglise Saite-Pierre or…

2).  A Snowy Day, Paris Style.  Perhaps some…

3).  Ivy and Cobblestones?  At least it was a….

4).  Nice day for a stroll.

And Lisa really does know Paris very well.  At least, she knows the important bits…. Like Where to buy good slutty boots in Paris!

And isn’t that something that everyone should know?

Being in Paris I guess we’ll have to talk about the state of the pavements?

In Trippin’ Lisa talks about the “endless effort to avoid stepping in the crotte (still her number 1 pet peeve about Paris)” and then in I’m not the only one annoyed by this she points out that another Paris blogger actually takes photos of the stuff!

Now, there’s a man I could share a beer with!

And, with not a Crotte in sight… what about this lovely sports car?  Is that Hot, or what?

So, summing up….

The Bold Soul really has got something for everyone.  I’ve been reading it now for the last 567 hours solid (without even a break to attend to natures needs!) and I feel that I’ve only just started to scratch the surface!

And me?  Well, I’ve heard a rumour that They Still Exist! Yes, it could be true!  I’m going to investigate! I might even have to try it out for myself!

Perhaps history will remember Lisa Taylor Huff as “The Woman who photographed Squatters!”

All the best

BretonDiary	French Public Holidays	Images of Brittany	Market Days in Brittany	Website Design
Best Gites in Brittany	Roadside Tales	Internet Acceleration	MushroomDiary

The French Kitchen A delightful book in which Joanne shares with us ‘her family recipes, passed down through the generations. The French Kitchen is a tantalising collection of casseroles, soups, roasts, salads, tarts and sweets. More information	Cholcolat Joanna Harris creates a rich and vibrant description of a rural French village with all its petty rivalries and traditional, narrow-minded boundaries on thought and behavior. More information	Five Quarters of the Orange Five quarters of the orange’ is a story of a childhood tragedy in wartime France, and the shadows it casts across the later life of the heroine Framboise Dartigen. More information	Blackberry Wine Everyday magic, he called it, the transformation of base matter into the stuff of dreams – Layman’s alchemy. More information
The French Market Following the success of The French Kitchen, Joanne Harris and Fran Warde have collaborated once more to write a French cookbook with a difference. This time they have taken their inspiration from the rural markets of Gascony. More information	Coastliners Passionate, stubborn Mado, whose “head is full of rocks” tries to save the livelihoods of the villagers of Les Salants by urging them to work together to save the beach from erosion, both natural and man-made. More information	Five Quarters of the Orange Three sublime audiobooks from the bestselling author, now available together in a specially priced pack. Includes BLACKBERRY WINE, FIVE QUARTERS OF THE ORANGE and the huge bestseller CHOCOLAT. With a gentle touch and an eye for human frailty and strength, these mouth-watering audiobooks will draw you into her enchanting worlds. More information	French Lessons Failed rock legend, pickled onion manufacturer, air hostess and euro-entrepreneur George East takes us through another eventful year of his doomed attempts to make a living out of living in rural France. More information
French Flea Bites The character of France and the French people has been captured in words beautifully and the hilarious exploits of George his wife Donella, their neighbours and Cato the cat. More information	French Letters This is not so much a book as a continuation of the serial story of George and Donella as they carry on with their almost idyllic life in Normandy. It’s at least as funny as the others, but the hanky had to come out again several times. More information	French Cricket Once upon a time, former night club bouncer, seamstress and professional bedtester George East and his wife Donella fled to Normandy to escape their creditors and try to live off their wits in a foreign land. More information	Home and Dry in France Buying property in France is fraught with mishaps and misunderstandings. George East’s book brings humour and fun to what happens when people venture forth to a foreign land with more hope than money and humour than language skills. More information
French Kisses Those poor people who don’t like George East’s books often dismiss them as fiction. Not so, everything is at least based on real people and real happenings. George admits to a degree of embellishment and often combines several mishaps to produce a spectacular disaster. Such is the nature of his works. More information	Rene and Me Told in the inimitable style which has alrea dy won the author an army of followers, Rene & Me is a somet imes hilarious, sometimes moving and always captivating cele bration of human nature, people and, above all, life and living. ‘ More information	A Year in the Merde This very funny book sounds a lot more like the France that I know. Read it and you’ll still want to come here, you’ll just be a lot better prepared for the surprises that France has to offer. More information	Merde Happens Paul West is in deep financial merde. His only way out of debt is to accept a decidedly dodgy job that involves him touring America in a Mini, while pretending to be typically British. Also in the car is Paul’s French girlfriend, Alexa, and his American poet friend, Jake, whose main aim in life is to sleep with a woman from every country in the world. More information
Merde Actually A year after arriving in France, Englishman Paul West is still struggling with some fundamental questions: What is the best way to scare a gendarme? Why are there no health warnings on French nudist beaches? And is it really polite to sleep with your boss’ mistress? More information	Dial M for Merde In this book, you’ll get Paul, Elodie, her dad and some new French girls. All of them are of course hot and all of them adore Paul. Didn’t see that one coming… More information	Talk to the Snail The only book you’ll need to understand what the French really think, how to get on with them and, and most importantly, how to get the best out of them. With useful sections on: Making sure you get served in a café, Harassing French estate agents, Living with bacteria, Pronouncing French swear-words and much more! More information	1000 years of Annoying the French Was the Battle of Hastings a French victory? No! William the Conqueror was Norman and hated the French. Were the Brits really responsible for the death of Joan of Arc? No! The French sentenced her to death for wearing trousers. More information
The Olive Farm This is television actress Carol Drinkwater’s lyrical account of a new life in France; about her house, Appassionata, and the trials and tribulations of acquiring an olive farm, restoring it, farming the olives, overcoming the heartaches of taking on a “new” French family and understanding slowly the workings and lifestyle of a vivacious Provencal community. More information	The Olive Season This is an extraordinary and fascinating follow-up to The Olive Farm. The reader is drawn deeply and inexorably in to the world of the author, confronted with her personal struggles and entranced by her pastiche of growth and decay in the world of nature, a metaphor for her life. More information	The Olive Harvest Carol and Michel have again returned to Appasionata, the Olive Farm that they have restored, and Carol is eager to continue production of the olives and attain their cerificate for producing Organic Oil. More information	The Olive Tree THE OLIVE TREE charts Carol Drinkwater’s colourful and often dangerous journey in search of the routes that olive cultivation has taken over the centuries. Set during a springtime Mediterranean that is evocative and perennial, it is above all a tale of our time. More information
The Olive Route A tour de force from Carol Drinkwater in this, the fourth in her Olive series. The joy of this book is in the pen pictures that she creates of the unusual characters that she encounters on her journey. More information	The Illustrated Olive Farm The photgraphy is wonderful and the book is a great insight in to life with the olives and all that that involves. There are wonderful pictures of the dogs, family, friends, even the dreaded wild boar. Recipes as well. More information	Petite Anglaise Petite Anglaise is a memoir by Catherine Sanderson based on her blog of the same name. In 2004 Catherine decided to start up a blog based on her life in Paris. More information	French Kissing Name: Sally Marshall Status: single mother Age: 32 Nationality: ten years in France, yet still English through and through I like: Living in Paris, playing with my daughter Lila (four years old), the company of good friends, the smell of baking bread. More information
Tout Sweet You cannot help but fall in love with the author’s character. She seems like a Bridget Jones let loose in the French countryside, getting into a lot of funny situations with both ex-pat English and French locals like, as she adjusts to a totally different way of life. More information	Serge Bastarde Ate My Baguette John Dummer’s sharply focused descriptions of the landscape, towns and villages, and the weather of the South West of France form a animated background for a series of adventures with an array of characters from some intimidating and belligerent peasants to a sad little old man whose only companionship is a collection of antique dolls. More information	Merde! This book is an excellent source of words and expressions, of varying degrees of vulgarity, that are used all the time by french speakers. I used it often during the first of my two years in France. More information	Almost French “Almost French” is the story of a woman who goes to France to visit a French lawyer she has only met a couple times before and barely knows. Of course, she gets caught up in the romance of the city and stays on to live there. More information

3 Comments

• 

  By The Bold Soul, June 11, 2010 @ 2:30 pm

  Thanks Keith, for such an entertaining review of my blog. And really, I hope you DID stop for a nature break at least once during those 567 hours. Just a few side-notes:

  On the pink caddy: my husband took issue with it, too. You will rejoice along with him to learn that on a recent supermarket excursion, it completely fell apart and needed to be replaced. I choose a more hip one that even a man could love: red, grey and black geometric pattern. Better now?

  American gynecologists won’t examine a woman without a female nurse present in the room (even when the doctor is also a woman) — too afraid of lawsuits and accusations of sexual harassment, but that’s America for you — so they certainly won’t expect a woman to disrobe in front of the doctor or even the nurse. They give you 5 minutes to “get ready, with a paper gown and everything. Here in France, you’re just expected to “let it all hang out”. I’ve gotten over the shock, myself.

  The crotte problem seems worse than ever, and yes, it’s still my #1 pet peeve about living here. Dog owners here are just plain lazy.

  And I still find it fascinating that the Turkish toilet post got such a reaction. Of all my posts, I think that one proved to be the most “controversial” even though I’m rarely interested in controversy.

  Thanks again and I’ll be happy to cross link to your blog… and will enjoy reading some of your other reviews and discovering some new ex-pat blogs.

  Best and boldest,
  Lisa

• 

  By Keith Eckstein, June 11, 2010 @ 4:10 pm

  Lisa – I’ve got a green one (and my shopping trolley is green as well!)

  If I ever need to see a gynecologist, I’ll bear your advice in mind. I suspect it wouldn’t phase me; when I worked at the abattoir, people of the female persuasion used to walk through the men’s changing rooms as it was a short cut for them!

  Keep counting the Crottes!

  All the best

  Keith

• 

  By Karin (an alien parisienne), June 12, 2010 @ 10:13 am

  I love checking in with Lisa at The Bold Soul! I’m so glad you reviewed her here. I love her story and her perspective on life.

  Turkish toilet post and controversy, eh? I have not read that one. Sounds like one to check out!

Other Links to this Post

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URI

Leave a comment