A few months ago, we took the plunge and bought a car. The whole experience was conducted in French, so we really were lucky that at the end of the day we got what we ordered: a blue Honda Fit (here, it's called the Honda Jazz). We bought it from a dealership called "JapAuto", which is apparently not at all derogatory in these parts, but would be greatly frowned upon in the US. Even though we bought the car in May, we were not able to drive the car home until July - seriously. The French bureaucracy thrives in moments like these, made even more complicated by the fact that we have to have the car registered with diplomatic plates through work. But at long last... we are mobile again! This is not to say that the whole process has been easy as pie. For example: The paperwork to apply for diplomatic plates required a gaggle of forms (in French, of course), several of which needed 6 individually signed copies, each. The whole system of car insurance here is waaaay different than in the States. Insurance rates are calculated by the number of years you have been driving, taking into consideration how long you have driven sans accident. But... if you are uninsured for over 3 years (which we almost were even though we had periodic coverage with rental cars), your coverage jumps back to as if you were a new driver! Should this happen, you will easily pay twice the monthly rate. Signing up for insurance took a 1.5 hour phone call, and a whole lotta patience on both sides. Next up: where shall we park the car? They drive and park like maniacs in Paris (see below, for example), so we weren't about to park the new car on the street, just for it to be mangled within the month. But parking fees for a garage spot are astronomical in central Paris - especially in the 7th where we live. Michael had a moment of brilliance when he thought to search AirBnB for rentals in our neighborhood that came with parking. He contacted a few of them to see if they'd be willing to lease us their spot in exchange for a steady monthly income. It worked! We now have a parking spot a few blocks from our house that doesn't break the bank. When we finally received the number for our diplomatic plates from the French Interior Ministry, we had to purchase and order them online. I mistakenly ordered 1 plate (instead of the required 2), as it never crossed my mind that they would sell them to us in anything but a set. Shout out to Michael who called this one in advance. A single, lonely plate arrived in the mail several days later. After ordering a second license plate, we were faced with the dilemma of replacing them with the temporary plates that came with the car. The main problem we identified here was that there were no holes in the plates themselves, so we had no idea how to affix the plates to the car. Each plate came with 3 small metal nail-looking things that we could only presume needed to be hammered through the metal plates into ... something ... on the bumper? So off we went yesterday with the plates, nail-looking thingies, hammer, swiss army knife, and only a small glimmer of hope. The situation was not looking good when we were approached by the building caretaker, who saw that we were clearly not on the right track. In our best French, we explained the situation, and when it became obvious we were going to royally mess things up, he volunteered his services - "c'est facile!" - he said. Thank GOD he came along when he did. Turns out, the nail-looking thingies were rivets, and it took a power drill to remove the old plates and make the holes in our bumper larger, and a rivet gun to put the damn things onto the car. Guess our swiss army knife wouldn't have done the trick ;) Although random acts of kindness may be few and far in between in cities like Paris, they do come around every once in a while, and remind you that there are generous people left in this world.
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AuthorBecause why not get married and move to Paris to really kick off your thirties? Archives
December 2016
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