Author: bt

Hectic week trying to get everything done before leaving. First up was my second Hepatitis vaccination with Havrix (name of the vaccine)… Did it in the office infirmary since they’re the one that’s asking me to take the first one 6 months ago. So now I’m covered for another 10 years before I have to take my next shot.
Next up is the cancellation of my RATP train/tram/bus subscription. I was thinking that I had to pay some penalty but the cancellation of the contract (or suspension, if you want to call it, up to a year) is easy enough, just walk into any RATP office, tell them you want to stop it, and they will key in the month you want to stop or suspend the subscription and that’s all. Only problem for me is usually the 12th month is free, and since I’m cancelling it only after 10 months after subscribing, I dont get the free month subscription! Dommage.

The movers are coming next thursday. I should be flying out of Paris next Saturday. What do I do with 1 week more to go?
Most of the adminstration stuff with the moving is taken care of by the company, so lucky for that. I will have to cancel my Freebox internet/phone subscription and my bus/metro card but other than that, the other stuff is to think about what things I should buy to bring with the rest of the shipment to Shanghai. Clothing is one, but not too much since generally things are cheaper in China. Bought a bread machine as well since we’re not sure if they sell a lot of them over there. Cooking utensils… they have it in China but at least I trust more the EU standards not to put dangerous chemicals during the manufacturing of things like non-stick pan (even from the same brand). So this weekend will be the last weekend for us to do last minute shopping.

Continue reading “One week left to the end of my time here in France”

Two more weeks to go before the packers come for the move to Shanghai. Trying to think of what I need to bring over there. Just yesterday I was out to get a bread making machine, after tasting the substandard Brioche in Shanghai last week on business trip. Finally got my hands on a Staub cocotte as well, that heavy metal cooking pot/utensil. It was not that easy having to lug those two items back from the centre of Paris to Boulogne-Billancourt by metro. But got back safe, and hopefully today I’ll try out the bread machine since its Sunday. Not that there’s no boulangerie open on Sunday, but they’re a fair bit of walk away.

This is my first long haul flight during my time working in France. First thing I noticed is that there’s a check in queue when I arrived at Charles de Gaulle 2C. So far, within europe I could do an electronic checking on one of the kiosks, but international I have to queue up like everyone else. Then I overweighted the luggage. The usual economy flight limit is 20kg, but most airlines give a little extra before charging excess luggage. Singapore Airlines’ limit is 30kg. But Air France is only 22kg! I had to try and bring some items to Shanghai first before my next trip for good, so I had at least 26kg in the luggage.
No problem, small issue. Then when boarding the flight I had to take the bus, and it seems that in the last 2-3 trips out of France I’ve been using the bus and not the aerobridge directly. I think the Parisien airports are too small.

Once the Boeing 777 took off, I realised that my touchscreen LCD doesn’t work at all. Out of all the buttons that shows up one the screen (3×3 matrix) only the bottom right works, and on Air France its the button for “info” that has no information at all. So during the whole flight I had nothing to watch on the screen. Worse, the flight seems to be filled with very young chinese babies and their mothers, and they cry all the way from Paris to Shanghai.

In summary, I’ve had 2 out of the worst flights I’ve had ever in the last few months. The one to London before christmas included strikes by airport bus drivers and a heavy fog delaying all flights.