learning to belong in a place that doesn’t know my name

a personal essay on moving to France, the quiet loneliness, and the unexpected beauty of starting over.

it’s only been four days since i moved to france, and i already feel like i’ve lived a hundred tiny lives. the city doesn’t know my name yet. i walk through streets where no one recognizes me, and that anonymity feels both terrifying and freeing.

people keep asking me if i’m struggling with the language, but honestly, it’s not that. it’s the silence. i go out, see the cafes overflowing with people, the bakery windows stacked with pastries so beautiful they feel untouchable, and then i return to an apartment that doesn’t carry any of my history. it’s so strange to wake up in a bed where nothing around me has the weight of memory.

back home, everything was marked by familiarity, my favorite corner shop, my mother’s voice in the kitchen, the chaos that belonged to me. here, it’s all stripped away. i’m not sad, exactly. just… suspended. it’s like standing at the edge of a pool, toes curled on the tiles, not sure if i’m ready to dive in.

but in between the waves of restlessness, there are these moments that feel cinematic. like the way the light falls on old buildings at 7pm, painting them gold. or how i stood in a boulangerie, watching a woman choose her bread with such care, as if it was the most important decision of her day. i had my first croissant here, still warm, buttery enough to stain my fingers, and i laughed because it felt so cliché but also so real.

still, i can’t pretend i don’t feel a little homesick. i miss the noise, the ease of not having to explain myself, the background hum of familiarity. four days in, and i already know this isn’t going to be easy. but i also know this discomfort is shaping me, nudging me closer to a version of myself who can stand steady even in unfamiliar places.

so maybe that’s the point of these first days. not to belong, not to conquer, but simply to notice. to notice the way my chest aches when my parents call, the way my footsteps echo differently on cobblestones, the way i’m both stranger and participant here.

four days in france, and i’m not at home. but i’m paying attention. and maybe that’s enough for now.

thoughtful takeaways:

• sometimes the magic is not in the “big change,” but in the quiet dailiness of noticing the way a pastry flakes, the way your shoes sound on new streets.

• being new at something (or somewhere) is uncomfortable, but also kind of the purest form of being alive.

• maybe we don’t always need to “belong” right away. maybe belonging can just be curiosity stretched over time.

• beginnings are fragile, but they are also full of possibility.

• maybe moving somewhere new isn’t about reinvention, but about remembering how to see again.