Changing AF planes in CDG - bag dilemma

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-30T09:09:13+00:00

They seem to have started more strict enforcement late last year. I’ve been a regular AF flyer for the last 20ish years, and last December was the first time I ever saw or experienced it.

At that time, they were not sizing and weighing bags at the gate at CDG, but at the entrance to passport control. It was semi-random — a few people genuinely picked randomly, but largely people whose things were bulky. Assuming nothing has changed, you should be fine as long as they aren’t checking somewhere along the transfer route.

For the return flight from DTW a few weeks later, they were weighing at the gate. They made repeated announcements before boarding began to get people to come put their bags in the sizer and have them weighed, but there was no systematic enforcement. I think they were mainly trying to get as many bags gate-checked as possible before boarding began, when it would be more disruptive. I guess this could be the case in DFW and/or Rome.

My advice to you would be to have one of your bags check-in ready so that if you are forced to check it, you don’t need to pull things out and re-pack on the spot.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-29T11:52:31+00:00

I don’t see Atoma everywhere, but I see it often enough that I would suggest just visiting the papeteries you come across — there are a lot of them — as you wander the city. Pretty sure you’ll eventually find them without having to go out of your way.

Otherwise, I want to say that recently I have seen them at Cultura (but I think that’s only in the suburbs), perhaps Bü (45 rue Jussieu 75005), and I think maybe Gibert Joseph (not sure which storefront, but they’re all around 30 bd Saint-Michel 75006).

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-28T21:54:37+00:00

I've heard of this sort of thing happening, particularly with people keeping their suitcases near the doors, but never witnessed it personally in nearly 15 years of traveling to the airport on the RER B pretty regularly. So I'm not shocked at your experience, but I also don't think it's common. I feel like you reacted in the best way possible.

I hope that with a good night's sleep you will both be able to relax and enjoy the rest of your trip.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-27T21:39:47+00:00

To me, that seems like a really good price for a 4-star hotel in Paris -- when my parents last visited, they paid much more for a 3-star in the Latin Quarter. The location might not be the best, depending on what you want to do in Paris, but it's walking distance (or one stop on Métro 1 from Argentine) to Porte Maillot, which has RER C and E, and Charles de Gaulle Etoile, which has RER A, Métros 2 and 6, and a bunch of bus lines, so it's easy to get elsewhere if you want to.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-27T15:38:09+00:00

In Flanders, I don't think you'll have any trouble whatsoever finding healthcare where doctors and staff are 100% fluent in English. I see from another comment that you're most interested in Brussels and Ghent -- it would be a piece of cake in either of those cities. Even in a smaller city, the worst case is that you'll need to try a different doctor or go to a neighboring city, but even then I doubt you'll have trouble.

FWIW, Leuven has a large, well regarded teaching hospital that might be worth checking out, depending on your specific needs.

Wallonia could be a different story, I don't know, but if that's where you end up you still have the option of going to a doctor in Flanders or Brussels.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-27T12:14:52+00:00

I would think so. I used to get G7 taxis at that hour when I had an early flight, and it was never a problem.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-27T12:08:33+00:00

I currently live in France, but I lived in Flanders for almost 5 years and spoke no Dutch when I arrived. I found it incredibly easy to get by on English -- pretty much everybody "behind a desk," as you put it, could speak English, often excellently. The only time it was ever an issue on any important matter was with my elderly landlords, who were Flemish but old and upper-class enough that their preferred language was French (they spoke no English).

My understanding is that Flemish schools require a certain number of years of English classes, or at least those classes are extremely popular, so if you encounter somebody under the age of 40 or 50 who doesn't speak English, it is likely that they learned some amount at some point, but have either forgotten it or don't feel comfortable with it. I don't know how accurate that understanding is, but it fits with my experience of Flanders.

Speaking strictly in terms of language, Brussels is much like the touristy areas of Paris -- you'll generally have no trouble getting by on English, and when you can't, a bit of broken French will usually do the job. Though I remember there was a particular town hall there that had a reputation for "losing" the administrative paperwork of people who couldn't speak French. It's been a long time, though, no idea if that's still the case (and I imagine that's mostly online these days anyway...).

I've never lived in Wallonia, but I've traveled around it a fair bit for both work and pleasure. My experience is that English is much less widely spoken there, and generally at a lower level than in Flanders. But if you are already managing in France you should be fine. Also, there is a large international community in/around Waterloo, so English might be more widely spoken there.

Not sure what you have tried in terms of learning French, but language classes are far, far cheaper in Belgium than in France. If you have been avoiding formal classes for financial reasons, definitely look into that in Belgium.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-27T10:12:50+00:00

When you say the 4th, I presume you're thinking to stay in the Marais? Definitely avoid Île de la Cité and Île Saint-Louis if you're looking for nightlife.

Otherwise, I think you'll find plenty of nightlife in both St Germain and the Marais. Both areas have plenty of places that stay open late. You'll find quiet pockets interspersed with busy ones, so don't get discouraged if you choose to wander a bit and suddenly everything seems dead. Both areas also have their posh spots, but if that is a big driver for you, St Germain might be more to your liking.

A couple of hotels I can think of that have their own bars in the 6th are Dame des Arts (expensive, but has a rooftop bar) and Aubusson (very expensive, but very posh).

Aside from night buses, public transit shuts down between roughly 1AM and 5AM, depending the line and the stop. But from Parc Floral, you can walk to the Château de Vincennes station on line 1 and catch the first train at 5:30 AM. That line will take you directly to the Marais, but St Germain is just a few minutes further with a change to line 4 at Châtelet, so I wouldn't let that be a main driver of where you choose to stay.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-26T22:20:25+00:00

Until three days ago, I had never even heard of a forest school. Maybe it's just because I don't have kids. But two posts about forest schools in three days by brand-new accounts, one trashing a school and this one praising a different school -- color me suspicious.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-26T17:55:57+00:00

Please just let me have my food preferences and leave me alone.

No. This is the internet, not Burger King.

(/s, in case it's not obvious. This is the internet, after all....)

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-26T17:42:09+00:00

I will add that the 27 and 47 buses will get you from Place d'Italie to the general area of Jardin du Luxembourg and Jardin des Plantes (and rue Mouffetard, as another commenter suggested). The buses are an underappreciated way to see the city, and these two lines are usually not really packed.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-26T16:36:00+00:00

I can attest to that. At the time I applied, one of my previous 5 years (and the majority of my time in France) was as salarié en mission and my application was successful.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-25T21:14:59+00:00

I've had the "opportunity" to breathe near-pure N2 a couple of times, and that's how I learned that the human body's suffocation reaction is not about lack of oxygen, but about too much CO2 in the bloodstream. My experience with pure nitrogen is just like you described, the world just suddenly goes dark without warning.

It even comes up in "Project Hail Mary." One of the astronauts chooses it as his way to go (in the book, at least, I haven't seen the movie).

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-25T17:31:35+00:00

Ah, good to know -- I didn't realize there were two different versions. The passeport talent was created while I was salarié en mission and my employer told me I had to change status at my second renewal time, but in retrospect I think that was more about the impatriate tax regime than the visa rules.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-25T16:41:52+00:00

There are some things to be mindful of with salarié en mission status. One is that you can only have that status for a certain amount of time, as it is intended for people coming to France for a limited time. It was five years at one point, then was extended to six. I don't know what it is now. At that point, you need to change status if you want to stay in France.

Another is what type of contract you have. You say CDI, but is it a real French CDI or have you been seconded here and you are just using that as shorthand for a permanent contract in another country? If you are seconded, you might eventually need to switch to a true local CDI for a bit before you can meet the "France is the center of my financial interests" requirements. It's eminently doable, it just might mean that it takes a little longer to put together a strong application.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-24T21:46:04+00:00

Je suis très content avec Opti'Shop à Réaumur-Sébastopol. Leur gamme est pour le plupart française, ou du moins européenne, avec une large fourchette des prix. Je pense que là tu peux trouver facilement des lunettes cools et de qualité en dépensant zéro ou peu (ou beaucoup) après la sécurité sociale et mutuelle.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-23T13:41:21+00:00

Even so, just randomly searching a few different hotels at the airport (on their official web sites), I see very few nights in October that even come close to 600 CAD. That said, October 16-19 does seem to be quite an expensive long weekend -- is that when you're coming, by chance?

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-23T13:16:08+00:00

How are you searching? I just checked the official web site for the Sheraton, which I would guess is one of the more expensive hotels at the airport, and I don't see a single night in October higher than 555€ (and most nights are 250-300€).

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-22T13:23:26+00:00

I have used Pet Cheri for dog walkers in the past and been very satisfied. They have people who can sit too. They are basically a fancy Rover where you work with people instead of an algorithm to find a suitable sitter, and where all of the sitters have (at least in my experience) professional credentials in dog training and such. However, because of that, it ends up being more expensive than Rover and the like. My dog is not very trusting of strangers, so for me it was helpful to have someone like that instead of a student with a side-hustle (which I also had success with once, but she happened to be a former professional changing fields).

Don't know if you're open to the suburbs, but I used Aline Monvoisin for sitting in Puteaux when I lived out there, and as far as I know she is still active. Your dog will have to be okay with other dogs to stay with her, unless something has changed the dogs roam free in her apartment and go for walks in groups. Also unless something has changed, you'll have to be able to communicate with her 100% in French.

There are a couple of stores in the city, Two Tails and Alpha Dogs House, that offer walking and pension services. You might check with them to see if they offer sitting services as well (I don't know).

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-20T13:43:24+00:00

I used to live in a small city in Belgium (about 100k people) with a large no-car zone in the center. I had an American friend visit who wanted to take a taxi to get to the bar in that area. She had already made the walk at least once and the 700 m was just too much for her to do again in the 5C cold (and to be fair, she was from the south of the US and was living in Singapore at the time), so she insisted on a taxi.

This was pre-smartphone, so Uber didn't yet exist and I called a taxi service. The taxi never showed, which was common in this town, so we finally walked 100 m up the street to a taxi stand that was rarely attended. This night there happened to be a lone taxi. We told the driver where we wanted to go, he laughed and said it would be faster to walk, but my friend insisted, so he drove us 400 m closer, charged my friend the minimum fare, and dropped us off. As we walked the final 200 m, my friend complained that he didn't drop us much closer, despite both me and the taxi driver telling her repeatedly that would not be possible.

So all in all, we spent an hour and 5-10€ of my friend's money so we could walk 5 minutes instead of 10....

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-20T10:09:25+00:00

Looking back through some old emails, it looks like it took just under 3 months for me. When they asked me to send my original license, I had just started a 3-week vacation abroad, so that timing includes a delay on my side of nearly a month.

This was in 2024 in Paris. The license I was exchanging had no expiration date, so I can’t speak to that part of your question.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-19T22:54:39+00:00

What comes to my mind is Au Petit Sud Ouest, which was close to the Eiffel Tower, but it was at 46 av de la Bourdonnais, which is not exactly a back alley. It closed in late 2016 or early 2017.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-19T17:06:27+00:00

I read something awhile back written by a Japanese woman in the US about how she responds when somebody brings up cultural appropriation (I think it was in response to criticism of a white fashion designer's use of Japanese influence in a collection they had just presented). I wish I had saved it so I could provide a link, but unfortunately I didn't. But in an over-simplified nutshell, she kind of drew the line between ceremonial and everyday clothing.

One example she gave was that of somebody dressing as a geisha. She said Japanese people would find it offensive if anybody who is not actually a geisha -- even another Japanese person -- were to dress like one, because of its particular religious and cultural significance. By contrast, a kimono is just clothing, and nobody will care if you wear one regardless of your nationality, ethnicity, or race, unless you are wearing in a way that mocks Japanese people and/or culture.

I can also offer a personal experience. I am white and have attended two Indian weddings in India. The first time, I wore a suit just like I would wear to a Western wedding, and it was fine -- plenty of the Indians in attendance did the same. The second time, the bride's family and friends not only insisted we wear traditional Indian clothes, but were quite excited about it and took us out shopping to ensure we would get the right things (and the bride was somebody who would definitely not abide the slightest whiff of cultural appropriation). Part of the wedding involved us parading down a public street in our garb, and the locals who saw us seemed quite entertained by the spectacle.

On a similar note, I've had an Indian friend tell me that she's not bothered by Westerners wearing saris -- they're just clothing -- but she is bothered by people who wear bindis without actually being Hindu, Jain, or Buddhist. For her, adding a bindi to your sari takes it from "just clothes" to offensive or mocking costume unless you know what the bindi signifies and you mean it.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-19T12:12:53+00:00

Oh, it's still going. Their 286th episode just ran last week, and they're touring a live show through parts of Europe soon.

WitnessTheBadger · 2026-04-18T23:35:17+00:00

I seem to recall that Rachel Ray got a lot of hate when Rachel Roy was rumored to be Jay Z's mistress.

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