Am I in France yet?

At the end of last year, I wasn’t sure about my direction, but I did know one thing, I didn’t want a copy and paste of the previous year.  I wanted a new direction entirely. So on January 1st, written on notes, from a coffee shop in Kentish Town, I made a few goals. Amongst these were:

• Start writing a book

• Move country

As some of you may know, I am currently planning to move to France. It has been somewhat of a mission - or obsession - of mine for most of 2024.

It is what I would call…a Quest. Moving to Europe in the current climate is not for the faint-hearted or for anyone having doubts about whether they can be bothered. 

It is a long process, that requires time, dedication, and expenditure in this post-Brexit world.

As I’ve been moving through the bureaucracies of applying for a working visa in France and also my Irish passport in Dublin, I started to document my journey.

What strikes me is that many of these processes are almost made deliberately complicated. Sometimes, all it takes is a straight-up and frank conversation with one person who knows what they’re talking about, to save weeks of dancing around websites and GBT to get a straight answer. 

So for anyone who’s looking to embark on the same journey, I’m going to share everything I have learned so far, which could save you some time and a lot of headache. 

I’m doing it out of the goodness of my heart, but also because I have committed to writing every day for 3 months, and seeing what comes out the other end. Is there such a thing as a selfless act?

In this upcoming series - which I am officially announcing so cannot back out of - I will be writing an (almost) live account of my progress to get into France. Nothing is guaranteed yet, and I still have no idea whether I will make it to my target date in September. 

In any case, I thought it would be a fun project to bring readers along with me on the journey. Either to a big brick wall or to a whole new life. I suppose we will both have to strap in together and see what happens…

My first post will be for my Irish people out there who have have (like me) procrastinated over getting their application together to apply for an passport. Once I have this, of course, my attempts to get a French visa will be overridden by my new entry back into the EU. 

However, with processing time for Foreign Births amounting to up to a year, I am attempting to go ahead with my application for a visa regardless. I simply cannot wait!