Three favorite
places to shop in Paris:
Kiliwatch
Le marché aux puces
Le Bon Marché
Top three places
to travel:
Vladivostok (Russia): A completely unexpected place, far east Russia by the sea in front of Japan. A wonderful mix of cultures
Cuba: A landscape, a lifestyle, a history and a culture. It is sometimes hard to see beyond the facade they put up for tourists but it's
worth it!
Sidi bou Said & Menzel Temim (Tunisia): Small places near the sea—the smell of jasmine, mint tea, chili peppers and
a lot of sun.
Three
favorite books:
Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf: Describes women's psychology, our inner thoughts and feelings. It was for me a hard book, but has to be read again and again
Notes from the Underground by Fyodor Dostoyevsky: Takes us down through the meanders of the mind. A very self-centered character through whom one can actually perceive all the flaws of our societies.
Les Liaisons dangereuses by Cholderos de Laclos: Well-known worldwide, but still very powerful. A book that corrupts your mind and perverts your soul.
- How old are you?
I'm turning 20 in two or three days. I'll probably go out with my friends to a bar, maybe some club after. The legal age is 18, but it's not like they're going to id. I study in the center of Paris, so there are lots and lots of bars and cool little restaurants you can go to. - What are you studying?
I'm studying politics and international relations. I didn't want to specialize too early, and I want to become a journalist, so I thought this would be good. When you finish high school in France and you go to university, usually you just study one subject—only law or only history—and I didn't want to choose. I'm in a school where you can just do anything you want for a couple of years and then decide. - What kind of journalism do you want to do?
I want to do either television or written press. If I can work in the Middle East, I would like that. It's a region that I find very interesting. A lot of the world issues today are related to what is going to happen in the Middle East, and it appeals to me more than Asia or other places. - Have you spent much time in the Middle East?
I have been there a little bit, just to Morocco and Tunisia, and maybe next year I will go to Lebanon. As a journalist, you get to travel a lot, and that is something I would like to do, and I like that your work will always be different. I don't want to sit in an office. I don't think I could do that for all my life!
- Where do you usually get your news?
I like to watch the news on television, because I think the images are important. I like to watch the BBC, and I read French newspapers as well, like Le Monde. - What do you think is the most important international issue facing France right now?
I don't know if it is really a big issue, but it is in the media right now, everything that has to do with immigration has become a big deal in France. It is also very instrumentalized by the politics and I think we see it very differently in France. In the States, you talk a lot about multiculturalism and melting pots, and in France, it's a bit more complicated, because we have a lot of colonies, so we have a history that makes it difficult to talk about it openly. - What's the most interesting class that you're taking now?
I have a class called "Structures and Crisis in the Middle East," and it is actually a class that focuses on Syria and Lebanon. I take it in English and it's very interesting. I have to take half of my classes in English. I went to a bilingual school from when I was very young. - Where do you spend most of your time in Paris?
I am usually in the sixth or seventh arrondissement. It is the very, very old Paris, so it is very pretty. The streets are very small and the buildings are nice. It is also where we have a lot of universities, so people are very young and there's a lot of nightlife. I love living in Paris. It is very relaxed, the lifestyle is very cool and it's just so pretty.
- What do you do when you're not studying?
I like photography, I just go out with my camera and take pictures. I also like reading a lot, and right now I am reading a classical French book by Albert Camus called La Peste. - What do you like about your friends?
My friends are usually very relaxed people. I know I can trust them for sure, and I know if I need them one day, they will be there. It's really not superficial. We can just decide to go on a trip, and all go together. We took a trip last summer and went for a month in Russia. I went with three friends, and we bought plane tickets, then got on the train when we got there and took the Trans-Siberian all across. St. Petersburg and Moscow are both nice places. St. Petersburg is very European, I think, and when we traveled through Siberia, it was great and very, very different. The people were really nice, and halfway through Russia there's Lake Baikal, so we took a little trip around that. And it is unbelievably pretty, it's great. - What did your mom say when you told her you were going to Russia for a month?
My mom is very cool as well, and she loves travelling, so she told me as long as you make sure you're safe, go.
Do you have any more travel planned?
I might take a trip around the Mediterranean with the same group of friends. - What are your current goals?
I have to find an internship for next year, in Lebanon, if I can find that. In my school, you have to do a year abroad. To go live there alone, I thought Lebanon would be easier for a girl alone, and I have heard very good things about Beirut. And I have to take my driving test!
