Welcome to Paris. Don’t let the city eat you up.

The wheels hit the ground. The French flight attendant announces the arrival. You’re in the City of Lights. Bonjour. 

Within 24 hours, the city starts talking. You pass a bistrot you want to try, a vintage store with Chanel gloves for €35, a cinema running Oscar-season French films. You hear about Silencio at 1 AM, a boat party, a Normandy day trip, three nights out in a row— 

Stop. 

Paris is a giant, shiny monster. It’s easy to get swept up, to say yes to everything, and to slowly lose the thread back to yourself. The moment you lose your priorities, everything else loses its beauty. Paris is only beautiful if you have both feet on the ground. So before you go: here are three things to anchor yourself. 

1. Meals: Feed Yourself Like You Mean It 

Let’s be honest: Paris makes eating cheaply feel glamorous. Wine for €4. A baguette for €1. A pain au chocolat for 70 cents that will ruin every other pastry for the rest of your life. The temptation to survive entirely on bread and cheese is very real, and sometimes you will. 

But there are no cafeterias here, and eating out at Paris’ thousands of beautiful restaurants every day will drain your budget fast. Cooking is the move—and grocery shopping in Paris is genuinely affordable once you know where to go. Monoprix is your everyday staple for everything from produce to wine to dry shampoo. If you lean organic, Naturalia is essentially Paris’ Whole Foods—slightly pricier but worth it when you need it. A few non-negotiable discoveries: Payson Breyton demi-sel butter and Madame Loix cream cheese—your Philadelphia era is over. 

One last thing: French produce has no preservatives, so it goes bad twice as fast as what you’re used to back home. Buy small, shop often. And if you arrive in the cold months like I did, buy a small pot immediately—heating water for tea became one of my most grounding daily rituals. Your throat, and your nervous system, will thank you. 

2. Transportation: Leave Before You Think You Need To 

Paris transit is genuinely great—but it runs on its own schedule. The golden rule: whatever Google Maps tells you, add 15 minutes. If the bus says 25 minutes to class, you leave 40 minutes before. My 8:45 AM French class has been a consistent teacher of this lesson. 

Get a Navigo monthly pass—the one that covers metro, bus, and tram. It pays for itself within the first week and removes the mental overhead of buying tickets every day. Be ready for a lot of underground life; the metro is efficient once you know it. 

A small trick that genuinely helped me navigate faster: the last two digits of any Paris postal code tell you the arrondissement. 75006 = 6th, 75002 = 2nd. Once it clicks, the city’s geography starts to make sense. Most of us come from campus life where everything is a five-minute walk—Paris will rewire your sense of time and distance. Let it. 

3. Movement: Your Body Is Doing a Lot 

Here’s what every study abroad brochure gets right: you will walk. Obsessively. More than you ever have. Paris is a city built for wandering and your step count will reach numbers you didn’t know were possible. Invest in good walking shoes before you come—not cute ones, actually good ones. Your feet are doing real work. 

Beyond walking, the city offers incredible options for intentional movement. Running along the Seine in the early morning feels cinematic in the best way. Luxembourg Gardens and Jardins des Tuileries are perfect for a slow jog or outdoor yoga. For getting to class, cycling is both practical and a solid workout—download Lime for quick electric bike rentals around the city. 

If you want structured classes, ClassPass works beautifully in Paris—there’s a strong yoga scene and boutique studios tucked into Haussmann-era buildings all over the city. And if you’re feeling particularly ambitious: Barry’s Bootcamp in the 2nd arrondissement will humble you in the best possible way. 

Paris will always have more to offer than you have time for. That will never change. But the city reveals itself most generously to people who are actually present in it—slow enough to notice the light changing on the Seine, the smell of butter from a boulangerie two streets over. 

Build your routines. Eat real food. Leave early. Move your body. Then let the city surprise you. The diamonds will still be there. So will you.