I keep telling myself that I must put up this post for people who are relocating , especially to France. I am not an expert but I just write what I went through or want I know.
When Ken got offered a position in Toulouse France, we only have about 4 months to prepare and go! I got to quit my beloved job, transferred our maid ( which truly upset her), packed up and told friends we are leaving, learn french language(crash course), etc etc.
The thing that come to my mind was to buy things that maybe France won't have. I mean, you will definitely be homesick, you need to have something from your hometown to keep you sane, right? I went crazy with shopping, online shopping too. I bought chinese herbal soup in packets form, winter clothes(Singapore is hot, you don't need them), chili sauce, noodles, 3in1 coffee if you like to drink coffee(very important!!), chrysanthemum tea, red tea, similac milk powder (we could not get the same brand in France so I bought 6 big cans for Stacy, merries diapers (I swear merries diapers is the best) etc etc. mostly food and household items. I did not buy any household appliances except to bring what I already have, as France uses 2pins plug, we uses 3pins plug.
The challenge came when we have to pack what we need for the luggages. The rest of the items (which we think we might not use that much), we shipped it. Shipment took 6weeks to reach France. So do not ship over important documents which you will need when you arrive in that county. Unless your shipment comes almost the same time, you reach France. We got not much time so we only managed to ship our items 1week before we were scheduled to fly.
We have 5 luggages and 2 hand carry for 2 adults and 2 children. We arrived during the colder months in Autumn.
In our luggages,
- mostly long sleeves clothes
- winter clothes (shawls, gloves, beanies, winter shoes, etc)
- jeans /long pants
- children toys (we have to bring quite a few as 6weeks they will have no other toys until the shipment arrive)
- English books (children books, your favorite books, very important!)
- phone chargers
-universal plugs
- baby and toddler's food and snacks (we brought quite abit as France did not have those from USA but their own brands)
- diapers
- milk powder
- toiletries
- medications (for children and babies especially. France have their own brand but if you prefer your own
- documents ( children's birth cert, our marriage cert, and you need them to be translated to French, etc.)
- I will add the list if I remember anything important
In part 2, I'll blog about when we arrived in France and things we need or do.
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