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Americans will today be joined by people around the world to commemorate the 12th anniversary of 9/11 with solemn ceremonies and pledges to not forget the nearly 3,000 killed when hijacked jetliners crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a Pennsylvania field.
New York is a resilient city that has endured, overcome and continued to be the city that sets the trends for the world in so many ways.
New York is a so many things to so many people, almost every lifestyle and every culture on earth can be found here. To me this is symbolized by the iconic United Nations General Assembly, right in the centre of New York's heart.
Here are some of the different New York's from my perspective:
New York is a state. With a population of around 20 million, the economy of New York state is diverse including agriculture, printing and publishing, scientific instruments, electric equipment, machinery, chemical products, and tourism. New York exports a wide variety of goods such as foodstuffs, commodities, minerals, computers and electronics, cut diamonds, and automobile parts.
New York is a city, in fact the most populous city in the United States (with over 8 million people), and the centre of the New York metropolitan area, which is one of the most populous urban areas in the world.
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs with a population of around 2.5 million. The economy of Brooklyn includes services, retailing and construction. Half of Brooklyn's residents work outside of the area, most in Manhattan.
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. It is regarded as the commercial, financial, and cultural centre of both the United States and the world and is home to Wall Street, the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ. Many major radio, television, and telecommunications companies in the United States are based in Manhattan, as well as many news, magazine, book, and other media publishers.
Queens is the easternmost of the five boroughs of New York City, and is the largest borough in area and the second-largest in population with around 2.2 million people. The economy of Queens includes tourism, industry, and trade and is also a manufacturing and back office centre. Queens is home to two of the three major New York City area airports, JFK International Airport and LaGuardia Airport.
Whatever New York means to you, in the words of Frank Sinatra, if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere, its up to you New York, New York.
Paris the "City of Love". Who has not wished to live in Paris once in their lives? There is a line in a Baz Luhrmann song called Sunscreen that goes "Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard; live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft." I think this applies to Paris too, perhaps the saying should be "Live in Paris once but leave before it makes you too French," unless you are French of course.
Paris has a magic about it that draws people. What is it about this city that is so special? Is it the notion that French people are undeniably romantic? Couples walking hand in hand along the Seine, sharing bread, wine and cheese in the gorgeous green parks, snuggling up on park benches in winter, whispering to each other in cafes! Or is it just that the French sound so unbelievably sexy when they speak?
I am not sure, but whatever it is I would love to live in Paris just once in my life. Paris has all the romantic attractions for me, I could imagine myself as an expat walking the streets, shopping at Galleries Lafeyette or Avenue Montaigne and Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré for thecrème de la crème. Left bank or right bank you will have a ball.
Then there are the museums from The Louvre (which could take your entire stay in Paris to get through), Musee D'Orsay and the Centre Pompidou. The beautifully manicured parks will take your breath away and you could spend hours sunning yourself in deck chairs while life passes you by, from the elegant Luxembourg Gardens or Place des Vosges which is in the fashionable Marais quarter, and most importantly the Château de Versailles, which is opulent, fanciful and luxurious, the gardens cover more than 800 hectares - with woodland, ponds, fountains and statues. Picnicking is certainly one of the best Parisian past times that I have ever experienced.
Then there are the flea markets to browse, cafes and tearooms to experience, street markets, and last but not least the architectural wonders of the Eiffel Tower, The Opera House, Arc de Triomphe, Montmartre, Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie, and Notre Dame Cathedral to name a few. Oh Paris, you are calling.
This is certainly not where it stops, as living in Paris gives you access to the rest of the France and well, Paris may well take you a year or two to get through, and then there is the rest of the country to experience.
Certainly enough good reasons to want to be an Expat in Paris!
But what will Paris cost you if you decided to make a career move here? What are you earning and what would you need to earn to live it up in Paris and her night clubs?
Use Xpatulator.com's SPPP calculator which calculates how much you need to earn in Paris to compensate for cost of living, hardship, and exchange rate differences, in order to have the same relative spending power and as a result have a similar standard of living as you have where you live now. If, for example, you live in New York and earn 100,000 USD, what would you need to earn in Paris to have the same spending power?
And to end off with Baz again:
Don't feel guilty if you don't know what you want to do with your life.....the most interesting people I know didn't know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives, some of the most interesting 40 year olds I know still don't.
Americans will today be joined by people around the world to commemorate the 12th anniversary of 9/11 with solemn ceremonies and pledges to not forget the nearly 3,000 killed when hijacked jetliners crashed into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a Pennsylvania field.
New York is a so many things to so many people, almost every lifestyle and every culture on earth can be found here. To me this is symbolized by the iconic United Nations General Assembly, right in the centre of New York's heart. 
