Gen X Expat vs. France: I Was Built for This Bureaucratic Circus

From mixtapes to mairie appointments: how Gen X became the ultimate French survival class

As an adult, I considered myself trans-millennial. I worked in tech for a decade in San Francisco, surrounded by brunch-loving, meme-slinging millennials who referred to things as “a vibe” unironically. I played along. I kept my age quiet, perfected my avocado toast order, and feigned deep enthusiasm for the new Instagram font. But let’s be honest, I’m Gen X through and through.

We are fine. We are always fine. We were latchkey kids, raised on Capri Sun, after-school specials, and emergency numbers stuck to the fridge with a Garfield magnet. Our parents? They were smoking inside and told us to “figure it out.” And we did.

We didn’t have TikTok. We had rotary phones. You ever try dialing a number with a 9 in it three times? That’s commitment. We were the first to learn computers, and the first to break them. We lived through dial-up, floppy disks, and the heartbreak of someone picking up the phone while your Napster download hit 98 percent. France’s glitchy government websites? Please. That’s just giving AOL energy. We were born for this mess.

Moving to France at 50? Ha. Child’s play.

They say moving to France is bold, romantic, and slightly unhinged. But for Gen X, it’s just another plot twist. We’ve been quietly adapting and surviving since the Carter administration. You think a little culture shock scares us? We survived Reagan, chain wallets, and writing term papers using the Dewey Decimal System.

France isn’t intimidating, it’s just a puzzle with wine breaks.

Bureaucracy? That’s Cute.

We have the patience of saints. It took us two minutes to dial a phone number, and we did it uphill both ways. We waited three days for a LimeWire download only to discover it was mislabeled and definitely not Radiohead. Did we cry? No. We clicked refresh. We were born in buffering mode.

Need to organize a dossier of 47 documents for the prefecture? We’re the Trapper Keeper generation. We bring receipts. Color-coded.

French Websites Don’t Work?

Cool story. We learned basic HTML to customize our MySpace pages. We downloaded drivers off a CD-ROM. I once installed a printer using six floppy disks and a prayer. If the French tax portal needs me to scan and compress ten versions of my birth certificate, I’ll do it while humming the AOL login tone and sipping wine. Je suis un hacker now.

Social? Before Social Media.

We made friends the old-fashioned way: we showed up at someone’s door, knocked, and hoped their weird older sibling didn’t answer. We survived phone calls where a parent answered and you had to ask, voice cracking, if Jimmy could come out and play. You think we’re scared of French apéro? We’ve been charming strangers since 1986.

Parenting? Oh Please.

We were raised on streetlight curfews and the occasional “come home when you hear me yell.” Helmets were optional. Supervision was “neighborhood-based.” In France, kids walk themselves to school and play unattended in public squares while parents drink rosé. You know what we call that? Tuesday.

There are no participation trophies in France. Just ask Sonia. She got nothing for her “effort.” C’est la vie. Gen X kids would’ve cried into their Ecto Cooler and kept it moving.

Budgeting? Grandma Trained Us.

We knew the value of a quarter. A quarter bought a loaf of bread, or at least a gumball and some Garbage Pail Kids. We had paper routes, babysat, and scammed Columbia House out of 12 CDs for a penny. In France, we handle currency conversions like we handled checkbooks, with a calculator and righteous indignation. My grandma would be proud. She could stretch a five-franc coin for days.

Adaptability is Our Love Language.

We were raised in analog and now live in digital. Oregon Trail gave us dysentery. Carmen Sandiego gave us wanderlust. We wrote term papers using actual books and now type with thumbs. France wants us to switch gears constantly between customs, codes, and metric vs. imperial? Child’s play. We are professional code-switchers. We belong to no one and adapt to everyone.

Cynicism: Activated.

We don’t trust systems. We lived through the DARE program and it did nothing. We question authority. We understand that the system is broken, always has been, and we’re just here to fill out the form for the fourth time and hope this version works. If not, we ask for someone else and start again calmly, with sarcasm.

Our humor? Darker than the bottom of a French bureaucrat’s inbox. Our therapy? Sharing a story that ends with, “You can’t make this shit up.”

Final Thoughts from the Bleacher Seats

So yes, Gen X was made for expat life. We have the patience, the adaptability, the gallows humor, and the spreadsheet templates. We know how to survive in limited space. Hell, we prefer it. We’re resilient. We don’t break, we just mutter something sarcastic and fax ourselves back into existence.

Moral of the story?

If you were born between the fall of disco and the rise of emo, you are ready. Living in France won’t break you. You’ve already been broken and rebuilt by Blockbuster late fees, dial-up trauma, and the trauma of watching someone not rewind their VHS tapes. Moving abroad is just one more level-up in your quiet boss battle of a life.

Like this post? Smash that restack, share with your most underappreciated Gen X friend, and follow me on Instagram at @le_simple_sudiste where I pretend I’m an influencer but mostly post about bread and dog poop on cobblestones.

Fuel this sarcasm with a coffee, s’il vous plaît. It keeps the content free and the sass fully caffeinated.

We survived Y2K. We can survive the préfecture.