For a project I'm working on, I'd like to put Python for .NET in a more standard Python package that lives in site-packages. However, the bootstrapping that happens in InitExt() in pythonengine.cs doesn't work in that case. If I put together a package that looks like: site-packages pythonnet __init__.py clr.pyd Python.Runtime.dll add "from pythonnet" to the lines that the nasty bootstrapping hack looks for in traceback, then when I call from pythonnet import clr Python goes into an infinite recursion loop. The import calls up initclr() in ClrModule.cs, which calls InitExt() in pythonengine.cs, which calls Python with the command "from pythonnet import clr", which calls initclr() in ClrModule.cs, which calls InitExt().... For whatever reason, this doesn't occur with a straight "import clr", if I dump clr.pyd and Python.Runtime.dll in my root site-packages directory. What's going on?