LETTER FROM PARIS #18 in retrospect

You know you’ve been around by the social references you make, like remembering the once best-selling: “Europe on Five Dollars a Day. Saying: “I remember it “like it was only yesterday” is a trap. And since I promised in the beginning that this could also be a forum for the retired and the soon-to-be, here goes.

Our first trip to Paris was about 30 years ago. We were not especially flushed so we looked for bargain hotels and less expensive dining, and certainly never a limousine-driven guided tour of the Châteaux of the Loire. It turned out that all the ugly rumours about Paris being terribly expensive, were canards circulated by jealous competitors. Or at least that’s what I thought. So I decided I would write a piece about Paris and how you could “do” the city on a budget. Somewhere along the way I lost my way. The “article”turned into a rambling narrative more the length of a novelette than an article. I was borne aloft by the magic of the place and even more, by the idiosyncrasies of the Parisians. (At least that’s how they seemed to me.)

So what follows is a memory of some of what I wrote then, contrasted by what I see today. Time for Paris has passed. Years for me have also passed. Here goes.

There were at least two pages on how I see pedestrians in Paris and how I compare them to other cities I knew. Montreal, where if you stand at a corner waiting for the light to change, people know you’re from Ontario. New York, where people simply barge and scurry across. Even today, with special pedestrian police at the intersections trying to persuade people to wait, they scurry across. But in Paris they jaywalk with a kind of sangfroid, a kind of insouciance, a kind of arrogance. My memory from 30 years ago: we are standing in front of Les Deux Magots (where millions of tourists stand) looking across the street in the general direction of Brasserie Lipp. An elegant women steps off the curb with that oh-so-Parisian air of invincibility. Wham! The next thing I see she is flying in the air. A Mercedes has hit her. She stands up and inspects the torn nylon stocking. She walks toward the car. At the same time the driver emerges. Before he can say anything she belts him one – right in the kisser. Wham! She dusts herself off, and proceeds to finish crossing the road. I felt like applauding. It was street theatre at its best.

I remember too that I was struck with how many cars had dents and scratches. (I don’t see it today.) Having seen the Place de la Concorde and commenting that there was very little “concorde” because driving that traffic circle was a Parisian version of a blood sport. I write that I was astonished at the number of high end car dealerships there were on the Champs Elysees. I wrote that “driving a brand new car in Paris traffic is like wearing an Italian silk suit to do mud wrestling.” (Well, I thought it was clever at the time.”)

The rudeness: I remember commenting that with few exceptions, people, especially service people, were polite and helpful. It was around that time that President de Gaulle had started a campaign to make the city more tourist-friendly and to persuade arrogant waiters to drop their arrogance. It seemed to be working. There was, for us, one notable exception. Remember, I said we were trying to prove you could “do” Paris on a budget. Shirley said “Just once, could we go to someplace a little more elegant. How about Bofinger?” I agreed. We took the Metro to Place de La Bastille. Before hitting Bofinger, I wanted a picture of Shirley standing in front of a statue of someone famous. As she posed. I asked her to step back. A little farther. A little farther. I got the picture, but she had stepped back into a pile of the special gift Parisian dogs have for tourists. Because the French meticulously hose down the streets, there was enough water in the gutter for her to clean up. That was before Jacques Chirac, soon to become mayor (then President) decreed that the law was going to crack down on indifferent dog owners. It seems to have worked. I actually see Parisians doing “stoop and scoop: but not always. There’s a little less poop, but Fido is still king.

Back to Bofinger. It was only lunch so prices can’t be that bad. A tall, haughty-looking waiter handed me a menu. I asked: “What is this “saucisson?”” I knew what a sausage was, but it didn’t look right. The waiter, displaying the disdain that so exemplified French waiters, said “tripe,” and walked away. I made my choice. When he returned I said “Ris de Veau.” He gave me the most patronizing sneer “Veal kidney Monsieur” came out like “You American prick!” I told him I knew what Ris de Veau was but it was too late. Which led my to a conversation with the people sitting next to us, a couple who, it turns out, spoke only French. I asked why there were so many people in France who thought anyone from somewhere else was a barbarian. (In fact, look up the meaning for “barbare.”) They responded very politely and with apparent contrition that it was not that way at all. Then they returned to their enormous lunch treat of a heaping platter of seafood. (Not uncommon in many Paris restaurants.)

We struggled. We loved it. Somewhere I lost the big book of maps I bought from a sidewalk vendor. I overlook having asked for a “grande” when I ordered a beer and being very stubborn, sat there and finished it. It looked like the equivalent of a six pack!

Why, after all this, do we continue to return. It is because of “all this” that we do. We share something undefineable to outsiders, a sometimes preposterous love of the city. It is where flaws become virtues, and the virtuous become seduced.