Travelogue 7: Paris, Rouen and Geneva
Paris is unquestionably my favorite city and has been since my first visit. I know, it is a cliché. I would love to be more original and choose a less famous, less touristy place, but the heart wants what it wants, and mine has beaten for Paris for years. Living there for a month felt like inhabiting my own skin for the first time, finally being where I had always belonged. I do not even know how to approach the task of writing this travelogue, but I will try. Forgive me if I occasionally stray into Francophilia.
Parisians
No stereotype seems falser to me than the claim that Parisians are rude. Perhaps the idea that people from Buenos Aires are unbearable comes close. Parisians are essentially cordial and helpful. Courtesy is an important part of their culture and even their language. Dealing with strangers involves a kind of deference; it is common to address anybody as monsieur or madame, which may feel excessively formal in other cultures. For somebody like me, who values courtesy and manners, Paris is paradise. For those uninterested in such forms of interaction, it can become hell. The obligatory greeting, bonjour, is the first step toward ensuring good treatment in any place or situation. Near nightfall it becomes bonsoir, but the principle is the same. Upon entering anywhere, one must say bonjour and make eye contact with the person at the entrance or behind the counter. It is a sign of respect. This is no secret I discovered; every travel blog hammers the advice endlessly, and I knew it even before my first Paris visit. What do tourists do? They enter everywhere while breaking the rule and the social convention, then complain that Parisians are rude when they receive a cold response. Likewise, saying excuse me, please, thank you and I am sorry can open the way throughout the city. Yet even after witnessing tourists shout questions and demands in English without greeting anybody or asking whether the staff speaks the language, I have seen them receive good service. I truly do not understand the stereotype’s origin.
Does that mean there are no rude Parisians? Of course there are—rude, indifferent or surly people—but they are a minority. Most of my interactions in Paris, during this and previous visits, have been positive. I must admit I have an ace up my sleeve: I speak French. Basic French, with terrible pronunciation, but I try, and I feel this wins me more sympathy and therefore better service. How did I learn? Entirely by myself: apps, videos, podcasts, music, French news; for a while I even changed my iPhone’s operating system to French; I read my first book in French and am now reading a second. With my own resources I learned enough to read fairly well, understand spoken French at an intermediate level and speak very little—but enough to enter a restaurant, ask about the menu, request changes to a dish, ask for the bill, split and pay it, or enter a store and inquire about prices and a product I need. Basic interactions, in other words. I have even managed them without employees automatically switching to English when they hear me, which is an achievement. Whenever I complete a successful exchange, I think: “I fooled them; they thought I spoke French.” After this month-long visit, however, I began to think: “Perhaps I am not fooling them. Perhaps I do speak French.” The language issue that intimidates so many visitors is another part of the myth; one can visit Paris without speaking French. Many people speak English and even Spanish. One must simply observe the social conventions and use good manners.
As an example, when somebody in a restaurant or shop hears us speaking Spanish, they have often served us in Spanish. To me, this is a sign of kindness. On my first visit, I interpreted switching to English or Spanish as evidence that my French was dreadful. Later, I understood that addressing somebody in a language that is not your own and that you do not master is an act of generosity intended to offer better service or help.
Le Marais
Le Marais was my neighborhood that month, and it is one of those places whose borders are a mystery even to its inhabitants, much like Condesa or Roma in Mexico City. What people call Le Marais covers the 3rd and 4th arrondissements and parts of the 10th and 11th. My apartment was technically in the 11th, at the corner of Boulevard Richard-Lenoir—the one above the famous Canal Saint-Martin—and Rue Saint-Sébastien. For my taste, this is the neighborhood’s best location: not in the most touristy portion, the 4th, but full of restaurants, cafés, boulangeries, bars, supermarkets and shops. The apartment was small but adequate; the building attractive and comfortable. The location was extraordinary. I could walk to the Seine, Canal Saint-Martin or the tourist area in fifteen minutes; Notre-Dame and Les Halles took twenty, the Louvre thirty.
I had the opportunity to walk the neighborhood’s streets repeatedly and appreciate its little gardens and parks, medians and public squares; its numerous local-brand shops, restaurants and cafés; and the people sitting beside the canal or river, spending the afternoon with a bottle of wine, a beer or simply a cigarette.
Daily life
Although I tried to live a normal daily life, it felt somewhat like a vacation because every day offered a building, museum, park, cemetery, shop or monument to visit. In the morning one had to go out for bread: baguettes for the meal and a pain au chocolat purely for pleasure. Twice a week, our meal became a simple baguette filled only with crunchy semi-salted butter, ham and cheese. Comté was a great discovery.
I ran beside the Seine in the mornings, which is much more complicated than one might imagine because stretches of the riverbank become cobbled or simply end. One must move away from the city’s most touristy area—from Hôtel de Ville toward Jardin des Tuileries—because the sidewalks become impossible to navigate.
Nothing is more satisfying than beginning to know the streets, routes, metro stations and shortcuts; which streets are most beautiful, where there are more cafés, which boulangerie is best, where the finest wines are sold, which areas to avoid, and where to spend a quiet or a busy afternoon.
Weather
May weather in Europe is crazy. We had two weeks of relatively good conditions and two of constant rain and cold. I would have preferred to arrive in June and spend my birthday in Paris, but that proved impossible. We changed our stay in Santiago from three months to two, forcing the entire itinerary forward.
I love rain and can enjoy cold weather. My only complaint is that I could not run as much as I wanted. One wonderful experience, however, was seeing the Eiffel Tower in the rain against a completely gray sky—an aesthetic one cannot always appreciate.
I noticed that Parisians bundle up excessively in normally cold rather than extremely cold weather. I wore a jacket while they put on coats and scarves as though snow were falling. One might expect people accustomed to harsher cold to wear less in the moderate conditions we experienced. Perhaps they always dress for cold in the same way, regardless of its intensity.
Showing somebody the city
Nydia has a friend who married a German and lives in a town near Köln. They visited us in Paris for three days near the end of our stay. Spending time with them was pleasant, but I had not anticipated how it would feel to show people around “my city.”
Although I have not truly lived in Paris, multiple visits and an entire month spent there living my daily life—not vacationing—have given me extensive knowledge of the city. I can identify and point out on a map its various areas, neighborhoods, attractions and main streets. I understand public transportation, know several lines and many metro and RER stations, can walk from practically any point to another and estimate the time required. In short, I possess the sort of knowledge normally acquired by residents. I also know much about the city’s history and workings: the origins of street, neighborhood and district names, the meaning of certain public spaces and monuments, what many buildings are or once were. Somebody might acquire all this casually after years of living in a city. I gained it partly through experience, yes, but largely by studying Paris. I have read a great deal, studied the map repeatedly, and memorized information and facts. Ever since my first visit, my dream has been to live there—or, if that proved impossible, at least to become an expert and feel that the city was mine whenever I returned.
That three-day visit was, so to speak, the final examination for my graduation. Without planning or thinking about it, I found myself constantly explaining things, describing neighborhoods, suggesting places to go, pointing out a street or monument and recounting its origin. It felt like showing somebody around the city where I normally live. Even if it was only an illusion, I felt Parisian.
Versailles
At last, I had the opportunity to visit Versailles, and it was incredible. Exploring the palace, gardens, park and other houses took the entire day. The palace is beautiful, but the gardens and park exceeded my expectations. The complex’s sheer size is astonishing, and I cannot imagine how many people are needed to maintain and care for it. I certainly recommend the visit, but seeing everything does require a whole day.
The Louvre
This was my fourth visit to my favorite museum—and perhaps my favorite place in the world generally. This time I spent seven and a half hours calmly exploring the galleries and enjoying every corner. Despite my repeated visits and the many hours spent there, it still feels like a labyrinth. I remain incredulous that a place can be so large and so full of art and history. I hope to return many times until the day comes when I can walk through it without becoming lost.
A trip outside the city: Rouen
A ninety-minute train ride took us to Rouen, the capital of Normandy, a small city on the Seine with a metropolitan population of around half a million. During the Middle Ages it was among central Europe’s most prosperous cities and retains as proof one of the world’s most impressive cathedrals. Rouen Cathedral has an extraordinary façade whose complexity and detail are impossible to comprehend. Even after looking at it for a long time, I cannot form a concrete memory of it as I can with other churches and temples; its design is too intricate to remember in detail. Curiously, one recalls it in an abstract form, like Monet’s paintings of that very cathedral.
One such Monet is in Rouen’s Musée des Beaux-Arts, where I also saw a Caravaggio in person—the thirty-third I have managed to see. The museum has a remarkably interesting collection for such a small city.
Overall, Rouen is attractive but somewhat neglected. My impression was that it needed renovation and cleaning. Because it is such a short journey from Paris, it may be worthwhile, but only for people with a genuine interest in Gothic architecture and art. Otherwise, an extra day in Paris is the better option.
A trip outside the country: Geneva
At the end of our Paris stay, we took a train for three days in Geneva. It is an attractive, clean and orderly city. There is not a great deal to see or do, so the visit was relaxed. I was once an avid watch enthusiast, which made exploring the city interesting: one can walk past watch-shop windows admiring the pieces on display. I also visited the Patek Philippe Museum, which has an impressive collection of antique watches. I saw Jorge Luis Borges’s grave, walked through the historic center and admired the Jet d’Eau on the lake, the iconic fountain that is the city’s main tourist attraction.
Conclusions
So far, this and my stay in Buenos Aires have been the most enjoyable periods of the New Era. I genuinely feel at home in Paris, as though I were where I had always been meant to be. The dream of living there is extremely difficult to achieve for several reasons, but if I could spend at least a year in the city, perhaps I could shake the feeling that I am missing out on life in the world’s finest city, where everything is exactly as it should be—at least for me. For now, I hope to return soon and continue visiting many more times.