The
year draws to an end in a glitter of lights reflected in wet pavements; streets
crowded with hurrying pedestrians bundled up in chapkas and écharpes; smell of
roasting chestnuts and corn on the braziers by the kiosques des journaux;
accordéonistes belting out Christmas tunes in the metro; the fruit and veg
stalls radiating colour and vitality in the grey light.
On
Thursday I walked back from yoga following the track of the metro line 2 along
the boulevard. It was spitting and snow was forecast for later in the day. Line
2 runs above-ground on a high bridge between Chapelle and Barbès. Underneath it
the central reservation forms a space with a low wall either side. This has
been inhabited for quite a while by rough sleepers who leave their mattresses
and possessions there all the time. Now it has morphed into a fully-fledged
bidonville with well-constructed roofs of plastic sheeting, cardboard and
planks – marginally warmer and safer than the open pavement but still not much
protection in these cold nights.
On
Tuesday 14 December a group of activists that goes by the name of ‘les Morts de
la rue’ gathered outside the Forum des Halles to recite the names of the homeless
who have died on the streets of France
I
stopped off at Ed, the low-price supermarket. They were searching everyone’s
bags at the check-out. The manager was apologetic but said he had no choice:
his losses from shop-lifting have gone off the scale since September. By the
time I came out it was raining hard and the beggar sitting on the ground by the
telephone box had put a green plastic rubbish bag round her to keep the wet
off. I gave her some money – she was almost certainly a ‘Rom’ (gypsy) and I was
immediately surrounded by other women all pestering me for money too. Poverty
thrust in your face and whatever you give it’s never enough.
I
could go on a long time about the under-belly of Paris
Two
days later and I was not so far away in kilometres but on a something like
another planet in terms of the environment – in the 16th arrondissement,
not the shuttered avenues around l’Etoile, further out where there are lots of
green spaces, lots of big trees and fat, furry donkeys all lined up and waiting
for les petits. I was on my way to the
musee Marmottan, to see the other Monet exhibition, (the one that’s had all the
publicity is at the Grand Palais).
Because
this is a Christmas bulletin I’ll end on a happier note: a celebration of what’s
as good if not better in Paris than anywhere else in the world, the cultural
life. What would I single out from all that I’ve seen and done these past 3
months? Didon et Enée, Purcell’s opera, at the Theatre Mouffetard? The open
rehearsal with the English Baroque Soloists and the Monteverdi singers with John
Eliot Gardiner conducting at la cité de la Musique? The Ballad of Sexual
Dependency with Nan Goldin’s photos at Villette? ‘Les Papilles en Fete’ a
Rabelaisian food fair with artisanal produce from every part of the hexagone,
at the Grande Halle de la Villette? The film, ‘Le long voyage’ at the Institut
Culturel d’Islam? The ‘Tresors des Medicis’ at the muse Maillol? The convivial
evenings with other would-be writers at Anna Pook’s workshops in the upstairs
room at Shakespeare & Co? Browsing along the shelves at Harmattan, on the
rue des Ecoles? The Arman exhibition at the Pompidou? The film ‘Miel’ directed
by Samih Kaplanoglu? The joys of riding the manège Carré Sénart at the
re-launched Centre 104? … They were all wonderful in different ways. But I’d
have to go for Bernard-Marie Koltès’ ‘La nuit juste avant les forêts’, directed
by Chereau and played by Romain Duris in a hall of the Denon wing in the
Louvre. Because it moved me like nothing else has done.
No comments:
Post a Comment