Paris – Day One

I suppose the general perception of France (as seen from London) is that the French are like ourselves, only different. France has a reputation for lofty aspirations, however impractical they might be to implement. The French prefer logic whereas the English rely on common sense.

Therefore I set out on my recent visit to Paris thinking that I knew about France and the French. This was my first prolonged stay in the country for several years, and I was not expecting much to have changed. On previous day-trips to Paris I had seen a society where the machinery-of-living (to use a German concept) was working smoothly and effortlessly. The streets were clean, the people well-dressed, the restaurants full. I knew that there had just been a hotly contested presidential election. I knew that the British newspapers talked of France as the new Sick Man Of Europe.

But I was not expecting much in the way of change.



Above: the Gare du Nord.

I arrived by Eurostar at the Gare du Nord at about twenty past five. The late afternoon was warm and sunny, with shafts of light coming down through the station roof like searchlights. I waited until most of the other passengers had got off before moving myself (I hate walking along a platform in a crush of people). I was probably among the last half-dozen to leave the train, walking the short distance to the concourse where Robert Leiper was waiting. I had only half-expected to see him since we hadn’t made a definite arrangement to meet. He looked thinner than when I had last seen him in February, and his mood seemed to be one of reserved wariness (as if he were afraid of me in some way).



Above: the 8th Arrondissement is a very good area of Paris (and there’s nothing wrong with being bourgeois).

We went to my hotel in the 8th Arrondissement. Robert Leiper was impressed by the district. He was further impressed by the star rating of the small hotel where I was staying.

“The Eighth District is very bourgeois” he told me, slight sneer in his voice.

“I am nothing if not bourgeois” I said (coming from a genuinely working class East End family I am scornful of middle class people who try to pretend they are proletarian – my parents and grand-parents were glad they had escaped from poverty).

I didn’t understand why he was being hostile. Did he begrudge me an hotel in the 8th? Originally I had intended to stay at his accommodation on a house-boat permanently moored on the Seine, but the thought of sleeping on a rocking boat made me uneasy and I had transferred to an hotel at the last minute – possibly this switch had offended him in some way.

I gave him a copy of The Guardian and The Daily Telegraph to read in the hotel sitting room while I went upstairs to unpack and have a wash – this took about twenty minutes. There was a tiny lift, big enough for about one person and a suitcase, but as I was only on the second floor I used the stairs (good exercise as well). My room was comfortable but a little small (I had stayed at the hotel before, years ago, and remembered the rooms as being twice the size, so they may have divided some of the rooms in two).

We walked down from the hotel to the Boulevard Haussmann (about two blocks away). It was a fine evening, so we kept on walking right into the centre of the city, over the river, and down the Rue de l’Universite, looking for a bistro that had been recommended to me. As soon as the restaurant came into view Robert Leiper seemed to have a little fit of suppressed rage.

“It’s a joynt” he said, spitting the words out.

“It’s a what?”

“It’s a joynt. You know, a joynt. This is NOT a good place to go – c’mon, I know a bar where we can get a cheap meal.”

I didn’t want to fall out with him, but equally I was not going to let him decide where I would eat. There seemed nothing wrong with the restaurant which looked respectably and authentically French (not surprisingly, as we were in France). Not replying to Robert Leiper, I went into the bistro and asked for a table for two. Robert followed me in and sat down in the seat opposite. The restaurant was a big square room, fairly dark, with a zinc topped bar and a huge range of decorative objects (wooden carvings, vases, strange curios). It was about seven thirty.



Above: I ordered the specialty of the house – poulet au pot.

Only one other table was occupied, and Robert Leiper took this as proof that the restaurant was no good. I ordered the specialty of the house, which was poulet au pot. A big vessel was brought to the table containing chicken stew – pieces of chicken with slices of carrot and potato (it was very good). Gradually the tables around us began to fill up until they were all occupied. All the voices were French and there didn’t seem to be any tourists among them (part of the attraction of the restaurant was its “authenticity”). I liked the place – it was exactly the experience I wanted.

I talked to Robert Leiper about his life in Paris over the last five months. He was very evasive about how he managed to stay in the country without a visa. I asked whether I would meet any of the French people he had got to know, and he told me he didn’t know any French people. Then he hesitated slightly before saying he wanted me to meet an American friend of his – Charles Frappe. The next half hour was dominated by his descriptions of Charles Frappe. How he was a great writer and intellectual, how he had taught Robert so much in the last few months, how he was a brilliant amateur art dealer etc etc etc. By the time we left the restaurant I was completely fed up with hearing about Charles Frappe and had no desire to meet him.



Above: one of the monuments on the Pont De Alexandre III – when I took this photograph I was feeling very apprehensive about meeting Charles Frappe and was trying to string out the walk so that it would be too late.

We walked back to the city centre and across the Seine, turning down onto the embankment. I was surprised at the hundreds of houseboats permanently moored, two deep, along the river. We walked for ages until Robert Leiper stepped down onto one boat, crossed over the deck and half-jumped onto the boat beyond it. I followed, feeling very uneasy about stepping between to rocking boats. In through a white door and down a short flight of stairs that was more like a ladder. I was so preoccupied with keeping my footing that it was only when I was completely inside that I had a chance to look at my surroundings.

“Charles” said Robert Leiper, “we’ve got a visitor!”