One can imagine Paris as a mix of many unrelated elements that do not make sense and are lacking coherence. The same rule applies to the French soul. It is, of course, my own biased projection… as a true French will be quick to point out…

The banks of the Seine River are full of antiquarians selling old books (the bouquinistes). I fail to understand who might be interested to buy (exclusively French) old books in the current age of information technology and internet. Yet, the French are among the nations who read the most. What? I don’t know. But they definitely have the worst internet of Europe. And most do not know foreign languages, English included. And they always have an excuse, such as “languages are difficult”.

The Notre-Dame Cathedral caught fire in April 2019 and burned for about 15 hours. It is still under construction. Yes, 3 years have passed and the reconstruction is still a work in progress.

However, for touristic reasons, everything has been organized. And you can admire the façade from a scene opposite the cathedral. I know, who would build such a thing!?! The French!

Here is the scene. Behind is the Prefecture of Police. A watchful eye…

And since we’re talking about police, here is a familiar image: a Carrefour supermarket “protected” by wooden boards so that the windows wouldn’t be broken once again. Graffiti has already appeared on them – it was almost an invitation. This speaks also about the level of security in Paris; I wasn’t comfortable at all with this…

I know, it’s a place full of sand in the middle of the city… actually this is a place to play pétanque, a kind of French bowling. In the distance there are actually people playing. This game is some sort of fetish, being played in all the regions I have lived in France with equal pleasure… or obsession.

An interesting hobby some people might have is to collect buttons. Imagine the time one could spend in creative or practical pursuits! Well, not the French; they enjoy theory and discussion and dislike action and pragmatism. And here a problem might rise…

Were you ever passionate about doing something without a purpose? Well, this is a gate that has no purpose; it just stays there on the street, having a modern building behind that has a completely different architectural style. I suppose the gate was initially part of a house that no longer exists, yet the inutility and the contrast with the rest of the surrounding structures creates a sort of vibe I find difficult to describe in words…

Is the statue thinking? Is it giving birth? Is it sexually provocative? What the hell is all about? I don’t know…

In the middle of Paris you can find Rue Crémieux, unique by its style of colored houses. The contrast between the noise of the big city and this peaceful place that resembles to the Mediterranean world is quite remarkable.

In France you must be prepared to “negotiate” with situations like accidents, failures, cancelations and the like. Sometimes, between a strike and a technical problem, you must have good reflexes and… good luck…

In Alsace there was German, on the Cote d’Azur there was Italian, in Paris it’s English and Spanish as the main secondary languages. This is the exit from the underground train of Austerlitz Station and Spanish was a surprise. Judging by the trends, I expect Chinese and Russian. Soon.

The words on the window of the TGV (high-speed train) can be translated by “let yourself dream” (laissez-vous rêver). The French use the 2nd person singular and plural depending on context. In this case, the “you” is in plural. This creates a distance similar to the one between “du” and “Sie” in German. This makes the interpersonal distance quite big emotionally and making friendships quite a challenge. Just imagine that a “you” in plural can be used in a couple that is together for more than half a century (and made love thousands of times, knowing each other intimately a lot), as a form of politeness that is almost impossible to understand for an English speaker.

So I let myself dream while returning to the Alps, being happy to escape Paris and the strike that plagued my trip. Of course, as I reached Aix-les-Bains, the weather changed.

The Haute-Savoy is one of the coldest places in France. People follow the same pattern. I still have flash-backs of Paris. The image below with the pedestrian lacking a foot and the cathedral under re-construction in the background, are powerful symbols.

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Video with the recent strike in Paris: cezardanilevici.substack.com/p/paris-in-greva