Paris is Old

i was in paris for 11 days. wasn’t my first trip so i did not indulge in tourism. wasn’t my second trip so i did not indulge in contemplation. neither my third so i was not ventilating to see the real paris, nor my forth as a quick get-away-vacation. until now, i loved paris. and that love slowly faded.

the second part of a man’s life is made up of nothing but the habits he has aquired during the first half. wise quote by dostoevsky. luckily, i’m not yet on the second side of my life, but paris definitely is. if cities are mental conditions, and have souls or whatever form of biological entity, paris is living its second and last part of its life. it has grown so big, so old that it resembles more to the stubbornness of grumpy old people.

parisians are a bunch of hoarders. since ever they have gathered their stuff in paris. from statues to paintings to prostitutes and clothes. from algerians to americans to quite a few asians. all kinds of architecture, all kinds of fashion. only their pot is not melting. and things tend to get very messy when there is no synergy. i literally mean messy. clustered. and then add tourism, hordes of people spreading the dirt from one place to another.

the latin quarter was a place with some romantic nostalgia in my mind. now, it’s a bunch of immigrants with oversized but ripped jeans doing one of the worst street choreography i have ever seen (they weren’t even trying) on a loudly distorted boombox playing some 90 french pop hit. Right under the statue of st michael. the two dragons spitting water on the cigarette butts thrown in the fountain with other pets. pickpocket children raid the tourist that are somehow trapped in the crowd. two feet away people eat 15 euros tartines on the street watching throw the cars and the exhausted gas. or the trocadero, marais and the subway, where you can’t find a piece of stone without scraped vomit and booze on it.

ok, so it’s not clean right? maybe paris has gone beyond the possibility of cleaning its self, i can understand that. new york ain’t the cleanest. neither is rome. but for paris is more of an old man’s habit. something he can’t shake off. just like parisians will never speak english. i went to the hussein chalayan expo at the musee de arts decoratifs. awesome exhibit, nothing in english. in the capital of fashion, the work of a british/turkish designer does not have an english flyer. come on. and don’t get me started on french waiters and people selling stuff in shops.

granted, there is a lot of wealth and culture spread in paris. streets, houses, corners, museums, they all live and breath art. but old art. art done in the first half of parisian life and culture. now, they are only replicating their habits. and it’s turning slowly into kitsch. at night, whenever the clock strikes the hour, the golden lit eiffel tower is flooded with christmasy lights. swear to god, i’ve always imagined thousands of asian tourists flashing their photo cameras at the same time when that happens. it is kitsch and it goes hand in hand with all the little towers in all colors and sizes sold everywhere. you could not find a toilet in paris to save your life but you could buy 20 different eiffel towers while searching.

these thoughts where in my head for a couple of days. i decided to go to notre dame. somehow that cathedral always made me calmer and more understanding. but i went in and it was full of plasmas and noise. and when i came out, i saw this and it freaked me out. just near notre dame. i took some pictures and a short video. quite haunting.

well, here’s the thing. bucharest, our little paris, is still a young city. love, hate, fix still works. because of all the things it lacks it also still leaves us in control. we don’t have enough statues, and the ones we have are hidden by bushes and trees. we can cut those down. we are still clean. or at least cleaner. and smaller. we have taxis and all in all you feel safe at night and can find a place to grab a bite. we have cheap high speed internet everywhere. in paris i could not find a wireless in the fucking louvre. let’s say i want to see who degas is on my smartphone. or i want to read something in english about rodin. not a chance. we don’t have that many art galleries but we have artist and many of them fill the parisian ones.

somehow, from my trip i got the feeling that today someone like me can work from any city. i have my laptop, camera, and notebooks. i can fly anywhere, talk to anyone almost instantly. so why not live in a young city?