Paris - meet André, Luis, José and Amélie...

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Uff, what a flight. I do open my eyes, the light in the cabin is bright again. After a day with meetings in Nice, I finally made it back to Nice airport, catching a Easyjet flight to Paris Roissy Charles de Gaulle airport (what a name…). I got a seat in row one, sitting just in front of the flight attendants. For take off, they take their seats and start chatting in French. I close my eyes, just for a moment… When waking up again, we are going through some heavy clouds, but the two French guys are offering croissants and caffee au lait in the usual, professional way. It is already dark outside, nothing can be seen, so I close my eyes again and wait for our decent to Paris.

Paris - city of love…

I remember when I was here last time. I flew in from Francfort, staying the night at an Ibis hotel to continue my journey to Mumbai the next day with Air India. I didn’t have enough time to go to the city centre last time, so I decided to come here again for some days of plaisier and here I am.

The aircraft touches the ground. “Madames et monsieurs, bienvenue a Paris Roissy Charles de Gaulle Terminal Trois…”, the name seems to grow every time being spoken. Leaving the aircraft, I am quickly on my way to the train station to go to the city centre. How funny it is to see that local trains all over the world are the same. Stopping at every train station, strange people do enter and leave the train. I think again about the aggressive demonstrations in Paris they have shown on television the last year. And the explosion in local trains in Madrid the year before. And now, I sit in a French local train, heading for Gare de l’Est. A German in Paris. I feel excited.

I do travel a lot, but usually I am able to speak the language of the countries I do visit. This time it is different. I do not know anything of French (ok, French kissing is an exception!) and I know that they are not the best in English - don’t even think about German! I haven’t been in such a big city abroad for a long time, I do not feel francophile at all, but I want to see, feel and smell this city to have the chance maybe to get a litter bit closer to the way of life of the Parisienne.

Next stop: Gare de l’Est, get out of this train! I walk to the hotel to meet my friends who joined me from Malta for this weekend. It is not cold at all this evening, so it is really a pleasure to walk through the streets of Paris. It seems to be a quite neighbourhood. Only few people are in the streets on this Thursday evening. I pass by small bistros and restaurants. On the other side of the street I see a ‘alimentation’ which seems to be a small grocery store that offers everything your might forget to buy, but will need in the evening.Ten minutes later I enter the Best Western hotel in the 10th arrandissement of Paris. The receptionist is an Indian, shaking her head when she sees me.

“Good evening Mister”, she says and I start remembering immediately my India-for-24-hour-adventure, “welcome to our hotel. Please sign here, and this, Mister, is your key.” I look at her, but after a second she realized my strange look which again I do realize, because she starts getting nervous. I look down on the form I have to sign. In my mind, hundreds of Indian girls in traditional clothing are doing a perfect Bollywood show. “No”, I tell myself, “this is over. You are in Paris now, sing Edith Piaff’s ‘Je n’regrait pas rien’ or France Gall’s ‘Elle la Ella’, but no Bollywood!” Thanks. The girls in my head do stop singing and dancing and leave the stage. Curtain. Darkness. Just a spotlight I can see now in the middle of the stage, a bar stool and a white guitar. “Oh my good, whats happening now?”, my next thought is, but it is too late. Nicole with ‘Ein bisschen Frieden”, then Nana Mousskouri and finally Paola are on my mind’s stage, singing, dancing, giving a good show.

I take my key and take the elevator up to the second floor. When the elevator door opens, the hall looks almost like in a small English hotel, colourful curtains, carpets and wallpapers, but the patterns won’t fit at all. My room is at the end of the hall, I open the door and the room is as I have expected in a small hotel in Paris: really petit and cosy, a window to the back yard which is used as a car park and only French television available.

I lie on the bed, tired, but still excited. I want to close my eyes just for a moment, but it’s too late. I fall into deep sleep, far away.

Saturday.

It is early and I cannot wait to leave the hotel. I have a hot shower, jump into my jeans and am out of the door. I walk to the nearest metro station and do enter the world under Paris. Waiting at the platform for the next train bringing me to I look around. André Rieu smiles from a big billboard, smiling as he does from his concert announcements in Brussels, Cologne or Stockholm. He shows white his violin (only his teeth are whiter) and makes everybody believe that after visiting one of his concerts, this world is full of peace and love. André still watches me when the train enters the station almost in silence - later I see that the trains of this line do run on rubber wheels. I enter the train, it’s almost empty, finding a seat and close my eyes. The train leaves the station and disappears in the darkness of the tunnel that connects one station with another. Warm, sweaty Metro wind enters through an open window and reaches my nose. Again, the smell reminds me of my trip to India, uff again I try to get rid of this thought. The train rides in the darkness, it reminds me of the Metro in Santiago de Chile (I think, they used the same technology there). It reminds me as well of the Metro in Madrid, but, I do miss the automatic station announcement like in Lisbon: “Proxima estacao, MARQUES POMBAL - hay connecao com a linhea amarilha” (you see, my Portuguese is not so good).

Seven or eight stations later, I leave the train at “CHALETET” station. I meet André Rieu as well, he still smiles and looks at me from the station’s wall. I leave the platform, go up the stairs, around a corner, another set of stairs up again, some more corners a gate to leave the station and the last stairs. I already can see the sky with clouds and can smell the fresh air that fights to enter the station. I am out, standing in the middle of Paris. Now, I have a look on the map that I took from the hotel. First stop: Notre Dame. I turn left, walk down one block, cross a street and the river Saine. Then I stand in front of this church.

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