Living in Paris 5

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Living in Paris 2009-10
No.5

New Year’s Day and a deep silence pervades in rue de la Corderie. Most of the shutters and blinds opposite remained closed until well past midday. It is grey and cold and attempting to snow. Last night (known here as the Réveillon de St Silvestre) we took Mark’s daughters, who are staying with us, down to the Seine after dinner. Notre Dame was wonderfully illuminated and some rustic musicians in medieval attire were encouraging a handful of people to dance under a giant Christmas tree. The Left Bank was ablaze with lights and streaming with people ‘just like Blackpool’ said Hannah. We sought refuge in Café Panis opposite Notre Dame and found a table overlooking her just in time to order a bottle of champagne before midnight, rewarding the waiter with a small glass for getting it opened and poured with seconds to go. He then announced the New Year to everyone present who looked up, clapped, gave one cheer then resumed their table talk with no further ado! A few muffled explosions could be heard from down below on the Seine and a couple of pink sparks shot up as far as street level but otherwise no excitement, just a very cheerful atmosphere of goodwill which extended onto the métro when I set off home around 1p.m. leaving Mark and the girls to explore Paris by Night which they did - until 7 am!

The same relatively low-key festivities prevailed on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day - everywhere is beautifully lit, even the Mairie which has garlands of lights in every window and banks of heavily decorated trees in its courtyard. However, you do not hear Christmas music anywhere except in the churches, the chief focus being firmly on good food and drink. Indeed, the only shops that appeared to be doing a busy trade were food and wine shops, all the others, in spite of lovely window displays, seemed very quiet with quite a few displaying the sign ‘Baille a Céder’ (Lease Available). We entered into the spirit and ordered our foie gras from a neighbourhood restaurant that we like (taking it home in a bin liner as they had no bags and it melts if you hold it!), queuing for an immaculately boned and rolled guinea fowl stuffed with cèps and a designer bûche de Noel (Christmas log). We were recommended to buy the latter from a ‘grand patissier’, being assured that it was worth saving up to do so! We went to Pain de Sucre in rue Réamur a day in advance to inspect their bûches which varied in flavour from pistachio and green tea to blackcurrant and chestnut and were very dramatically coloured and shaped. (We dithered but settled on a deeply chocolaty one which consisted of a small Swiss roll filled and covered with ganache, abutted by two large plaques of bitter chocolate, all decorated with gold leaf). It needed saving up for but it was very, very good). I have never experienced such an easy Christmas dinner to prepare in my life - it took me about 20 minutes to put some vegetables to roast in the oven and cook the sprouts with bacon and toasted almonds, every thing else had been wonderfully prepared by someone else and it was all utterly delicious. We have the impression that Parisians will spend a lot of money on quality but that they buy smaller quantities than the English (meaning that they are ready for more the next day - there were queues outside the two bucheries, the poissonerie and patisserie on Christmas Eve, Christmas morning and the 26th!).

Before Christmas we held two parties. Although we live in physical intimacy with at least 20 other people we rarely see them, only hearing them on the wooden stairs at the beginning and end of the day. Their names (but not their flat numbers!) appear on the10 letter boxes in the hall way and so we put an invitation into each one for an English Christmas drinks party for the 17th December. First delighted response was a phone call from someone on the ‘rez de chausée’ (ground floor) which could only mean the occupants of the little blue shuttered premises (see Living in Paris 1) to the left of the entrance to our building which we were unaware was part of it, there being only a rubbish cupboard and the letterboxes otherwise. Then came two charmingly worded written replies accepting ‘d’être à vos côtés avec grand plaisir’ and a curt one from someone who was not ‘disponible’. Another phone call followed from someone who sounded very mystified but curious enough to accept and that was it (apart from two more replies a week after the party…). We made a large saucepan of mulled wine and lots of mince pies and waited to see what would happen. First to arrive on the dot of 6.30 pm were Corinne and Cédric from behind the blue shutters bearing beautiful flowers and chocolates. Teetotallers both, they sported a great number of tattoos and piercings between them and explained that behind the blue shutters is a tattoo parlour with a basement and a cellar below (for the 7 dogs?). Disconcertingly, Corinne talked about Cédric (approximately half her age) as he stood placidly but silently at her side and said confidentially that they may marry one day. Later, Mark had a lively and very informative conversation about the ins and outs of piercings with him - the tattooing seems to be Corinne’s role. Then came Florence with 6 year old Jeanne with pigtails and round spectacles from upstairs (father Fabrice, a stomach surgeon, arrived later) and Jean-Marc and Philippe from across the landing. The vin chaud flowed and the noise level rose. Philippe, a flamboyant character whose emploi we never quite fathomed, soon had a red moustache giving him a diabolic air as he entertained Jeanne wonderfully for most of the evening either bouncing her on his feet or telling her stories whilst Jean-Marc described their flat as being ‘très éco’ on two storeys with wood and clay walls, saying we must come and see it…we can’t wait. We were fast discovering that 9, rue de la Corderie is a complex corner building on 7 floors (if you include the ‘caves’) with some flats turning the corner on one or two levels! Then Laure arrived (the mystified caller) who doesn’t live here at all but has a two storey office next to us (she says we must come and see it..). I couldn’t quite make out what everybody thought of one another, especially of the tattoo parlour owners but nobody was in any hurry to leave and four other people we have met here struggled through the snow from further afield to join in including a French Canadian landscapist ( who I mistook to be a water colourist - ‘paysagiste’ can mean both of these) married to Laurence from my Thai Chi class. He creates public spaces all over the world and his great hero is Lancelot Capability Brown! His passion is gardening and tomorrow he will be delivering 3kg of Jerusalem artichokes and a large section of pumpkin that he doesn’t know what to do with - nor do I but it is too good an offer to refuse. I have no idea where he grew them. The building feels much friendlier now we have held a party in it and we are delighted to have such an interesting selection of neighbours.

We are discovering that the French love to share the source of their supplies of good food and wine - we have smoked trout fillets from Brittany in the freezer and a cubit of declassified Château Neuf du Pape in a corner of the living room. Other things they love to order (‘faire commander’) are honey and coffee. For festivals it is common practise to order homemade foie gras (as we did) or smoked salmon from your favourite restaurant. The Potager des Oiseaux* held a pre-Christmas Saturday lunch party in the snow with a barbeque for sausages and a cauldron of mulled wine set on a primus stove. I took homemade mince pies along and was immediately asked to email the recipe around to all the members after they had carefully cut them in half so that they would go round, devouring them before eating their sausages. We love the way the French tuck into good food at any time without any hesitation and with such pleasure - they are truly ‘gourmand’!

On Christmas Eve we took ourselves to the Place de la Concorde and the Champs Elysees to see the lights which were stunning - stretching right up to the Arc de Triomphe. At timed intervals, garlands of tiny pale blue bulbs sparkled in all the trees with shooting stars descending amongst them. On the hour the Eiffel Tower, dressed in a robe of silver lights, shimmered and spangled in the background.

We had dinner at Robert et Louise in the Marais - very few restaurants are open for the Réveillon (Christmas Eve night), the staff are all at home celebrating ‘en famille’ - which made no concessions to the festival (except for a short string of fairy lights wrapped around a drain pipe behind the bar) but which had the cheerful, relaxed atmosphere of people on holiday.
On the way home I went into our nearest church, St Elizabeth, for part of midnight mass (Catholics come and go during this service) and was in time for the sermon and the procession to the crib when the baby Jesus is laid in his manger. Everyone then sang ‘Il est née le divin enfant’ before returning to their seats. I was struck by the serious and sombre atmosphere of this service, so very different to an English Protestant midnight service - it would be hard to imagine the French belting out O Come all ye Faithful or Hark the Herald Angels Sing in such a setting. It felt as if the beginning of a life of sorrow was being acknowledged rather than a joyous birth celebrated. We opened our presents at midnight in true continental fashion with all the candles lit on their wrought iron candelabra in the fireplace.

After the Christmas and New Year festivities (with five days warmly spent in between in England with family) we retreated to Corsica where there was rain and a dramatic thunderstorm instead of snow but where we were very snug in 'our' little appartment built out over the sea, waves crashing beneath. The village, quiet and friendly in winter, was pervaded with the scent of woodsmoke and the trees glowed with clementines and lemons. Easy Jet cancelled all the midweek return flights which meant we extended our week to ten days, arriving back just in time to welcome a great friend, Alfred, to stay for the weekend. It was only when he left that we felt that the Christmas holiday had finally come to an end - on the 18th of January!


* the tiny communal allotment which I have subscribed to, next to the Marché des Enfants Rouge on the rue de Bretagne - see Living in Paris 3.

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Photos

Champs Elysees
Christmas lights

Eiffel Tower
All lit up

Candles in fireplace
La Reveillon

Mark and Julia
The easiest Christmas dinner ever!