Woke up to flickering of trees at the balcony. The sun rises in my room. Something prevents me from closing the curtains in Paris…. a phobia of some sort .. an anxiety of separation from Paris, a fear of missing out. Our airbnb is on Mont Martre. Mont Martre is hill overseeing Paris, with the Sacre Decoer at the center of this hill. Streets draw circles around it and layers, and we are at the first layer after the church. Although we are on the first floor, but our balcony looks at the top of the buildings beneath us on the second circle. The tree tops reach our balcony. We can touch them with our hands. It is rare that you get to touch the top of a tree if you are not a bird or dreaming.
I don’t know what depression hits me when I am about to leave Paris. Perhaps because I am someone else in Paris, who I like. I am a writer… a poet…I would say a philosopher, but I hate philosophy. I glide over the streets like I am floating. The walls know me. They are alone when I am not here. I feel like an adopted son when meets his biological mother here. She has her life, and he has his, but there is a sad bond that we both avoid to talk about. She is exhausted and so am I. It makes her bitter that everyone is here but me. The streets are filled with them, but I am her son. They all see her, but she only sees me.
I write as if no one will read, nor do I want anyone to read this. I publish because vulnerability is the essence of writing, and without publishing, it is not vulnerable. But I wish nobody reads, because it is too personal, and who wants to read anyways when there is TikTok.
We got a fresh baguette from the closest boulangerie and a piece of brie cheese from the closest fromagerie, and some olives from a Tunisian grocery store owner, and sat in the park behind the basilica eating. Abe fed the pigeons again. He is fascinated by his ability to condition them fast, and he looks around to see if others are sharing his fascination, but in Paris, no body is fascinated by any other. The place has a spell and presence, that make us almost invisible in it.
After we were done, we walked back to the apartment and rented bicycles (Lime) and drove them down to Eiffel tower. It is Abe’s first time, and he must visit it. All the grass area was seiged. There were heavy presence of police and what looked like army. Long lines were in place to go up the tower. The sky was cloudy, and african immigrants roamed the place selling chinese souvenirs and wine. We walked to a nearby coffee shop and patisseries and they were very bad and commercial. Restaurant servers tried to pull you to their restaurants from the sidewalk.
Then we took the bicycles again toward the Champs-Élysées, where we are scheduled to have dinner with the famous and huge Arab Poet and thinker, Adonis at 7PM. We reached the avenue at about 6PM, which gave us an hour to walk around. I entered a fragrance shop called ….. and the girl from Argentine, who knew Pablo Neruda, greeted us and showed us the perfumes. They were all between 200 to 400 euros, which means I will never buy them in my life. But nevertheless, I took the tour of smelling all the various sections, from the smoky and wooded, to the floury to the citrusy and fruity.
From Dior to Louis Vuitton … walking all the way to the Arc du Triomphe, strolling on the Champs-Elysees is a conflicting experience. I don’t like luxury or luxurious attitudes. For me, it doesn’t matter what level of wealth I have, if I am traveling in a plane, I will not travel First Class. I can’t stand the feeling of sitting down on a wider seat while others pass by you to their chicken coups and looking at you. Also, who cares about 5 inches extra and is it worth double or triple the price of economy class? If the First Class seats are reduced to economy, perhaps there every seat can have an inch extra. At any case, I don’t like luxury nor does it make sense to me. I understand fashion, but fashion should be accessible, not selective.
The number one real estate location in the world is 1 Champs-Elysees Avenue, which is Qatar’s embassy. With the price of that embassy, you could have empowered a million non-profit and civil Arab organizations that would change the Arab world. Nevertheless, I still appreciate them owning a valuable monument that will forever appreciate in the foreseen future of our world.
I watched as the Door man let people in and out of Dior. It is walking into a dream. It is beautiful, but inaccessible… inspirational, but unreachable. But there must be Dior in the world so there can be fashion. It is the divine of fashion that all other fashion strive towards. This avenue is the capital of merchandising. It is the epic of what the graphic design and commercial art have produced. It is a show of strength between these brands, that represent much more than a company for profit … Versace, Cartier, Boss, Gucci, Armani; They represent dreams of women and fantasies of men. They represent the tension between classes and the disorientation of the conscious of capitalism.
There was a gathering of some sort at the side of the Qatari Embassy…it looked like it is for veterans. The presence of armed forces under the Arc was noticeable. Protests usually start from there, so it is understandable.
At the end, we walked to the Ajami to meet Adonis.
Wissam Charafeddine 