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Place de la République, Paris, January 2015.

We were Charlie.

.

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Who are we now?

© 2015, Gary Lee Kraut

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Wishing you a bright and joyful holiday season.

Enjoy the ride as the new year comes ’round again.

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They passed in front of me as I left my building. They were walking at the time. I walk just behind them to the end of the street. At the corner they stopped, smiled at each other, recited the final lines of Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot”—Well, shall we go? / Yes, let’s go—and set off on their jog.

I took this picture just as they pushed off, the man two steps ahead of the woman.

They appeared to be 25 to 30 years old and looked well enough together to be a couple enjoying the weekend together, or perhaps a brother and sister. But no matter the relationship, what’s most surprising, particularly viewed with American eyes, is that they were together at all in these t-shirts.

I only saw the t-shirts from the back, as you do here. The man’s reads le monde a besoin de philosophes (the world needs philosophers) and woman’s reads oui à la vie (yes to life).

Oui à la vie/Yes to life (not to be confused with the British cancer support association of the same name) promotes itself as a traditional pro-life pro-family organization, while professing the world’s need for philosophers would appear more at home in the affirmative pro-choice camp.

If these were Americans, I would imagine the man as member of the graduate softball team at Vassar, and the woman on her way to a Santorum rally in Oklahoma. If they ever came to Paris they may have enough of a chemical or cultural connection to start flirting in the line to go up the Eiffel Tower, but I doubt they’d caucus long enough to wake up and go jogging together.

I don’t read into this any particularly virtuous tolerance on the part of Parisians. I’m simply struck that these two, in their somewhat opposing t-shirts, should look so happy to push off together after reciting the final lines of “En Attendant Godot” (“Waiting for Godot”).

Vladamir: Alors on y va? (Well, shall we go?)
Estragon: Allons-y. (Yes, let’s go)

But something held Vladamir and Estragon together, too, didn’t it?

I am reminded of another line of that play:
Voilà l’homme tout entier, s’en prenant à sa chaussure alors que c’est son pied le coupable.
“There’s man all over for you, blaming on his boots the faults of his feet.”

(c) 2012 Gary Lee Kraut

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Paris’s annual Motor Show, Le Mondial de l’Automobile, opens on October 2.

Like many Parisians I don’t own a car. The city offers many alternate means of transportation (metro, bus, Vélib bikes) and getting around on two wheels is definitely the most effective over short distances in this fairly compact capital.

My foreign friends often tell me how surprised they are to see cars parked so tightly along the street. They attribute Paris drivers with uncanny virtuosity when it comes to parking in tight spaces.

The red Citroën 2 CV (called the “deux-chevaux” in French, meaning two-horse) is the first to have caught my eye a few streets from my apartment. When I returned the following day to photograph it, several neighborhood residents came up to me and said “She’s a beauty, huh?, and she starts right up.” Several days later, also in my neighborhood, the sight of a Diane blue Citroën gave me the idea to create a blue-white-red automobile, colors of the French flag, on the occasion of the Motor Show. I found the white one outside of Paris.

Le 2 octobre s’ouvre comme chaque année à Paris le Mondial de l’Automobile.

Comme de nombreux parisiens, je ne possède pas de voiture. La ville me propose toutes sortes de moyens de transports alternatifs (métro, bus, Vélib) et le déplacement en deux-roues est incontestablement le plus efficace sur les petites distances… et comme Paris est une capitale peu étendue…

Mes amis étrangers se disent souvent surpris de voir les voitures garées le long des rues, très serrées. Ils attribuent donc spontanément au conducteur parisien une virtuosité hors pair pour se garer dans un mouchoir de poche.

C’est la 2CV (on dit deux chevaux) Citroën rouge qui a la première retenu mon regard à quelques rues de chez moi. Quand je suis revenu le lendemain la photographier, des riverains se sont approchés : « Elle est belle, hein ? et elle démarre au quart de tour ! ». Quelques jours plus tard, toujours dans mon quartier, c’est une Diane bleue Citroën qui m’a donné l’idée de construire un bleu-blanc-rouge automobile à l’occasion du Mondial. Mais c’est hors de Paris que j’ai trouvé cette 2 chevaux blanche.

– Photos and French text VNP. English translation GLK.

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