parismarisamadonna

Hurt – Christina Aguilera 2006

…I started to write this on National Sorry Day.

 When I tell people in Europe that I am Australian, and not American, and not English, and not German (it’s the thighs) they invariably ask one question first, do you eat Kangaroo?

I have eaten Kangaroo on several occasions, rarely because I actually chose it on a menu and even more rarely because it, like duck in France, is considered a local speciality. If I have eaten Kangaroo, it was out of necessity. As in… I was in a restaurant where they only served lamb or veal and I don’t eat babies. 

When I tell people in Europe that I am Australian they often ask me why I would leave the sunshine and move to a continent prevalent with snow and ice. I tell them it is because I an arachnophobic and there are no huntsman spiders in France.

When I tell people in Europe that I am Australian they never ask me why I sought refuge from the immigration riddled population of Australia, the indigenously overrun social state that is Australia or the boat people infested shores that are so eponymously associated with Australia. They don’t ask me because it is a question based on an idea that is largely unknown beyond the shores of the Great Southern Land or the pages of her populist media.

All white...

 

And trust me, if you want to live in a social state, France has you covered. In France, you can claim unemployment benefits of about 70% of your salary for up to two years. You can claim this from the government even if you resign from your job…willingly. You can also be given a couple of grand to start your own business, while you are unemployed. You can also go to the dentist without paying and get a new pair of eyeglasses every year. In fact, the fancy, lacy stay-ups that I am wearing to keep my tortoise blood running up and down my legs were largely paid for by someone other than me. Well not exactly, because I pay about 50% income tax, so I figure, I have earned some sexy, lacy stay-ups, even if it does feel a bit outré that the decidedly unsexy François Hollande gave them to me.

In Australia, there are essentially two media companies, Rupert Murdoch owns one, and the only information that is disseminated is information that will guarantee ratings, shock, horror and a knowing grimace from betwixt the brows of Tracy Grimshaw. There are only 22.3 million Australians, so alternative news agencies don’t flourish in quite the same way that they do in the UK or even the US. Unless you watch the Chaser, it is hard to access any kind of journalism that isn’t trying at the same time to encourage you to tune into the latest episode of The Voice.

So, in the interest of the public good, all the way from Paris, let me shell out some home truths. *

Unlike Turkey, Australia does not share a border with Syria. Australia shares no borders with anyone. People do try to ‘invade’ on boats, but they are not invading with rocket launchers, bayonets or mustard gas. They are ‘invading’ on dilapidated and unarmed fishing boats. They are ‘invading’ and duly met by the full force of the Royal Australian Navy with her warships, her uniforms and her orders to get thee to Christmas Island. As yet, I’m unaware of any boat people taking down the population of Northern Queensland with a suicide bomb. So let’s not call in the Starship Enterprise just yet.

Unlike Europe, Australia is not beholden to a common economy that hinges upon the financial well being of Portugal. In fact, thanks to the terrestrial resources of so much uninhabited space, Australia has remained relatively untouched by the economic woes of the older, Northern economies. Australia has not known such wealth in my lifetime; Australia can bake its gluten-free cake and eat it too. So why not share?

Unlike Korea, where native Koreans actually shoot each other across their own Korean border, the indigenous people of Australia have not yet taken up arms in defence of their native land. Unlike much of the old world, where praying to God, or Allah, or Buddha, or a statue of Liberace, warrants arrest, or ostracism, or torture, or death; originating from somewhere else dictates only what your last name is, rather than your right to be considered an Australian.

What Australia is, is a melting pot, a paella of myriad nations heralding from myriad places that has afforded her people, myself included, the opportunity to go and live elsewhere and discover what it is like beyond the sandy shores of the world’s largest island nation. Australia is indeed the Lucky Country. Australians are by nature of their remoteness upon this orbiting mass of silicon and iron, lucky not to be shot at on a daily basis. They are not beholden to a dictator or a religious zealot or a military regime or even Simon Cowell.

In a few weeks my third cousin, a cousin born in Australia, will marry his sweetheart in Malta, a country that not he, nor his father, but his grandfather was born in. My other cousins refer to their grandmother as Babcia, because they, like she, are part Polish. I live in another country thanks to the nationality that my now-dead father bequeathed me by chromosome; no guns, no war. That we are allowed to honour, respect and acknowledge our heritage and our ancestry is a right that we take for granted. And it is still far more honest than the thousands of Europeans who marry in Cyprus to better show off their tans in their Facebook photos.

But Australians in general are pretty shit at recognising this.

What Australia is, is the only nation in the commonwealth, now, or before, to have achieved Federation without civil war. What Australia is, is a nation made up of many, from far and wide. What Australia is, is unfortunately, a nation that initially flourished on the bleeding backs of its indigenous people and went on to ignore their very existence.

So it made me sad that this week that the totality of the “Lucky Country’s” media was wallpapered with a story that made my heart bleed redder than the shirt of the indigenous man concerned.

I am from New South Wales. I don’t really understand the game they play in Victoria that involves jumping on top of each other without the refereed order of a scrum. I am an Aussie who has never watched a complete game of Aussie Rules. But I know who the Sydney Swans are, I know that they won the Premiership and I know who Adam Goodes is.

 

Adam Goodes

 

Adam Goodes is an Aussie Rules player, he plays for the Sydney Swans and he is an Indigenous Australian. And this week he has become the poster boy for Australia’s new breed of bloke-y, mate-y, joke-y racism that makes me more afraid than huntsman spiders.

If you want to know what happened, Google his name.

After half a lifetime of explaining Priscilla Queen of the Desert, I am proud of my heritage. After seven years of defending the cultural significance of Crocodile Dundee, I am proud of my country. After years of being corrected for not using the word ‘shall’, I am proud of my dialect. After every Ashes loss, after Port Arthur, after the non-Kyoto treaty, after Baz Luhrmann making Great Gatsby in Sydney and not New York, after it all, I’ve held my head high. But this week I felt a bit shit…and not because of the 13 year old girl.

I felt a bit shit because everyone focussed on the girl…and everyone forgot that what she did was symptomatic of a much bigger Australian drought than a lack of water to feed the sheep.

So far away from the daily hell of so many impoverished others, so rich with reasons to be happy and so blessed with sun-drenched BBQs by the beach, Australia is starved of perspective.

Australians should be glad that they, and Adam Goodes, live in a country where he can become a national hero. Australia should be grateful that when people go to a football match, they aren’t X-rayed on entry, that women are allowed to watch… or even play. Australia should stare up at the steeples and the minarets and the Westfield branded towers and thank their lucky Southern Cross stars that until now, insults are devoid of fatality.

And like the little girl, Australians should focus on experiencing something that educates them, rather than reading their newspapers.

 

 

Not in bloody hell...

 

 

 

*I’m well aware that I will be criticised for having an opinion considering I don’t live in Australia, but in the same way that absence makes the heart grow fonder, seeing how the other half live makes you realise that maybe the grass isn’t greener…and a hundred other clichés to validate my argument.

Red Red Wine – UB40 1984

Usually, May is the best month of the year in France. Usually, the sun shines brightly as the days lengthen. Usually, the four public holidays* that we jam into the first three weeks of May allow for balmy hours spent lying on your back in blossoming parks (but not on the grass) sipping ice cold Rosé and reminding ourselves of how lucky we are to be in France. Usually, the strawberries that carpet every flat service by the door of every purveyor of fresh food are sweet, and red, and surprisingly cheap, because the little spotted hearts of juiciness have had months to ripen while lying under the sun of Southern France while Southern French farmers lay beside them drunk in awe at how lucky they are to be in Southern France in May. 

Usually.

This year, after the coldest March on record and non-alpine snowfall in April, May 2013 is proving to be rather unusual. There is heavy rain, brief spurts of sunshine, sub-zero mornings and rather notably, freakish hailstorms. This May, the weather is more than a bit shit. This May, anyone with more than 20 Euros to their name has booked a last minute flight to anywhere in search of sunshine and a temperature slightly above 10. It is even warmer in Edinburgh than it is in Paris.

So, wallowing in a slightly deeper sun-starved depression than I usually swim in, my May has become the month that everything broke…including me.

I have been visiting a blood doctor to try and ascertain the root cause of the alien foot’s propensity for remaining, at all times, 20% larger than the other, visibly more terrestrial foot.

First, a woman covered me with lubricating gel and ultra-sounded my legs; it would appear my veins are a bit slower than they should be. Officially, I am circulatory challenged. Then a man laid me down on a table and started jabbing a needle into my thighs. You see I have recently learned that you can make veins disappear. I always thought I was made that way and walking upon legs that resemble topographical maps of mountains were as much me as the googly eyes and the big mouth. In any case, do you think anyone is going to notice that my legs are veinless if one foot looks like it belongs to a rhinoceros? Still no cure for the foot, but I now own rather raunchy lacy stay-up support stockings.

While my blood might now speed like Lewis Hamilton, the bank cancelled my credit card. So again, everything stopped.

My bank, the world’s local bank, the one from Hong Kong and Shanghai, have cancelled my card three times in the last 8 months. They keep doing this, they have explained to me, because I have a ridiculous habit of spending my own money. More specifically, I have a ridiculous habit of spending my own money in countries that are not France. Sacré Bleu!

I’ve been told that I am a high-risk client because I travel so much. I am a high-risk client because I buy so much online. I am a high-risk client because I earn money, pay my bills on time and work very hard, often overseas, hence the requisite online purchasing. I just don’t have the time or the energy to go shopping. I am a high-risk client because I don’t write cheques. I am a high-risk client because I rarely pay with cash. High-risk, in France, means 21^st Century. 

Based on recent events, I am a high risk client when I am in a foreign country and my bank has cancelled my card, leaving me with no money and no means of paying for my hotel. I am a high-risk client when I am forced to go to the HSBC and scream at someone until they help me. I am high-risk because if I had a weapon of even microscopic destruction, I’d happily smash windows and break every single poster of a smiley HSBC person helping someone else because they don’t bloody help me. I am high-risk because I’m a little bit stressed, very overworked and without any access to my own money, I cannot feed my two glasses of wine a day habit. The very high-risk habit I have that affords me the placidity required to operate in normal, low-risk society.

So I have fibre-optically fast blood, but a slow, medieval, bank.

Then…on a sunny day in the countryside, my computer broke. After 5 years of faithful service, my little silver folder of love that keeps me company every day just would not wake up. She went to sleep grasping within her aluminium hands my photos, my music and most importantly of all, every word I’ve ever written. I’m not a complete fool, and am blessed to have The Painted Saint among my circle of intimate friends. When he talks tech, I listen, and when he said I should have a back up, I made sure I had a back up. But I still had to buy a new lighter, slimmer silver backed confessional…online. Just don’t tell HSBC.

One good thing did happen in May.

We had so much fun..we didn't even go there!

 

Taking advantage of Jesus Day and War Day and Another Day, I took off for a couple of days. I had no idea where I was going; I just knew that I had to be at The Body’s flat at 7pm with a towel and enough clothes for 3 days. I did make a point of remembering that I would be in Burgundy, place famous for making wine. I prepared myself, and my liver, for my own kind of hajj. 

The Body, who is half English and half German, is a pretty fantastic friend to have. Not only has she been kind enough to go and live in Dublin and Florence, then invite me to come and stay for the weekend, she also drives a red mini. I think all my friends should go and live in places I want to visit and drive cool little British cars so that I have something to do every weekend.

The Body unwittingly lives in the great heights of Bestest Friend in the Universe and then takes it a giant step higher. She has parents who own a huge house in the countryside, in the middle of a shitload of wineries. If Ryan Gosling were her brother, I’d quit my job and never leave her side. 

 

The Scarlet Chariot!

 

The Fashionista is also a good friend to have. She always looks fantastic, she has more style in her little finger than I’ve had in my entire lifetime and she speaks so fast, an hour spent with her is like a day spent with a normal person. Her speech, like her person, are compacted into a smaller than expected space, everything about her is more intense, more concentrated and inevitably, more stylish.

The Body loves music, The Fashionista loves Food and we all love wine. Cram all of that love into a red mini for the two-hour drive to Auxerre, and you’ve got the ingredients for a girly mini-break…just add Ibuprofen.

He said something about having to keep it for two years. I didn't listen.

 

I break into a sweat when my phone has to be switched off during a 2-hour flight. Taking the Tube, with its lack of phone reception is so stressful that I would rather walk, even if it were snowing. Spending three days in a place so hidden away from the rest of the modern world that I was deprived of 2G, 3G or anyG, nearly induced cardiac arrest after 3 hours.

Astonishingly, when soaked in a heady mix of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay the human body can adapt to almost anything.

No phone, meh. Broken computer, meh. I was still smiling. In fact, you could have walked up and king-hit me and I would have laughed in your face.

But what was the reason for my delirium of calm and happiness?

There were of course the copious flagons of wine. The Fashionista became a sort of barometer of inebriation for the rest of us. Her being so much smaller, we knew that when she started to slur, we should all stop drinking, (even if I didn’t).

The Cottage in inverted commas.

 

There were also the long walks in the countryside, talking to donkeys, gossiping and chatting, staring into the fluorescent haze of Canola flowers. There is also a particularly fantastic house just next to The Body’s cottage. Standing at the end of a circular driveway between a tiny chapel and a dovecote, I nicknamed it Pemberley. I was completely convinced that Colin Firth was going to appear, white shirt drenched and hair all mussed up at any moment. Again, the brain can conjure up all kinds of things when marinated in fermented grapes.

Pemberley..no Colin.

 

After careful reflection and the appropriate amount of time to allow my liver to regenerate, I’ve decided that the main reason I was so easily able to turn off for three days was that I was staying in a family home with someone else’s family.

The Canola - No Filter.

 

The Body’s dad, like my own, is British. He, like my own, tells the most ridiculous jokes and has nicknames for everything; coasters are doofers. The Body’s mother loves to cook and cater and lay a magnificent table for breakfast and both of them work in music. Sitting around a family table, with a mum and a dad, even if they weren’t mine, felt normal. It felt like coming home after school and hooking into a bowl of Spag Bol, while watching Degrassi and talking about homework. It felt relaxing.

 

Dinner!

 

No phone, no computer, parents and washing up. We could call it a retro-holiday. Pretend that you are 15 yrs old and forget the troubles of the modern (high-risk) world.

Just add wine.

 

A wine tasting...those French fools throw it out! Not I...

 

* Labour Day – the day French people protest in celebration of their right to protest. End of the War Day – the day French people do all but say out loud, we laid down and let the Germans walk all over us. Jesus went up in the sky day – the day French people are happy to forget that the Republique is secular and enjoy a day off from their hardworking, 35-hour week. Jesus went to Pentecost day – the day French people look at each other and wonder what the hell Pentecost means, but not for long, because after all, we are on a day off and can’t work too hard.

 

 

 

Fear – Sarah Maclachlan 1994

The definition of terrorism according to the Oxford English Dictionary:     

                        “The unofficial or unauthorised use of violence and intimidation in the pursuit of political                             aims”           

 

Terrorism, by definition, aims to frighten people, intimidate them and force them to acquiesce to the demands of their terroriser. 

Flying passenger aircraft into the tallest buildings of Manhattan or exploding cocktail bars perched upon the white sand tourist-filled beaches of Kuta, rest, morbidly, in the annals of our unfortunate history of terrorism. We have become accustomed to hearing about Jihad and Allah and the Qur’an as easily as we hear about The Voice or the political repercussions of the carbon tax. We’ve seen Damian Lewis on his knees with his arms in the air as he prayed, Claire Danes went crazy-eyed, and we’ve watched…

We’ve heard that women in Saudi Arabia aren’t allowed to drive. We’ve heard that Abu Qatada can’t leave England for fear of torture in Jordan. We’ve heard that women in France cannot wear a face-covering veil. We’ve heard that Barack Obama may or may not be sympathising with the Syrians.

We’ve heard it all. 

We’ve heard that Islamist revolutionaries want to teach us all a lesson. We’ve heard that evangelicals in the Southern States believe that Heath Ledger died because he glorified the life of a homosexual. We’ve seen the photos of the soldiers that have given their lives to keep us safe. We’ve seen the clerics that preach against a woman’s right to wear a bikini or terminate an unwanted pregnancy. We’ve seen that respected actors and DJs might be paedophiles. We assume that these same men, of all faiths, take advantage of numerous women, numerous times, in numerous ways, with, or without, the modesty of a face-covering veil.

We’ve watched Syrians on both sides decimate their own population. Or maybe we haven’t, depending on which news you watch. Some of us have paid attention, some of us haven’t. The Syrians haven’t yet taken to flying passenger aircraft into tall buildings, but maybe they will, in an effort to get their 15 minutes. 

We’ve watched as women were beaten, or ostracised, or stoned, or raped, or insulted and assaulted in every which way and said to ourselves that it won’t happen where we live. But it did.

We watched as men who lived in suburban towns, with suburban jobs owned up to hiding away their female prisoners in their suburban prison cells, in their suburban dungeons under their suburban homes and we said to ourselves, this doesn’t happen in our WASP-y neighbourhoods… even though it did.

And we said to ourselves, this wouldn’t happen in my neighbourhood. Not on my watch. Not while Jesus, or Allah, or Abraham, or Rupert Murdoch, or Richard Branson is watching over me. Not while I am too busy marching in the streets to protest the right of two men to marry, not while I am voting to protect the right that my country affords me to free dental. Not while my government is paying me a salary while I search for employment and certainly not while I am watching Simon Cowell destroy another teenager’s dream in the interest of better ratings for ITV. 

We said that we would not bow our heads to the demands of terrorists. We said that we would not cower in fear. Bush Frappuccino-ed our love for the hysterical with our need for the factual and said we would hunt them Dead or Alive! We sent our men and women off to foreign lands with guns and bibles. We had no reason to be frightened.

And then…on a day when no one was listening, and no one was watching: we did exactly what they wanted us too. 

We decoupaged the front pages of every publication, in every country, everywhere, with the picture they wanted us to see. A man, wielding a knife, hands covered in blood, hurling forth words that were translated for the benefit of the uninitiated, the uncaring, the uneducated, words that defined a whole congregation of believers as terrorists. Words that will forever be used to decry the mal of a religion rather than help anyone to understand what they faithfully and democratically believe. Whether we eat bacon, we wear a veil, we eat beef, we believe in polygamy or we believe in reincarnation, we are afforded the democratic right to believe that our God is great.

Why give a couple of freaks their 15 minutes? Is this not the same as bowing to the terrorist demands of the post-Sandy Hook NRA?

Why give more airtime to the perpetrators than to the victim? A victim, whose family wished him to remain anonymous, but were forced to acquiesce to the demands of a media happy government.

Why does our sensationalist media continue to bow to the exact expectations of the afore-defined terrorists?

Why don’t we devote more time to talking about feeding people…or housing people…or letting people who love each other get married…or FFS talking about anything other than the singular tragic act of two singularly tragic fools. 

Surely, the mass tragedy at a factory in Bangladesh should stop us in our H&M frenzied shopping delirium more readily than the photo of a man with a machete?

I pray to my own spiritual saviour that we will be more concerned by what is real and true for us all than what CNN tells us we should believe. I get down on my knees and I pray. I pray to all the gods…including Aries, God of war, under whose stars I was born.

I pray that we will focus on our neighbours, our families, our friends…I pray that we will stop reading our newspapers and turning on our televisions.

I pray that we will be brave enough to form our own opinions…without Rupert’s help.

 

 

 

The People in Your Neighbourhood – Jeff Moss 1969

For those of you that are not aficionados of all things felt, technicolour and googly eyed, this song featured on my all time favourite children’s’ television show, Sesame Street. Starring giant birds, talking frogs and microscopic people that live in a milk cartons in the window, Sesame Street is the second best thing to pop out of Jim Henson’s brain. Beaten only by the original The Muppets* and only marginally ahead of Fraggle Rock, Sesame Street was the home of the sexually obscure skivvy-ologists Bert and Ernie, a blue blob that stuffs it’s face with cookies, the numerophilic Count (mwa-ha-ha) and like their Muppets cousins, an anthology of catchy tunes.

To this day, as I count out 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12, I can still sing the rhythm of the song that plays as a giant ball jumps around some sort of psychedelic pinball machine. Joking with friends, I might spontaneously pipe a quick ‘one of these kids is doing his own thing’ when you see a weird looking youth in a pub. But the ditty that darts most frequently around my mind today is the one I hum as I wander up my local street. 

“these are the people in your neighbourhood, in your neighbourhood, in your neigh-bour-hoo-ood”

On the infrequent weekends that I am at home, my greatest pleasure is my Saturday morning wander. I’m happy for this to become my second greatest pleasure if the Butcher ever comes good on his salacious winks, but I will get to him in a moment. The day starts with about two hours spent in the lifting darkness reading the papers, reading blogs, watching videos, generally reminding myself that there is a world out there beyond the tip of my own nose… even if I experience it mostly in pixel rather than in person.

After I have managed to paint on the face that I washed way with Pouilly Fumé the night before, and wrapped something clean around my modesty, I head out into the wide world and I fais mes courses.    

As I wander down my local high street, the Rue des Abbesses, I wave hello to the same people at certain points along the narrow way. I feel like a little bit of a Rockstar as they wave hello, or on occasional, more intimate instances, kiss me on the cheeks. It’s always the same handful of people; they know me for the big hair and red shoes but most especially for the invisible Australian Flag that flutters above my head as I walk. I know them for the little pieces of sunshine they bring to my life, or at the very least for their contribution to my rounded tummy and wobbly thighs.

During this hebdomadal promenade, I am reminded that despite living in Paris, France’s largest city and Europe’s second, I am known, I am at home, I am safe. The faces are familiar, the repeated rhythm of my steps is comforting and the world is rendered a little less chaotic, a little less cold, a little less unbearable.

So here they are… the people in my neighbourhood.

 

Samir..working hard

 

First up, just as I pass by the Place des Abbesses and the metro station that spews hundreds of inert tourists proffering maps onto the little remaining open space, are the Tunisian brothers who own Au Verger des Abbesses. 

Samir and his brother and Tariq their cousin and the multitude of sons that work there during holidays when they are not studying somewhere, else are the second most famous greengrocers in Abbesses; the first being the fictional pair that featured in Amelie ^. Their family know mine intimately. They ask after my mother and my sister, whom they got to know during their stays in Paris, in fact they followed the Art-sist-ologer’s pregnancy with almost as much interest as I. More recently, they ask after Sapphire and Smack, the little people they bribed with free strawberries each time I went there to buy “kids bananas”.

 

Tariq..filling up my caddy for another week.

 

They’ve taught me what grows when, what it is called in french, which apples are crunchiest and why French people prefer clementines to mandarines (no seeds). They correct me if I get the LE or LA wrong on a vegetable, they show me photos of Tunis and I show them photos of Sydney. They almost always give me a free bunch of parsley and they drive the most interesting truck you ever did see.

I had noticed, but never bothered to ask why, that every single fruit truck in Paris is daubed with a mural graffiti. The Smartarse, curiouser and curuouser than I, had me ask them why. Rungis, the massive central market in Southern Paris from whence all fresh produce is sent out into France is full of trucks every morning from 3am. Robbed of safe places to paint and practice their craft, the street artists of Paris took to the enormous carparks of Rungis guaranteeing themselves an endless supply of fresh canvases and the cover of early morning darkness for safety.

 

The Truck.

 

Next door to Samir is Marie, the cheese shop (let’s call her my dealer) who has only just opened and next to her is the Chemist.

I don’t know their names, but they are husband and wife. They know me well; they remember me with a leg coated in plaster and a feeble aluminium crutch holding me upright. They taught me how to job a syringe full of blood thinner into my upper thigh. They remember me buying illicit substances in bulk to send home to Australia. They remember measuring the alien foot for my sexy support socks. They remember absolutely every detail of my medical history since I landed in Montmartre. 

A particularly special moment was when she asked me ‘how I was going’ after handing over a fresh box of drugs that keep me sane. I hesitated to say, ‘I’m fine, I just take anti-anxiety pills because being interrogated by strangers makes me anxious’. Even so, given they actually take an interest in my health, I count on them to keep me healthy more than the Hannibal-esque misogynist of a GP I am obliged to visit next door.

 

The Chemist..I would love to know why there are no green crosses in Australia.

 

After the Chemist I wave across the road to Stephane, Murielle, Lucie and Vincent, the hairdressers at Profession Coiffeur. They are the lovely, if over-theatrical, crowd to whom I have entrusted the maintenance and care of the Kate Bush that sprouts from my scalp. They are directly across the road from the Greek Guy who sells me hummus and semi-dried tomatoes, a Greek Guy who is always shocked that I say hello and thank you in Greek, a Greek Guy who gets my money each week because it is impossible to find pita bread or haloumi in a generic supermarket. Pita bread is, you see, exotic.

A couple of shops down from the Greek God of chickpeas is the home of my most entertaining purchase of the week, Boucherie Jacky Gaudin. Jacky and his band of Merry Men are widely believed to be the best butchers in the quartier.

 

Veal Brains, Rabbit thigh and Lamb Kidney..but wait! There's more!

 

Filled with naked contortionist birds#, the street-facing window appears to be a funeral home for poultry (their still-attached heads bent around plump breasts in supplication). While the queue to be served wends its way beyond a standing rotisserie oven that is home to even more dead, if slightly warmer, rotating birds. Entering via the glass front door, passing the passport posted on the wall that details the provenance of all the different dead things, is the interior display case. 

If the outside has all the horror of Freddy Krueger’s tribute to chicken, the inside is the Evil Dead of offal. Little brown kidneys, tubs of bloodied brains and a giant slab of veal liver vie for poll position with the traditional logs of loin. There are dried sausages dangling from the ceiling along with giant metal plates awarded to Jacky in honour of his ability to kill and then dissect a five-star joint of carnage. They laugh at my ever-wider eyes as they carve up something’s right leg in front of me, you would think I had become accustomed to it. But just last week, they offered me a glass of water as I nearly passed out in shock at a gutless, skinless lamb that just caught my eye as it was cradled in the strong arms of Guillaume.

 

Guillaume..and something's entrails

 

Aaah, Guillaume.

Guillaume is a rather strapping example of manlinees who with his father, Guy, might be the only people in Abbesses who follow Rugby…not counting me. Each week, I am subjected to jibes and jokes at the expense of the land I love simply because we lost…again. Each week they offer to sell me Wallaby, usually followed up by some comment about how they’d be better barbecued than trying to catch a ball. Each week they make fun of me for not being able to say magret properly. Each week I watch Guillaume flinging his giant butcher’s knife around in front of his carefully tied apron and wonder what giant things the apron hides from view. Each week I wonder what it might be like if he trussed, tenderised and spatchcocked me rather than the pale yellow bird on the bench.

 

 

Guy... behind a trellis of phallus

 

Essentially, despite the fear of seeing an actual lamb actually sacrificed in my honour, I still go to the butcher so I can stare into Guillaume’s big brown eyes while he debones my duck.

Should the opportunity to get roulade with Guillaume ever present itself, I would pay a pre-purchased visit to Laura, the Baker’s daughter, to whom I pay very large amounts of money to pour hot wax over my nether regions… but never after noon.

My Saturday lunchtime’s are sacrosanct.

 

The view above my table at Le Miroir ... marginally less nauseating than the Butcher

 

Regular visitors to my life on these pages, or even to my actual life, are familiar with Le Miroir. There have been some changes over the last year, some for the worse and some for the better. The food is still exceptional, the service is getting back to where it was and each week I entrust my digestive tract to the dynamice duo, Sebastien Squared.

Seb, the one who cooks, is spending increasing amounts of time on the floor, so I’ve gotten to know him a lot better. He is trying very hard to set me up with someone who’ll cook for me. He recently invited me to the party for the birth of his daughter. Seb, the one who gives me wine, is the new guy out on the tiles. His enthusiasm for art and design are matched only by his enthusiasm for a hairdo that is bigger than mine.

Like a dimly lit independent play, this little drama unfolds in a space only 5 blocks from my door. It features a small cast of reliable performers. Like Much Ado, I know the story inside and out, but I will pay to see it over and over again. I happily hand over the fruits of my fruity labour for the opportunity to smile, the opportunity to be entertained and the certainty that I will be delighted.

 

 

Something delicious with Scallops.

 

* In related news, I could write another War and Peace pledging my love for The Muppets and hence my manic obsession with Jason Segel, especially 4.26 minutes into Forgetting Sarah Marshall…

^ It is a real greengrocer!

# The human variety is just down the hill at Pigalle