Ne me touchez pas! Part II
No one knew what was going to happen next, least of all me. I had just finished Alistair Horne's Seven Ages of Paris, and I wondered if Parisians were still capable of the caprice that had led them to revolt at the drop of a hat in the past. Here was an injustice, and the possible culprits looked like they might be of Algerian descent. As I understand so far (not very well, honestly), Algerians and Arabs in general are villified more than any other group by the comparatively tolerant Parisians. It was an Algerian Islamic group that had gone on a bombing spree in Paris twenty years earlier, killing several people at Metro stations, in fact. So what's going on here?
I was only connecting the dots, and there weren't many dots. It would be like a Frenchman in America, who spoke poor English and didn't know our history, trying to tie together Bobby Seale-Vietnam-Kent State-Watts-Columbine into something coherent. I decided this little subway tiff wasn't going to be a major event.
To make sure, I looked at faces around me, trying to gauge the situation. There were a lot of them. The train still hadn't arrived, and I had been there ten minutes. It was getting very crowded. Crowded enough for...a revolution?!?
I caught a glimpse of the screaming man, a black man in his late twenties. He was handsome and well-dressed, which was relieving for two reasons. First, he seemed mentally stable, not given to unpredictable outbursts like maybe unloading an Uzi into the crowd or pushing someone onto the tracks in front of an oncoming train. Second, he probably didn't want to mess up his fab outfit getting into a fight with these kids. I think he just wanted to be heard.
Some of the faces I saw betrayed a little worry, though. I mean, it was a slightly volatile situation, right? But the group of young, chic black girls next to me giggled and rolled their eyes every time the man barked out his accusations. Perhaps they were too young to appreciate the history of racism in France. But wait, didn't African-Americans flock to Paris in the 1920s to live in a more tolerant atmosphere? Sidney Bechet? Josephine Baker? Why did the white people in the Metro station look worried? Okay, nervous white people, outraged young black man, Arabs potentially making racist comments...okay, it's a...uh...race thing, I guess. But rich black girls laughing off the whole thing, obviously class is trumping race, here, but...um...wait...
Okay, screw it. I have a lot to learn about race and class in France. Or maybe there's not much to learn, and I'm just hung up on it because I'm American. "Surely you must make life difficult for each other based on wealth and skin color! How else will you determine your self-worth?"
Finally, as the platform was starting to fill up beyond capacity, a light appeared in the tunnel. Crisis averted. I could get on the train, have a few laughs finishing the Sedaris book, and be home in time to watch the Eiffel Tower blink itself to sleep.
As the train pulled into the station, every single person on the platform groaned. The cars were packed to the gills. Merde.
I was only connecting the dots, and there weren't many dots. It would be like a Frenchman in America, who spoke poor English and didn't know our history, trying to tie together Bobby Seale-Vietnam-Kent State-Watts-Columbine into something coherent. I decided this little subway tiff wasn't going to be a major event.
To make sure, I looked at faces around me, trying to gauge the situation. There were a lot of them. The train still hadn't arrived, and I had been there ten minutes. It was getting very crowded. Crowded enough for...a revolution?!?
I caught a glimpse of the screaming man, a black man in his late twenties. He was handsome and well-dressed, which was relieving for two reasons. First, he seemed mentally stable, not given to unpredictable outbursts like maybe unloading an Uzi into the crowd or pushing someone onto the tracks in front of an oncoming train. Second, he probably didn't want to mess up his fab outfit getting into a fight with these kids. I think he just wanted to be heard.
Some of the faces I saw betrayed a little worry, though. I mean, it was a slightly volatile situation, right? But the group of young, chic black girls next to me giggled and rolled their eyes every time the man barked out his accusations. Perhaps they were too young to appreciate the history of racism in France. But wait, didn't African-Americans flock to Paris in the 1920s to live in a more tolerant atmosphere? Sidney Bechet? Josephine Baker? Why did the white people in the Metro station look worried? Okay, nervous white people, outraged young black man, Arabs potentially making racist comments...okay, it's a...uh...race thing, I guess. But rich black girls laughing off the whole thing, obviously class is trumping race, here, but...um...wait...
Okay, screw it. I have a lot to learn about race and class in France. Or maybe there's not much to learn, and I'm just hung up on it because I'm American. "Surely you must make life difficult for each other based on wealth and skin color! How else will you determine your self-worth?"
Finally, as the platform was starting to fill up beyond capacity, a light appeared in the tunnel. Crisis averted. I could get on the train, have a few laughs finishing the Sedaris book, and be home in time to watch the Eiffel Tower blink itself to sleep.
As the train pulled into the station, every single person on the platform groaned. The cars were packed to the gills. Merde.
posted by disappearingink at 1:21 AM
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