“If only we'd had a dining table and more than three chairs.”
In a previous episode, I acquired a social life and scene based around things happening in the Latin Quarter on the left bank. But it became increasingly inconvenient to make my way home back up to my little room in a side street up North. Catching the last subway home could be a bit stressful. The only real landmarks close by up there, were the two big railway stations for which I had no need.
It was all a bit ‘Metro, boulot, dodo’ (commute, work, sleep) but with extra metro.
Then I found myself working with a guy called Joe, who had long straight black hair, brown skin, a cheeky grin and very outgoing manner. He was not a musician, but unlike myself at the time, he knew he was very attractive to some of the nice tourist girls who walked around in pairs, and he made the most of it. We were a good team when working the metro and above ground too, so it was practical to get a twin room in the cheap hotel near Odeon where several of the Malaysian buskers stayed as well. Thus I had made my transition from the North to the Latin Quarter. That episode with Joe lasted for many eventful weeks, and ended up with a couple of French girls who actually had their own apartment! What’s more it was just off the Boulevard St Germain, so that was very handy.
The two girls were kind of short, very french and cute, always giggling about something, wide eyed and full of optimism. The postponed revolution from 1968 with the current police repression was just a temporary setback. Our time would come again, and it would be soon. This time we, ‘nous les jeunes’, the young people, we will win and everything will be changed forever. They worked as typists by day, and spent their time off wearing embroidered hippy smocks and enjoying the youthful gathering spaces around quarter such as by the fountain, outside Notre Dame and along the banks of the river and Pont Neuf.
The flat itself had been inherited from Eveline's parents at a fixed rent that couldn't be increased and was decades old. This meant virtually nothing to pay out for living costs, but also that no maintenance had been done for the same duration. There was hardly any plumbing and no heating, but genuine French windows opened out fully onto the access courtyard below. Behind us was a fire station, hence the weekly loud exercises. Four spacious square rooms and a little kitchen housed a small gas cooker. Joe taught me how to cook rice with tinned fish, Nadia made spaghetti bolognaise and if we had little steaks, Eveline would cook frites.
As creatures of habit, there would always be ham and cornichons to start, dressed green salad with the main dish, and camembert with yet more baguette to finish. Towards the end of the month though, things might be more frugal, like just the pasta with no sauce, or simply a plate of peas.
On Sundays we'd often go to a little Algerian restaurant and have a big family couscous with Nadia's brother who had just been discharged from National Service. It was always the same restaurant, just like families have their own cafe where they consume coffee and croissants for decades and wouldn't ever dream of going to a different one. Farid had learned to drive tanks in military service and thought he would soon get a driving job, and move on.
Although we had all originally all met just outside the Cafe Mazet, or maybe it was on the Pont Neuf bridge, anyway the girls seemed to disapprove of the scene in the cafe and this caused a tension between us. Joe and I still liked to go back there and hang out with the buskers, bohemians and underworld characters. It was finally resolved by Joe moving out, but I stayed put. We were now down in core number to just the three of us and remained so for a long and stable period. I was living day to day almost entirely in the French language by this point. We watched Columbo dubbed on the little TV and feature films which were always both preceded and followed by long philosophical discussions by a panel of experts and celebrities, encouraging similar discussions at home as well. Through immersion, the girls were also teaching me to become fluent in using the old Parisian slang words and phrases, but I would never be mistaken for a native speaker. Too many giveaways.
I wasn't going out busking every day any more, but I was learning new songs from the record player and from songbooks. I started composing at a higher level, and writing lyrics in English to fit the new tunes.
Eveline then hooked up with a sort of weekend boyfriend Jean-Pierre, who also had a best friend Jean Luc, so sometimes there were five of us - and a car! The 2CV took us out into the countryside and even to the coast. Jean Luc was a big fan of music, and he encouraged me to play a lot more, then he started getting tickets to wonderful gigs all over Paris. Only he and I were interested enough to make the effort, but we saw all the touring British prog rock bands in beautiful theatres and big halls. Van der Graaf Generator, Gentle Giant, Genesis, Roxy Music, Soft Machine. No Pink Floyd or Captain Beefheart for some reason, but some rock bands as well: Tom Robinson, The Who.
Nadia and Eveline, although originally from Brittany and Algeria were thoroughly Parisian in upbringing and had loose connections with various old friends we might bump into when wandering the streets for amusement on a fine day. So it wasn’t unusual that we'd suddenly get an invitation to a party in the suburbs or something like that.
I remember one when we had been tasked with contributing one item of food. Eveline decided we should make a traditional rabbit stew just like her Breton parents used to make. We instructed the butcher to leave the head on, and came back to collect the order on the appropriate day. Bought all the root vegetables and green herbs in the weekly market, down in the little square where the infamous guillotine once operated! (Maubert Mutualite) and two litres of ordinary white wine. That’s Vin de Table, in the returnable bottle with the stars and and a plastic cap. Collectively cooking the rabbit in mustard and making the ultra slow cooked stew made for a really joyful day, which clearly made a big impression on me as I have been making this very recipe as my signature dish ever since! Of course there was no way we could transport the huge cooking pot to the actual party, so we just took a portion along and enjoyed the rest over the next few days at home, wonderful farmhouse country cooking in central Paris. If only we'd had a dining table and more than three chairs.
To be continued.
To backtrack on previous parts of these serialised writings, it may be helpful to start here:
Friday March 22nd
A preview of the show being prepared for Ventnor Fringe festival
That’s at MusicCraft, Newport, 98 High Street. 7pm
Your chance to be among th first. Full details and booking from:
https://thelittleboxoffice.com/andyroberts/
Happy Mothers Day and Wales vs France
See you in the Wheatsheaf 3pm.
Andy