French Leave

by Liz Ryan

  The man’s smile was comforting, even encouraging. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said, ‘happens all the time. We’ll find your car. You leave your friend here with the trolley, hop in with me, and we’ll go look for it.’

  Phew. Hurray. Merci merci merci, monsieur. And merci again for not pointing out that the rows are numbered. What kind of moron doesn’t note that they’re in row 4567893/AKG/DFX/201?

  ‘So,’ he enquired, as I climbed in beside him, ‘what kind of car is it?’

  Well hey, that’s easy! It’s a Renault!

  ‘Uh huh. Okay. That narrows things down. There can’t be more than a couple of thousand Renaults here. And what colour is it?’

  I can answer that too! It’s lime green!

  ‘Right. Admittedly lime green is a popular colour, but the registration is …?’

  Why, the registration is … ah. Well, you see … oh, dear God. With rapidly rising panic, I realised I hadn’t the faintest idea what the reg was, except that it ended in ‘76’. But then so did nearly every other reg on every other car, since ‘76’ stands for the département Seine Maritime, population four million. It was a bit like standing in Athlone, peering up to Donegal and down to Cork, saying ‘I know it’s here somewhere.’

  ‘Oh. Hmm. Well, why don’t we drive round for a while, and maybe you’ll … um … just … sort of … recognise it?’

  So we did. Round and round and round, for what felt like hours, up and down row after row, through section after section, in growing silence and grim despair, inspecting dozens, hundreds of lime-green Renaults, even stopping to try the zapper on some of them in the futile hope that – ah! Hurray! Suddenly, belatedly, I remembered the carte grise, the logbook drivers have to carry at all times in France. It was in my wallet, and the reg number must surely be on it.

  Yes, it was. Plus, with another flash of the blindingly obvious, I remembered that the car also had an ‘IRL’ sticker on its back window. Surely there couldn’t be too many of those?

  Heroically, the security man didn’t yell ‘Why didn’t you think of that before, you pathetically stupid but typical foreigner!’ Instead he revved up from first gear into second, scooted round for only another fifteen minutes or so and, hey presto, there was the green Renault with the ‘IRL’ sticker. I experienced one of those movie moments when the hero and heroine run in slow motion from opposite ends of a beach into each other’s arms.

  Incredibly, the man wouldn’t take a tip for his trouble, brushed off all attempts at thanks and even smiled cheerfully, making me blush with shame as I thought of all those remarks people make about the French being unfriendly. This one couldn’t have been nicer, nor possessed of more saintly patience.

  ‘Now,’ he said, ‘do you remember where we left your friend?’

  No. Of course not. It seemed such a long time since we’d left her, in some other county, or even country, that she might well have been abducted by aliens by now. Adopted and taken home by kindly strangers, or eloped to Gretna Green…anything seemed possible at this stage. I had to concentrate even to remember what she looked like.

  ‘Then get in your car and follow me,’ said my saviour. ‘I’m pretty sure it was somewhere near the north entrance. We’ll soon have you reunited with her, and your shopping.’

  And he did. There poor Véronique eventually was, sitting on a bollard in the dark, huddled against the cold, clutching the trolley and looking resigned to spending the rest of her life in this outer wilderness. Our day of hedonism had turned to hell, and I knew it would be a long, long time before we ever went shopping again.

  Back home (hallelujah!) a few nights later, there was a programme on television about shopaholics. It was a disease, they asserted, and nothing could cure them of it.

  Oh yes it could. A day in a French hypermarket complex could, and almost certainly would, cure them of it permanently. Aversion therapy. It would leave them whimpering for mercy, screaming at the mere sound of the words centre commerciale.

  It could be argued that such a shopping binge saves money, because it will be a long time before you can face it again. But, inevitably, Christmas eventually rolled around once more and, recovered from her ordeal, Véronique suggested another excursion. ‘Let’s go to Paris, just for the day, to see the lights.’

  Okay. Just for the lights, then. No shopping, no spending. And not before mid-December. That would be fine, she said, because in France Christmas didn’t start in October. Lights wouldn’t be twinkling until the festive season was actually in sight. The big stores wouldn’t be dressing their windows so early it would only annoy everyone. Mid-December would be perfect.

  And so it was: a twinkly, frosty morning that felt Christmassy as we set off on the train. French trains are affordable, comfortable and punctual, and you can park free at the station in reasonable expectation of your car being intact when you return. Furthermore, your journey is unlikely to be interrupted by the ‘wrong kind’ of snow, or leaves – or anything else – on the tracks. (Of course, as we saw in the last chapter, there is the occasional suicide, and Thursdays are prone to fairly regular strikes.) Our train promised to have us in Paris at precisely 9.58, and that was exactly what it did, quietly and painlessly.

  Two minutes later, a church bell was striking ten and we were standing in front of our first Christmas window, belonging to Printemps, filled with dancing elves and singing pixies and flurries of snowflakes, teddy bears trudging off to work with little silver shovels over their shoulders, demented dolls swinging on trapezes, teetering on tightropes with manic grins: all the fun paraphernalia that Parisiens are accused of being too snooty to enjoy. All I can report is that hundreds of them were thoroughly enjoying this, hustling their muffled, chirping toddlers up onto the viewing walkway, laughing and chatting with no evidence of snootiness whatsoever. And then, up to the top floor for morning coffee, because Printemps has a terrific terrace with a stunning view over the city, all for the price of an espresso. In summer, you can sunbathe up there; on a winter evening, you can watch the Eiffel Tower light up and sparkle as the whole city turns into a twinkling jeweller’s box.

  But today we had resolved not to buy anything in a department store. Today was a day for individual shops, starting at Fauchon with its gilded pyramids of plucked pheasants, salmon studded with black caviar, glazed fruits in rainbow colours like edible jewels, mocha macaroons dusted in chocolate … its Christmas windows are enough to make grown epicures weep. (Especially when they glimpse the price of the truffles – per kilo roughly on a par with heroin.) If you have to choose just one art gallery to visit in Paris, let it be Fauchon. And yes, be a shameless tourist and whip out your camcorder. If anyone grins, you can always say you’re Japanese.

  And if you have to choose just one street, head for the Faubourg St Honoré, because even if you can’t afford a stitch of Hermès, it will cheer you up to see their handbags being made, along with gorgeous gloves and all the other lovely leather goods for which they’re famed. Yes, you can visit their boutique, along with those of Galliano, Gucci and Chanel, without feeling obliged to buy anything. You just go in, smile politely, inhale the intoxicating aroma of money and stagger back out, swooning.

  And then you look up at all the shimmering swags of white lights, and you are struck by the most brilliant idea: let’s have a seasonal glass of pre-lunch champagne at the Café de la Paix, beside the Opéra. Yes, pink. It is Christmas, after all! Or should we go to Les Deux Magots and pretend to be Juliette Gréco? Only one glass, though, because you didn’t come all this way to lapse into a coma. At least not before you’ve been to O & Co. on the Ile St Louis to buy olive oil to give everyone for Christmas, or browsed the quais for old prints from the hinged bookstalls, or had a stroll around the Marais where the smell of garlic and salami permeates the very walls.

  Lunch, when you’ve finally earned it, has to be a proper festive treat, at La Coupole or La Fermette Marbeuf, or – great on a budget – Chez Clément on the Champs Élysées, snuggled in amidst the trees th
readed with their thousands of blue lights. Or of course you could go up to La Tour d’Argent for your pressed duckling (they’re all numbered and the millionth was ceremonially served to Jacques Chirac), but don’t blame me when you get the bill. Legend has it that, in 1870 when France was at war with Prussia, the chef raided the zoo and served up elephant soup along with other, er, unusual dishes. However, you might prefer to order the Claudius Burdel soup, which – like the Billybi soup at Maxim’s – is so perfect it seems almost criminal to eat anything else afterwards.

  After lunch, if you insist, there’s a Christmas market at Les Halles, just beside the church of St Sulpice, which shot to fame as the site where Silas did his thing in The Da Vinci Code. Or an even bigger market at La Défence, packed incongruously into the plaza amidst all the gleaming steel and glass architecture, its fabulous arch illuminated in white. But as we weren’t great fans of Christmas markets – how much glühwein can anyone drink, how many gingerbread men do you really need? – we went instead to the Rodin museum to see The Kiss and The Gossips, two sculptures guaranteed to make you sob. (Well, is it Christmas, or not?) And then it was nearly five o’clock, and Paris was suddenly shimmering in that misty-blue way it does, and we decided to do the most unforgivably touristy thing and take a bateau mouche trip down the Seine.

  Okay, laugh if you like, but I’m sticking to my guns here: when you see Notre Dame’s golden glow rippling on the indigo water, when you turn round just in time to see the Eiffel Tower start to shiver and sparkle (on the hour), when you look at La Conciergerie and imagine Marie Antoinette spending her last Christmas in her pitch-black cell behind its ghostly white façade … well, you’ll be glad you’re not in Oxford Street or Henry Street, snapping up the last of the fluorescent Santa hats. If the bateaux mouches are delicious on a sunny summer morning, they are truly memorable on a haunting winter’s evening. We felt very proud that, so far, we’d done hardly any shopping, and were inclined to do even less.

  Naturally, you can go shopping if you want. You can wear yourself to a frazzle whirling round Galeries Lafayette – admittedly, their Galeries Gourmet section is very tempting – and Zara and H&M and all those international chainstores the entire length of the Boulevard Haussmann. You can purr your way down the Rue de Rivoli, or rummage on the Rue St Antoine … but why? Why not just buy a bag of chestnuts from a street stall and wander round the Marais, or the Tuileries, or the Luxembourg Gardens, especially if they’re filigreed with frost? Or go to the Hôtel de Ville to watch the ice-skaters gliding between the fountains … Paris isn’t called the City of Light for nothing, and you’ll remember your magical evening long after you’ve forgotten what anyone gave, or got, for Christmas. Besides, you can always do your shopping later, when you get home to your own village – which, after all, is hardly likely to be short of books or perfumes or regional foods, or whatever else you might want. A pre-Christmas trip to Paris would in fact be ruined by serious shopping, by zooming round frantically ticking off a list; in December, the shops are merely a pretext for a gorgeous girls’ day out. (I mean, the day is gorgeous, whatever about the girls.)

  We could have stayed forever. But unfortunately, we now had our return train to think about, which just left time for a cup of hot chocolate. Not any old chocolate, though: chocolate laced with brandy, in Hemingway’s bar at the Ritz. Why? Because the Ritz is on the Place Vendôme, which blazes with beauty after dark, and because anyone can – contrary to popular belief – sashay into this divine hotel, the only credential you need is confidence. And because the oak-panelled Hemingway bar makes the most deliciously snug end to a December day out; once you are installed in your leather sofa you may well have to be winched out of it. Our hot chocolate came heaped with whipped cream, and we watched all the brazenly fur-coated plutocrats’ wives tottering in with their glossy bags and perfect parcels, and saw a coiffed spaniel sipping tea from its owner’s saucer, and goggled at some Russian woman’s ruby bracelet (it could have illuminated Pigalle), and had a thoroughly, addictively good time.

  Damn. We knew we should have booked a hotel, and stayed overnight. Only not at the Ritz – at least not until we win le gros lot. Once again, we found ourselves in need of pyjamas, sleeping bags and a tent.

  17.

  Summer Swallows

  It’s nice to know that your friends will not forget you after you move to France. Especially for the first summer or two, you will in fact see quite a lot of them, arguably more than you might do if you were still in Ireland. You become quite adept at quick changes of bed linen and the proud owner of at least thirty bath towels, thirty sets of sheets, thirty assorted spare jackets, sweaters, pyjamas and tennis shoes, six hairdryers and innumerable mobile-phone chargers, since virtually all your visitors forget theirs and no two are ever alike. You know the schedule of every market in every village by rote and you buy so much wine you feel like getting a T-shirt printed up: ‘No I Am Not A Lush, It’s For Them’. Your shelves fill up with maps and guidebooks and mysteriously abandoned neckties, you amass tons of Barry’s tea and learn to keep a stack of Jiffy bags on standby for posting home the specs, keys, earrings and numerous other forgotten items.

  Some of my visitors were horrified by their first sight of Normandy, ‘when you could have chosen the Côte d’Azur, or Biarritz, or even Paris!’. There was some veiled suspicion that I’d picked this outpost – the French equivalent of Roscommon or Leitrim – specifically to annoy them, to frustrate their plans for lazing by the pool. I have no pool, and no plans for one; pools cost a fortune to run, and besides, what’s wrong with the beach or the garden? Yes, admittedly the beach is a bit stony, but you just wear Crocs. And admittedly, mine is the only garden not frothing with hydrangeas, but let’s face it, gardening will never be my forte, anywhere.

  So, some people pout a bit at first, but then everyone slowly starts slipping into the Normandy pace, gradually getting to like the lack of glitz, to enjoy not having to dress up for everything, to become quite contented, actually, lazily picking at a salad with a glass of rosé or five, idly listening to the hypnotic drone of the bees foraging in my battered banks of lavender. Some start looking round and murmuring: ‘Mmm, this is so relaxing. Maybe it would be kind of nice to have a little holiday home somewhere in this area?’

  Eventually, some even start visiting Pierre Yves the estate agent, enthusing about cheap air fares, about orchards and coves and cottages, renovations and satellite dishes, markets and French lessons … though this last scarcely seems necessary. Pierre Yves reckons that France will soon be operating entirely in English, and I reckon he could very well be right. Next there are visits to glamorous Deauville – hmm, expensive – to fishy Fécamp, to thatched longhouses and flint townhouses, and Pierre Yves smiles at the growing frenzy of it all.

  ‘I hope your friends will find somewhere to make them happy. And I hope they know what they are doing, because 60 percent of foreigners eventually leave, you know. They tire of doing up houses, tire of the sun, run out of money. Their schedules change, their children want to go to Florida … Normandy is very lovely, but it is not very trendy.’

  Triumphantly, he beams. For him, not being trendy is a major plus. For Pierre Yves, happiness is built on four simple pillars: ‘being healthy, loved, relaxed and solvent’. He doesn’t want disgruntled clients overstretching themselves, and I suspect he doesn’t want to see his lovely landscape turning into St Tropez either, filling up with sports cars and platinum blondes on mobile phones. Although this would no doubt make him richer, he seems to feel that he earns enough. ‘At lunchtime, I close my office, I go home and see my wife, I enjoy my children and my garden and my pets … no amount of money can compensate for stress, for life zipping by in a blur.’

  However, we continue to visit properties, and then my friends fly back to Ireland to think about them. A week or so later, I come home one day to find the phone ringing, but my hands are full, so it takes a message.

  ‘Bonjour vous avez un nouveau message du zéro z�
�ro trois cinquante-trois seize dix-huit dix-sept quatre-vingt dix-neuf pour écouter vos messages faites le trente-et-un zéro trois ou si vous souhaitez rétourner au menu principal faites le—’

  Aiieee! Of all the media, the phone is the most difficult to master, since you can’t see the person at the other end, can’t deduce anything from gestures or facial expressions, or ask the mystery caller to slow down. Especially not when, as now, there’s nobody there. It is merely a recording, which wants me to dial 3103 and listen to whatever news has arrived from Ireland.

  ‘Hiya!’ chirps a familiar voice. ‘Great news! Get the kettle on! We’re on our way to buy our house!’

  And sure enough, in jig-time Séamus and Kate have arrived, signed the papers and finalised the purchase of their holiday home. Just a little place, to unwind in at weekends. Peace and quiet, a nice view, a barbecue, a spot of wine. Simple stuff. Within a month, the house is habitable, painted and furnished. They can even pick a pear or a chestnut off their very own trees, if there’s time.

  Because, while the house is affordable, the one thing they are slightly short of is time. By the end of a normal week in Dublin, they have between them worked a hundred hours, sat in twenty hours’ worth of traffic, done ten hours of paperwork, repainted their living room this month’s colour, supervised fifteen hours of homework, cooked for an army, visited elderly parents, flown to London and back on business, attended four receptions, a birthday party, a conference and a dinner party, and been to the theatre to see That Thing, Whatsit by Whosit. They don’t realise how exhausted they are, but it’s clear as soon as they arrive, translucent with fatigue: Kate instantly falls asleep on the sofa, while the only thing keeping Séamus’s forehead out of his dinner plate is the relentless ringing of his mobile phone. But, heroically, he outlines his plan for their first weekend in their new French home.