Member-only story
In addition to French, schools should teach us how to eat soft boiled eggs: Americans would be much better Europeans that way.
I write this at a Le Pain Quotidien — a ubiquitous chain I’ve been to in New York. I’m here because it’s convenient, because I’m killing time before my train to London. Last night I had a wonderful night in Paris; but moments of real joy or connection or peace while traveling are fleeting. There’s always wake up, check out, move on — keep consuming. (And not just while traveling, in general.)
Consuming Europe: the title of every American’s spiritual guidebook. I just saw an American hold a loaf of French bread get her photo taken by her friend in front of this Le Pain. Do they realize this isn’t an authentic place, and that that bread is just a generic loaf they could get anywhere?
Montmartre isn’t a village in 1900: it’s Brooklyn with better optics and a prettier accent.
Real Parisians clearly take care to hide their real lives from intruding tourists; as a New Yorker I should know — my brain automatically filters tourists from my landscape.
I remember a remark of Simone Weil’s that the American victory in the war was as…
