After having spent almost three years in London and now five months in Paris, one would almost forget that there’s still something we used to call ‘home’ back in Belgium. Home is a wonderful place where I grew up in absolute happiness. I remember the green open spaces of my hometown were I would just lie on the grass and watch the clouds pass by in absolute silence. It’s also the place where our family and closest friends live, the people you could never imagine not having around forever. But still we chose to move to big cities, to live in very small spaces and to share parks with thousands of others whenever we want to lie on the grass. This also means meeting new people from all around the world every day and discovering whatever life has got to offer. There are great sacrifices on the one hand, great rewards on the other.
Once in a while the two worlds collide. One weekend in June Louise was in Venice for work (eating ice cream and buying shoes), so I took the opportunity to invite a bunch of Belgian football buddies for an “old-fashioned training camp”. They’re not really the type of guys that get a kick out of travelling. They’re most comfortable playing football and grabbing some beers afterwards. I was surprised to see the general enthusiastic acceptance of my invitation. The ‘no wives’ - bit in the invitation might just have done the trick. 5 of them would come and crash in our tiny flat for a weekend. I set some basic ground rules and reminded them to bring a mattress and perhaps some beer if they were looking to booze a little. When I picked them up at the Metro stop close to our flat on Friday, they were to be heard and seen from a distance. Each of them was carrying a heavy bag. They did not bring mattresses; they did not bring towels or clothes. They brought beer. Over a 100 liter of cans of Jupiler, Belgian’s finest lager. As these cans were significantly heavy, they started drinking them along the way, getting themselves nicely toasted even before arriving. I was happy to meet them as I knew them back home, unaffected by the big city. As they marched into the flat on the 5th floor we were soon reminded that we were not partying in our local backyard but in a building which was inhabited by hundreds of people. After that first excitement two of the heroes crashed and fell asleep into each others arms. The others went for their first pita of the weekend (we would round up with our 4th pita on Sunday evening). Whilst eating our midnight snack on a bench, one showed up with a toilet seat he amazingly found lying around. Yes, it would be an interesting weekend.
On Saturday we woke up pretty early – sleeping on a wooden floor does not stimulate lying in. I got some baguettes for breakfast, we filled a bag with beers and we were on our way. As for some it was their first visit to Paris, I wanted to show them at least the essentials. We walked along the Seine, Notre-Dame, the Eiffel-tour, the Louvre, the Marais, Montmartre (Moulin Rouge) and Sacre-Coeur just to name a few. On our way we bought beer wherever we found some to clench our thirst. When the active part of the day was over, we went to a pub to see some world cup games or just chilled lying in the grass (at the Eiffel tour) or listen to live artists in Montmartre. The Paris experience was complete. As we opened the windows of the apartment on Sunday morning and I put on some classical music (as I like to do on Sunday mornings) the neighbours were welcomed with a mix of Tchaikovsky and Belgian humour noises. And then it finally happened: the door bell rang, somebody was at the door. I expected some angry French woman (we heard some angry cries the night before) but to my surprise it was our neighbour from upstairs, Bertrand, I met the other day. This time he was not stoned, just a slightly bit drunk and asked if he could join the party. I welcomed him and reminded him of our previous encounter – which he did not remember. The Belgians were glad to share some beer with our new friend and performed a live whipping act (yes, leather vs flesh) to his complete amazement. We ended up visiting his flat, meeting Wolfie (his ginger cat) and listening to some Vive la fête music. Apparently Bertrand is a professional bass player who has worked with the best (Interpol) and knows the lead man and woman from Vive la fête pretty good. Cool stuff. We left Betrand to get our lunch at restaurant Casa di Naktel close to our flat. Casa di Naktel is the best restaurant in Paris: great food, great staff, great price. In the end, my football buddies went home happy. Happy with their weekend in Paris, to have seen the city, to have met the people, to have drank over 100L of beer but also happy to go back to their wives and sleep in their beds in their cosy comfortable little town. The pleasure was all mine.
