Paris: A tale of two cities

A photograph of Bronze medalist Bolade Apithy of Team France reacting during the Men's Sabre Team Bronze Medal Match on day five of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 at Grand Palais is projected as part of Parisienne Projection on July 31, 2024 in Paris, France.  Image: Hector Vivas/Getty Images
 
There is no chatter, no discussions either. Even the AirPods and headphones have run out of juice. Exhaustion is apparent on the few faces onboard this Paris Line 9 Metro train to Mairie de Montreuil on a Thursday night around 9 pm. Even the rush hour trains and metros are empty. There is hardly any traffic on the roads, no one scurrying to catch a metro or a bus, no speeding cyclists brushing past pedestrians, no animated working lunches and cigarette breaks along the Seine, no usual swarm of tourists around the Eiffel Tower, Louvre, and Notre Dame, and no snaking lines at the city’s swathe of luxury stores—barely any tell-tale signs of a gorgeous Parisian summer.  
 

Then again, there is a non-stop rush of people around Grand Palais, Trocadero, La Concorde, Roland Garros and the Stade de France constantly checking directions on their cellphones, reconfirming what their phones display with volunteers, thousands of whom have been deployed across the City of Light. There is talk of medals and records, and, of course, there is wine, cheese, onion soup and tartare being ordered around.
 
It is the best of times, it is the worst of times, it is the Olympics. And Paris these days is, indeed, a tale of two cities. One where the fans are out having a good time (without any beer, wine or alcohol at the Olympic Games venues). And the other where most of the city’s constant population—the Parisians, the visiting fashion conscious and wealthy shoppers, gourmands and tourists, who always give Parisians a compelling reason to complain, are all missing. The city has never been emptier and its roads, despite the multiple Olympics-related closures and diversions, never been so easy to drive through. 
 
Right from the day the French capital was awarded the Summer Games, Parisians have been clearly divided. There were the enthusiasts who were thrilled at the chance of watching the world’s grandest festival of sports and those who felt the city could have done without the extravagant expenditure ($9 billion is the estimated cost).
 
Locals say the warnings about travelling fans during the four weeks of Olympics and Paralympics, travel disruptions due to closure of several key metro stations for crowd management and multiple road closures and diversions for events such as cycling, race walking, marathon and triathlons for security reasons scared away a big part of the city’s population. Alexis Delori, 25, who handles internal communications for the a national scouts group and usually gets very busy during the summer because of holidays for teenagers, locked up his flat and took a train to Provence a day after the Olympics opening ceremony. Translator and artist Roberta Anino, 36, chose to care for a pet in Berlin instead of getting caught up in the Olympic mess she had anticipated. “Several companies have given people time off or the option of working remotely for the 40 days covering Olympic and Paralympic Games,” says Tanmay Garg, 23, an investment banker with Societe Generale, who is among the few who still has to go to office in Paris.          
 
Even the shop and boutiques around Opera, Haussmann Saint-Lazare and La Marais are hardly witnessing any footfall these days. “Everyone has left Paris for the summer holidays and because of the Olympics,” said the manager, shrugging his shoulder, at Heroines Republique women’s clothing store on Rue Beaurepaire, a popular shopping spot among residents.

Tourists pose for a photo with the Eiffel Tower in the background in Paris on August 4, 2024, during the Paris 2024 Olympics games. Image: Olympia DE Maismont / AFP
 
The high-end Paris regulars, who come to enjoy the fine French cuisine, wines, spirits, cheese, luxury brands and the high life, have also stayed away this summer forcing cab drivers like Oussam to put his apartment on holiday rental to visiting Olympics fans. “The clients whom I used to take around to the most exclusive stores, restaurants and clubs around the city have given Paris a wide berth this summer because of the Olympics. They are the kind who would want to avoid chaos at all costs,” he said. Even the cafes and bars around Opera and Champs Elysee are largely empty these days—something seen only during the early post-Covid days. Even the Louvre is without its trademark snaking queue.

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On the same timeline, there are the Olympics and its fans. Millions from around the globe have flown in from everywhere. Supporters of Team USA make up the biggest chunk, like every single Olympics since fans became all important. Thousands of Indians who study, live and work in France and the rest of Europe have descended on the city to catch some badminton and hockey action. Shuttler Lakshya Sen’s semi0final loss to Denmark’s Viktor Axelsen witnessed a large number of Indians—including those who had flown in from nearby Switzerland, Sweden, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium and, even, the USA—in the stands on Sunday. Many were willing to pay the premium on the black market to snag a ticket last minute after Sen had secured his spot.  
 
Despite the big numbers and venues spread out across the city, the fans are mainly concentrated in the middle and are usually spotted around the competition venues and on the transit system only before and after the game. The fan zones in the centre such as the Parc de Champions at Trocadero near Eiffel Tower and Hotel de Ville attract the biggest numbers and getting into one of these locations can be a challenging as well as time-consuming affair.
  
Parisians who are still in Paris are most likely fans who want to soak in every bit of the Olympics action. Like Parisian Sylvain Tartes, 30, who is watching 22 events, is volunteering and also running the first-ever open marathon at an Olympics; the others are working, most likely for Olympics-related jobs, that they cannot get away from. Tartes has spent more than 3,000 euros on tickets alone and has also spent a fortune on collecting limited edition Olympics stamps, Paris 2024 special edition plastic cups in which Coca-Cola serves its drinks and more. After having spent his hard-earned money, he is also going to trudge through the 42 km official Olympics marathon course on August 10 in “5 hours hopefully”, he says.
 
Both these worlds exist in parallel and intersect for a few minutes every day when the locals who have remained in the city are forced to share the metro with Olympic fans dashing around from venue to venue to catch the action. 
 
It’s working at one level, but Paris doesn’t feel like Paris the world has known for the longest time now.