Читать книгу Our House is Definitely Not in Paris - Susan Cutsforth - Страница 7

While an apartment in Paris is precisely that, and so like no other in the world, it was nevertheless not quite the one of our dreams. It was, in fact, the site of a grande rénovation. Now, why shouldn’t that have surprised me? After all, is our life not one huge construction site? We renovate at home; we renovate in France. In fact, even when I spent a year living in Istanbul, the year Stuart and I met and married on the banks of the Bosphorous, my flat was on a building site. When I got a job teaching English for a year in a private school, before my departure, I imagined the windows of my Turkish flat would overlook a bustling, lively market that I would slip out to for warm pide bread for my breakfast and Turkish delight in the evening. There would be minarets on the horizon, the call of the muezzin, winding streets full of culture and history. Non. It was a building site in the suburbs far from any cafés or exquisite cuisine. And so it would seem to be the case, several decades later, in Paris.

The surreal adventure starts on arrival. First, I gasp in horror when the concierge ushers us into a petite lift the size of a small suitcase. I step back in alarm and simply refuse to get in. Naturally, Stuart bravely ascends, carrying his luggage, despite the shock of the miniscule lift. Part of my mind is registering how very French movie-like it all is. Have we not all seen the films? The heavy wooden door leading in from the boulevard, the courtyard, the concierge whose door bell you ring,