I have been to the right bank

A recent discord on Postfix@Arielsakura featured Dans Le Cafe De La Jeunesse Perdue (Dans Le Cafe De La Jeunesse Perdue), a book by French-Jewish novelist Patrick Modiano , the book mentions that the coffee shop where the group of college students are staying is on the left bank, @陈姸名 asked if there is a clear watershed between the left bank and the right bank? Therefore, I wrote this article on the basis of the theme.

In my impression, the Left Bank is a place where academic institutions and well-known universities are concentrated, and there is a feeling that "people who work on the Left Bank are more artistic". On the right bank, there are luxury brands, high-end nightclubs, and bankers...a sense of sight like the Wolf of Wall Street ? But that's probably the most extreme part of saying, walking as if not realizing "I'm on the left bank or the right bank now"!

My commute is to cross the right bank to the left bank, which should be the case for a lot of people.

However, according to the above classification, people with a bit of discernment have probably already thought that the left bank is populated by free-spirited leftists, while the right bank is dominated by capitalist rightists; the left bank reads Le Monde, and the right bank reads Le Figaro. ( Le Figaro) . Indeed such a concept.

In last year's "My Favorite Ten Books" campaign essay, I chose "The Lost Cafe in Youth". The title of the essay I wrote was " Ten Books That Become 'Me'" , but I don't remember it anymore. The content of the book is specific, but "The Lost Cafe in Youth" is also a part of my youth memories. In the article, I wrote:

 When I read this book, I was sure that I was going to Paris, and I arrived in Paris shortly after, practicing the scenes over and over again. But if I were to say what the value of this book was, I couldn't tell.

I once wrote this article to introduce the author a little bit, and extract the following paragraph:

"Mondiano, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2014, brings out his outlook on life by describing Parisian city life. The story of "Dans le café de la jeunesse perdue" (Dans le café de la jeunesse perdue) takes place on 50, 6 There used to be a Belle Époque Paris Saint-Germain café in the 1900s on Rue de la Sardéon in Paris, and the author describes the elusive fate of human beings with the Parisians aged nineteen to twenty-five in the café.”

The Rue des Sadéons in the 1950s mentioned in this book has the status of "whatever is discussed in Sadéon, what Parisians are discussing", such a story scene should be yearning for those who go to Paris to chase their dreams. I I also planned my own walking map according to the book, and I met a boy in the Latin Quarter who was studying at the Fifth University (Université Paris V – René Descartes). That was also my youth.

At that time, I liked boys with good heads, and I had read the law myself. The writers were not attractive to me. It was precisely the French boy I met on the left bank that matched my ideal object. Parisians playing football. The first time I went to his house, I was attracted by the collection of books on the bookcase, a large number of books I had never seen in a single apartment of a man in his early twenties...except me. And he's not a liberal arts student, nor is he a nerd.

I'm not a hypocritical person, but every time I look back on the day I met, I still think rationally that I will definitely develop a relationship with him. And still 80% must be due to the fact that I read too much French literature and watched too many French movies in middle school, and the scenes and plots of my encounter with him are completely in line with the popular Parisian drama.

Chatting and flipping books in a coffee shop on the left bank, everything is too reasonable. That's the picture of young people yearning for a date in Paris.

It turned out that I was on the right bank that day

A Parisian man who lives on the right bank sent me a message today, to be nostalgic.

A few years later, I went to Paris for two weeks. At that time, I had already lost contact with the French man, but he suddenly found my phone number during that time. Since it was such a coincidence, we made an appointment to meet again. He asked me to go to a trendy bar near his hometown and ordered a glass of red wine for 20 euros. It was not luxurious but it was different from what I remembered. The area is a bit like the atmosphere of the Weixiu business district in Xinyi District, Taipei 20 years ago. It is the place for local trendy young people to meet.

Bercy in the 12th arrondissement of Paris.

After years of acquaintance, I learned that day that "he is from the right bank of the Seine". The right bank doesn't match his image so well - he is a medical student but works in the cultural industry, if I say I would think he is a leftist - these are all stereotypes, his hometown is right bank but not traditional The wealthy area is a residential area with the majority of well-off families; the eleventh arrondissement where I usually go to Paris is the most densely populated area in Paris (the most local residents), and it is also in the right bank but not noble area.

It only takes about 20 minutes to take the subway from Fifth University to Bercy, and the straight-line distance is only five kilometers, but I hardly ever went there on purpose before. But it's not the boundary between the left bank and the right bank. It's just that you're used to drinking beer in a coffee shop and you don't need to go to a place dedicated to drinking red wine. I don't remember his spending power more than ten years ago. At that time, he probably went to the supermarket to buy a bottle of 18 O's Wine Bar.

About the misunderstanding in Paris