by Nicky Gentil
Copyright © 2020 Nicky Gentil
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.
Matador
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ISBN 9781838597207
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd
For my husband Etienne, who good-naturedly indulges my increasing inclination to take taxis when public transport will indeed do!
About the Author
In 1988, fresh out of Oxford University with a degree in French and German, Nicky Gentil moved to Paris to pursue a career in translation.
Some twenty years later – having acquired a husband and two children along the way! – she took up jazz improvisation on the piano, rapidly discovering a great passion for it, so much so that, in 2016, she published a book on the subject. Her first published work, La jazz-girl passionnée et son dévoué accordeur (Éditions Beaurepaire), is a light-hearted, feel-good account of her unexpected road to jazz.
The book received an overwhelmingly positive response at France’s 2016 EuroPiano Congress. Consequently, at the suggestion of the English-speaking attendees and in light of numerous requests from family and friends in the UK, she translated her work into English. It was published in March 2018 under the title The Jazz-Girl, the Piano, and the Dedicated Tuner (Matador Publishing).
In October of that same year, she also published Petits dialogues en taxi (Éditions Beaurepaire) – a collection of around thirty tales recounting some of her more memorable cab rides since moving to France – in celebration of her thirtieth anniversary in the capital.
Taxi Tales from Paris is the English version of that work.
Today, Nicky Gentil divides her time between her writing, translating her writing and her various musical activities.
Contents
Prologue
The Caricature
The Tease
Another Tease!
The Beginner
The Cabdriver Who Surprised Me!
The Singing Cabdriver
More Musical Tales…
The Appreciative Cabdriver
The Philosopher
Another Philosopher…
Pok
The Optimist
My Very First Book and Nath
The Cabdrivers in Bordeaux
The Silent Type
The Compassionate Cabdriver
Tales on Some Most Unexpected Compliments
An Omnipresent Fragrance
A Persistent Accent
The Windswept Look
The Eyes of a Film Star
Eyes to Remember and the Sweet Offer of…a Sweet!
The Creep
The Wacko
Another Wacko!
The Considerate Cabdriver
The Considerate Dad
The Considerate Passenger
Another Considerate Cabdriver!
The Business Lawyer
Prologue
It was actually an American writer who gave me the inspiration for this collection of tales… although he is blissfully unaware of it!
In 1995, having just been entrusted by The New Yorker with the somewhat enviable task of writing a series of essays on all aspects of life in France, Adam Gopnik relocated to Paris − together with his wife and young son − for a period of five years.
Gopnik’s essays were subsequently grouped together in a book – the poetically titled Paris to the Moon − that shot into the bestseller lists when it came out in the States in the year 2000.
One of the many reasons I so love Paris to the Moon, to the extent that I tend to recommend this work as a kind of indispensable ‘bible’ to any English-speaker who comes to live here in the French capital, is because I can really relate to it. The sense of pure wonderment that life in Paris elicits from this American author, reminds me so much of my own when first I moved here over thirty years ago. Indeed, a single binding thread lies at the heart of Gopnik’s fascinating narrative relating the widely differing events that marked his five-year stay, such as the general strike of 1995, the trial of the Nazi war-criminal Maurice Papon, and the spectacularly elegant way in which France’s Grande Dame − aka the Eiffel Tower − saw in the year 2000, to name but a few. It is a thread of undiluted praise for literally every aspect of his new environment: the stunning architecture, the fine food, not to mention the wonderful light of the ‘most beautiful city in the world’, including that more sombre ‘grey-violet’ light of the seemingly endless, sun-deprived winter days!
Furthermore, Gopnik does not limit his undiluted praise exclusively to the grandiose. As if being in Paris serves to re-awaken each and every one of his senses, he also happily lingers over descriptions of the more simple pleasures arising from his new-found way of life: the joy, for example, of sipping un express (the French word for espresso) in his favourite local café, or that of being able to obtain a hot and crusty freshly-cooked baguette every evening on his way home. In short, he is bowled over by all those little ‘treats’ that actually constitute the norm for the average French man or woman, but are generally considered, by the vast majority of foreigners who come to this country, to be a source of pure delight.
Having said that, in spite of all Gopnik’s reactions to which I can so relate, ultimately if I had to choose just one reason for loving his book it would be this: towards the end comes a truly memorable passage recounting the most unlikely of conversations with a Parisian cabdriver; so unusual is this exchange that I can still recall it to this day – many years after having read about it – as if I discovered it only yesterday.
To give you the context, Gopnik’s wife, Martha, is at the time pregnant with their second child. This happy state of affairs provides Gopnik with a convenient opportunity to devote an entire essay to the subject comparing the different approaches between France and the States, or more precisely Paris and New York. And, once again, the American author is pleasantly surprised by his Parisian experience, as evidenced by his descriptions of the ‘wonderful’ health service, the ‘luxury’ − afforded to any woman who has just given birth − of being able to stay in hospital for four or five days in order to rest and have time to bond with her newborn, and the cool elegance of the obstetricians who in Gopnik’s world all seem to sport the same ‘uniform’ of black jeans and matching roll-neck sweater – a far cry from the traditional white coat of his expectations!
At the same time, he is genuinely amused, as is his wife, when the doctor advises, half-way through the second term of the pregnancy, that Martha should do some sport – swimming for example – because he considers she has put on far too much weight. In the case in point, she has put on just half the amount gained at the same stage of her first pregnancy when she liv
ed in the States!
Naturally, as one would expect, Martha’s pregnancy also gives this couple an opportunity to learn a whole new set of French expressions, one of which stands out head and shoulders above the rest. Whenever they announce that they are expecting a baby girl, the response – given that they already have a son − is systematically the same: ‘Ah, c’est le choix du Roi!’ In other words, in the eyes of the French, they are in the process of hitting some kind of parental jackpot apparently known to all as ‘the king’s choice’; without exception everybody, literally everybody − the doctor, the neighbours, the security guard in their block of flats, the local baker, the butcher etc. – says it.
And then there’s the cabdriver…
One day, taking heed of the doctor’s advice, the family decides to go to the swimming pool. According to Gopnik, their cabdriver, dressed in an old pair of ripped jeans, a short-sleeved shirt and displaying a row of metal where his teeth would normally be, does not exactly bring to mind your typical intellectual.
And yet…
The cabdriver begins the conversation by profusely congratulating the couple’s young son on his fluent French, spoken with absolutely no trace of an accent. Then, alluding to Martha’s condition, he asks them:
‘So, is your little boy about to have a baby brother or a baby sister?’
Together they chorus:
‘A baby sister.’
At this point Gopnik grimaces. He knows what’s coming. It’s inevitable. They are about to hear THE expression − the one and only response to their happy news − in Gopnik’s eyes, a monotonous refrain of which he is growing increasingly weary. Thus it is that he braces himself for the exclamation that naturally comes bang on cue.
With a slap on the steering wheel, the cabdriver triumphantly declares:
‘Ah, c’est le choix du roi!’
Gopnik is by now so fed up of hearing this that he murmurs: ‘Please explain it to me.’ It is said ironically, rhetorically almost, but the cabdriver doesn’t miss a beat as he parks his car in order to be able to give his passengers the following mini-history lesson:
‘In Latin countries we have what we call Salic law, which means that only your son can inherit the throne… a French king, under Salic law, had to consolidate his hold on the throne by having a boy. And he had to have a girl, so that she could be offered in marriage to another king, and in this way the royal possessions would be expanded since the daughter’s son would be a king too.’
As Gopnik sits there in silence, the cabdriver expands:
‘It is very odd because in the Hundred Years’ War the King of England, as Duc de Guyenne, a title he had inherited from his grandfather, was subject to Salic law too. The story of how this worked itself out in the making of the two monarchies is a passionately interesting piece of history. I recommend the series Les Rois Maudits (the dammed or cursed kings), which is a fascinating study of this history, particularly of the acts of John the Good and what he did as an act of policy to accommodate the Salic principle. The books are by Maurice Druon of the Académie Française, and I heartily recommend them. Passionately interesting.’
This explanation leaves Gopnik and his wife utterly speechless for the rest of their journey!
Often, when taking a taxi, I will think of this quite remarkable scene. And maybe I’m mistaken but I simply cannot imagine having this type of exchange with a London or New York cabdriver. Whenever I recount this anecdote to English-speaking friends who live here they too are of the same opinion. ‘It could only happen in France’ is the unanimous reaction. And, just to be clear, it is always said in a positive, admiring tone.
So, you see, it is for this reason that for many years I would muse – without actually acting upon it – about how some of the more memorable conversations I’ve had with cabdrivers since moving here, over thirty years ago, could make a great subject for a book.
*
While it did indeed take another man’s cab ride to give me the inspiration for this collection of tales, on the other hand it took another cab ride altogether – many, many years after having discovered Adam Gopnik’s − for me to actually put pen to paper…
It happened one Sunday afternoon in October.
That day, my husband and I had tickets for a recital by a French pianist who is particularly dear to our hearts. In spite of this, we were really dragging our heels. At the time, the whole of France was enjoying an absolutely spectacular Indian summer. Consequently, we had no wish to prise ourselves away from our terrace, where we had just had lunch, and where we were sorely tempted to spend the rest of the afternoon lazing around, a-reading and a-snoozing.
Be that as it may, neither of us wanted to waste the tickets – booked some months previously and coveted by many – and we both agreed that once we got to the recital we would be happy to have made the effort.
Before setting off, in accordance with our personal family tradition, we had some serious negotiating to do: I wanted to go there by taxi while my husband was all for taking the métro. For ecological reasons, my better half will use public transport whenever he can and I cannot deny that he is absolutely right to do so. From a purely selfish point of view, however, the idea of spending an hour in a jam-packed métro, in the scorching heat of that particular afternoon, did not exactly appeal to me. We thus did a deal: we’d take a taxi to go there on the condition we use public transport to come home.
The journey took about half an hour, during which our cabdriver – seeing that we were happily dozing in the back – barely spoke to us, choosing instead to save the best for last.
Thus it was that, upon arriving at our destination, he immediately leapt out of the car, raced round to the side so that he could open the door for me and then, as I alighted, shook my hand!
Finally he gave me an explanation, one that took me even further aback than his most considerate gestures.
‘Madame, I would just like to take this opportunity to express my immense gratitude towards you. Thanks to you, I have completely given up smoking.’
The effect of his words was immediate − as if he’d pushed some kind of mental button that was now raising numerous questions in my head all at the same time. What on earth was he talking about? Where had I met him? What could I possibly have done to have such a huge influence on his personal habits? Had I – heaven forbid – been rude to him? Etc., etc…
In response to my perplexed look, he added:
‘Last summer, I dropped you and your daughter off at the airport.’
The penny finally dropped as his words transported me back in time to the month of July…
*
I felt as if I were suffocating – both physically and mentally. The heat in Paris was punishing. Added to that was the prospect of a difficult weekend. I was going to England with my daughter in order to help my siblings move our mother into a retirement home, and I was really dreading the days ahead. It was the end of an era for everybody.
As I got in the taxi that day, the pungent stench of cigarette smoke merely served to intensify my feelings of suffocation, inciting me to open the windows, which in turn incited the cabdriver to say to me:
‘Madame, it’s really very hot today. Wouldn’t you rather shut the windows so I can put the air-conditioning on?’
Not wishing to offend him I kept my reply to a strict minimum, content to utter a mere: ‘No, thank you.’
A few minutes later, the cabdriver pursued the matter with:
‘Madame, there really is no air in Paris today. It would be so much better if you were to shut the windows so that I can put the air-conditioning on.’
Now I didn’t have a choice. I was going to have to explain the problem, which I attempted to do diplomatically:
‘I’m sorry to say this but your car really smells of smoke. Maybe it was the previous clients but if you close the windows the smell will be unb
earable.’
Unfortunately, any attempt at diplomacy on my part turned out to be counterproductive as the cabdriver replied:
‘No, Madame, I’m the one who’s sorry. It can’t be the previous clients because smoking in taxis is strictly prohibited. That’s also why I never smoke in my car. I always take a break and get out to have a cigarette. However, it would appear that my suit must have absorbed some of the smoke.’
By now I was mortified so I attempted to defuse the situation by taking some of the blame:
‘I’m so sorry to have mentioned it. Truly, I am. But you see… well, the thing is, I have never smoked in my entire life and this makes me extremely sensitive to the smell. Unfortunately, there’s nothing I can do about it. So, if you don’t mind, I’d like to leave the windows open, at least until we reach the ring road. Then, I agree, it would probably be better to close them.’
*
Who would have thought it? There I was, on this beautiful October day, standing opposite the very same cabdriver who was now about to tell me precisely what had happened, subsequent to my previous journey with him:
‘Your comments about the pungent smell in my car had a really devastating effect on me. I remember telling you how careful I was, how I would always get out of the car to smoke. But until I had you as a client I just didn’t realise that, even though I thought I was taking the necessary precautions, my car could stink so much! You’ve no idea how ashamed I was. That said, though, you really did the right thing by pointing it out to me because since that day I have not smoked a single cigarette. It was utterly radical! As a result of your comments I stopped smoking, literally overnight. And for that I cannot thank you enough.’
‘It’s really nice of you to tell me that. I do indeed remember feeling absolutely mortified by our conversation that day. However, since it had such a positive consequence, now I don’t regret it at all.’