Seeking the elusive beauty of Montreuil (by kerouac2)

[Deleted]

I need to preface this report with a few items. First of all, "Montreuil" is a rather common city/place name in France derived from "little monastery" of which I'm sure there were many in bygone days. This report is about Montreuil-sous-Bois, which is the 5th largest city in the Paris metropolitan area, with a population above 100,000. I am putting it in the Paris section, because the Paris metro serves it completely with 3 stations and it is only 7.5 kilometres from Notre Dame, which is "point zero" for all distances in France. In other words, you can walk to the centre of Paris in no more than an hour.

Montreuil has a few distinctions, such as being the second largest Malian city in the world after Bamako, and also the French city with the largest Roma population. Frankly, neither of these is considered an advantage in urban development. Until the municipal elections this year, Montreuil had a Green Party mayor, thus also being the largest city in France run by the ecologists. But the mayor was exhausted after six years and did not run for re-election (even though she would have won). So now there is a Communist mayor again, which was already the case from 1944 to 2008. It is really the epitome of a left wing city of the former "red belt" surrounding Paris.

However, for the last 10 or 15 years, Montreuil has also become the countercultural epicentre of the metropolitan area, attracting artists, musicians, activists... and gardeners, among others. That makes it sound quirky and intriguing, but since these people are a minority, it is also one of the most godawful ugly suburbs of Paris, even if it is changing faster and faster.

I had a number of things to look for in the city, but for my first incursion, I just wanted a basic overview to refamiliarize myself with the city. To do this, I entered the city from Porte de Montreuil in Paris and just worked my way up "rue de Paris" which is very often the name of the main street in the majority of the towns pointing themselves at Paris. This first bit is just my very first impression, and there will be a multitude of different things to see later.

The very first thing as you enter the city is the Montreuil flea market where I did not pause. I will return there later.



Facing the headquarters of the CGT communist leaning trade union, there is a fresco to honour one of the most famous people of the city -- Georges Méliès, who created the very first movie studio here.



To take advantage of lower property values, there are also huge hotels and a shopping mall facing Paris 50 metres away.



As you advance into the city, you see that it is not very chic.

When the metro was extended into Montreuil in the 1930's, there was a huge debate over the name of the Robèspierre station. The metro administration felt that it was inappropriate to name a station after one of the bloodiest figures of the Reign or Terror following the French revolution. But he remains a hero to dyed-in-the-wool traditional Communists, so the city held out and got the station name that they wanted.

Interestingly, the one and only South African restaurant in the Paris region is on rue Robèspierre in Montreuil. I have not yet managed to catch it when it is open because I visited on Monday when it was closed or else too early in the day, but I am determined to right this wrong sooner or later. It is not at all a picturesque place, at least what you can see from the street.

This is what you see when it is closed.





But at least you can check out the menu.





It's hard to imagine that on the main street of a major city you would encounter this.





Oh, but Montreuil is full of surprises.

[Deleted]

Buildings of varying heights are considered charming in the old areas of Paris like Montmartre or the Butte-aux-Cailles. They are called "dents creuses" (gap toothed). But in the suburbs, it often just looks like "in urgent need of urban renovation."



It was not a market day for the Croix-de-Chavaux covered market.





It is really a very large covered area but has no walls to protect it from the cold season.





This sign intrigued me very much, but I'll get back to the meaning later.



That concluded my first incursion into Montreuil. I needed to come back with a map to find what I needed to see.



Already back again... the market is open today, mostly clothing for less than 5€. That is already more expensive than the flea market where most clothes are 1€ or less.





Paris has only three 24/7 pharmacies with a population of 2 1/2 million. So Montreuil can be very happy about this one.



In spite of the urban blight, even Montreuil has created a little pedestrian zone in the centre.







Most of the high rises of Montreuil are along the border with Paris, but there are a few in the city hall area.







Here is the city hall.





Back there is the municipal non-commercial cineplex, Le Méliès, a source of rage to the major movie chains.

[mossie]

I note that it has been infected with McDonalds

[Deleted]

I still had few clues about what I was looking for. Finally, I printed up a map from the municipal website, but it was not nearly as detailed as I would have liked.

Third trip to Montreuil, starting from Porte de Montreuil again... I'm going to get this right sooner or later.

My map said that one of the things I was looking for was behind the Air France building. I used to go to meetings in this building, which is the corporate sales department. One thing that has always amused me is that it officially has a Paris address in the 20th arrondissement, rue Léon Gaumont. They moved here after several decades in the office built on top of Gare Montparnasse. However, the part in Paris is pretty much just the front wall of the building. Once you have stepped inside, you are in Montreuil.

I found that I actually had to go through the building to find my address.



I walked along the street and searched where to turn left.





Hmmm, where the hell am I?



I backtracked half a block to find the secret entrance.



Without this discreet sign, there was absolutely no way I would have gone up the stairs.





It finally looked like I might be on the right track.



I was nevertheless a bit disconcerted 3 levels above the street.





And then I finally found the first of the famous shared gardens of Montreuil, national capital of shared gardens.









           

The Malian women's garden was quite lush, also a bit wild.



Whenever I see these flowers, I always imagine that they are actually electronic transmission devices, perhaps grown by the CIA.





Raspberries were leaning over the fence at me, but I did not take any.

[lagatta]

The TACOs are taxis collectifs, non?

There seems to be more invasive (and ugly) graffiti than when I stayed there a decade ago. In your photos, I see little evidence of gentrification. I suppose the Croix de Chavaux market is nicer on Sunday morning - correct me if that was a Sunday morning - when my friends and I were there, it was almost all food, and there was a very nice choice for a market of its size.

It seems odd to call Hannah Arendt "American" without qualification. Of course she was a refugee in the US from Nazi Germany, like Einstein.

[tod2]

Wonderful! What a find. Thanks so much for venturing to places in Paris most of us only see on the map and go no further.
And a big thank you for the 'South African' menu board. Now it is South African foods in the true sense of a combination of dishes. The black South African food - the pap which is a stiff white maize preparation - and Afrikaaner food which is the Boerewors or meat part of the meal, - topped off with an African sauce of Chakalaka ( mixed spicy vegetables similar to a veg curry or chutney) and of course samp and beans is truly black African. We make it at home for everyone but you would never be served it in a restaurant here.
South African food is of course tremendously diverse and consisting of the Dutch part, the English and then the traditional African foods which consist more of entrails and odd parts of animals.
I noticed they also had Bobotie on their menu which now also includes the Malay section of our population.
I wouldn't mind going there just to check it out!

[Deleted]

Yes, the TACOs are collective vehicles, a play on the word tacot, which means jalopy. There are 10 TACO stations around the city, but it is better to reserve a ride ahead of time. They can also be hailed as they drive by, and they are accessible to people in wheelchairs, too. You have to buy a ticket from one of the authorised shops (various tabacs and newsstands) beforehand. A ride costs 1.50€ or you can buy 10 tickets for 13€.

[lagatta]

Do the TACOs only take people to destinations within Montreuil, or can you travel to nearby destinations in Eastern Paris, or adjoining suburbs?

We don't have TACOs here (tacots yes, of course) but disabled people do have access to accessible taxis for the same price as a passage in the métro or buses. My neighbour has a degenerative disease (not MS, but something similar and far rarer) and uses those taxis every day, as he swims and trains at a community centre to stay in the best shape possible.

[Deleted]

There were some officially commissioned paintings to try to cheer up the concrete everywhere.



Here's a view out on the périphérique in the direction of Paris.











Frankly, the vegetation was nicer.



There was even some wildlife hiding out in the plants.





I have been away from vegetable gardens for so long that I don't even automatically recognize the plants anymore.



And then it was time to go back down and try to find the next garden...

[Deleted]

Aug 27, 2014 12:52:03 GMT lagatta said:

Do the TACOs only take people to destinations within Montreuil, or can you travel to nearby destinations in Eastern Paris, or adjoining suburbs?

We don't have TACOs here (tacots yes, of course) but disabled people do have access to accessible taxis for the same price as a passage in the métro or buses. My neighbour has a degenerative disease (not MS, but something similar and far rarer) and uses those taxis every day, as he swims and trains at a community centre to stay in the best shape possible.

I think the TACO system is only within Montreuil, but I bet they make a few exceptions. Anyway, this is in addition to the PAM network for disabled people, which I have used with my mother. The PAM used to cost 3€ for any destination in Paris (for the handicapped person + 1), but now it is completely free for my mother since she is officially on welfare. I'm sure the PAM pricing is a bit different for the suburbs.

[tod2]

The vegetation was lovely and wild...your photos of the Passifloras or granadilla vine were absolutely fabulous! What lovely close-ups!
In the garden I recognised a pumpkin or courgette/cucumber vine crawling along the ground(second to last photo), there was rosemary bush behind the teddy bear, the photo with the comment about vegetation being nicer was Lambs Ear.
Also seen in other photos was lavender, nasturtiums, and I think the yellow flowers are Gazanias?, and there were some pink dahlias too.

[Deleted]

Back down on the street, I was happy to make other discoveries, such as these freight containers assembled into decent housing for eleven Roma families.





Little parks and playgrounds are scratched out of any available area.



There are some nice looking establishments here and there for food or beverages.

Les Nouveaux Robinson is an organic coop chain that was created in Montreuil 20 years ago and from the number of stores in town, you can see that it is a source of local pride. They are still expanding, because they took over an organic superette on my street last year,j so now I have a Nouveaux Robinson only half a block from my place. I have not read anything official about the choice of the name, but I automatically assume that it refers to both Mr. Crusoé and the shipwrecked Swiss family.

The food trucks of Montreuil have more variety.





another Taco stop...



Quite a few individual houses are absolutely buried in wisteria.



But let's face it -- most of the streets look like this.



Little by little, work is being done to renovate some of these buildings.

[lagatta]

L'Amourette has a "good value" rating from guide Michelin:

restaurant.michelin.fr/restaurant/france/93100-montreuil/l-amourette/s5wxl17?from=SEM

Their website: www.lamourette.fr/

Des bulles et des ballons: Their website of the same name refers to their former bookshop (as they say, "Amazon has won". Seems, nice, a bit more simple place - still has lots of albums of bandes dessinées on hand.

In the Netherlands, they are using those ubiquitous containers for student housing. The quality of the housing would depend on the insulation - if not they could be cold in winter and very hot in summer.

[tod2]

Thank you Lagatta for the link - You never know, we might end up there and report back!
I am intrigued by their menu - one of the best I've seen in a long time.

[tod2]

Kerouac - I loved the 'ANTHRACITE" sign. It reminded me of my very young years (7-8) when our Aga stove my mother slaved away on, was fed this very coal product.

[lagatta]

According to the sites I've read, L'Amourette is very good value. Probably because they are paying a lower rent (or mortgage payment if they've bought the building) than they would inside the ring road. It is very close to a métro station.

Yes, I liked "ANTHRACITE" as well.

Their daily (lunch) menu looked very good as well. You have to click on it:

Jeudi 28 Aout 2014
Entrée : Œuf poché, lentilles et jambon de la féria
Plat : Navarin d’agneau, taglierini ail et basilic
Dessert : Clafoutis aux framboises

Very classic, but all things I like.

[Deleted]

The next collective garden was just a small corner lot behind a fence, so I just took one photo of it.



It is always interesting to see what methods have been used to raise the height of buildings. This one looks solid but would not win a beauty contest.



Montreuil used to be a major farming community, so it was interesting to see a final trace of this potato merchant.



I am always intrigued by dilapidated hotels, so I had to look at the price of rooms. What a shock! This is almost double the price of my nieighbourhood, for hotels that don't look as terrible.





I had to go back to the main street (rue de Paris) to go across to a new section of Montreuil. It had begun to rain.



One day all of these buildings will suddenly disappear and probably be replaced by big office buildings, like the part of the city closer to Paris.





I am irresistably drawn to that Robèspierre metro entrance which is so different from the ones in Paris.



I follow my map in the direction of new gardens...



The next one is pretty easy to find.

[Deleted]

This particular shared garden was on a square which I felt had an interesting story. The sign -- which is just as poorly respected as the square -- explains that the city wanted to honour Barcelona's Güell park which was designed by Gaudi. The artist in charge of the square gathered a team of 13 unemployed persons between the ages of 18 and 47 and taught them ironwork, concrete construction and mosaic art. I think they did a really good job, but the square is rather dirty and dismal, clearly a hangout for alcoholic vagrants.

On the far side of the square, there was a visible demand for a new shared garden in a large unused space.



If there are no imminent construction plans, I say let them have it for a few years.





Montreuil will clearly continue to evolve in the coming years.









One side of the square was undergoing demolition. In places like this, that is usually a good thing. No need to preserve crumbling slums.

[Deleted]

Thank you for this, Kerouac. As you know, I have a deep abiding love for the dents creuses of all descriptions. I know it's too much to hope that Montreuil could be renovated without office towers and concrete, but in my next life I'd like to live in one of those two or three-story buildings, in the flat above L'Amourette, perhaps.

[htmb]

A very interesting report, Kerouac. Your photos certainly show a lot of variety, an assortment architecture, and somewhat productive gardens. I particularly liked the first garden, and there's also a photo near the beginning of the report with a person on a balcony that I found very intriguing.

[lagatta]

Yes, while much of what is coming down is insalubrious, I hate a lot of what is going up. I like those little houses; they aren't so different from a lot of old housing in Montréal.

One couple among my friends there live in one of those pretty streets with lots of high trees.

The other ménage live close to the Mairie de Montreuil, not as many trees but a very nice house.

We had a dinner at a Kabyle-French restaurant during the European Social Forum in 2003. The menu was not bad at all (and of course, lots of house wine) but nothing special. We were looking a bit jealously at some private patrons who were being served much more interesting Maghrebi food.

Montreuil is odd; I found some corners utterly "populaire" charming like the best of the eastern arrondissements of Paris, and others rather desolate.

[Deleted]

The "urban furniture" of JC Décaux is famous all over the world now, but who has ever seen a place where they store all of that stuff?



Some of this city is put together very oddly.





A fabulous old villa was hidden behind this wall.



There seemed to be some very nice dwellings at the end of this alleyway.





And I arrived at the next collective garden...





Every amateur gardener is complaining about how late the tomatoes are this year due to the appalling weather.









But this seemed to be in advance.

[mossie]

That last photo shows that some of the locals are not happy, no doubt with reason. However you show a lot of tatty areas so it would benefit from some improvement. This seems inevitable as the city spreads beyond the tight confines of the periphique.

[Deleted]

In all of these cities, there is always a fear of being taken over by more powerful places. As usual, the people in power cannot imagine why there is so much resistance to having their lives improved, and it seems that the "powerful" will never learn, whether it is on an international level or even the tiniest local level. Paris would absolutely love to be in charge of its suburbs and would be delighted to add another 10 or 15 arrondissements. If such a thing were to happen tomorrow (but it won't), it would probably be a financially neutral operation. The cities to the north and east of Paris -- places like Montreuil -- are in dire straits, but a lot of the cities to the south and west of Paris are doing quite well, so it would probably balance out to a certain extent, except for the fact that Paris would quickly decide what to demolish and recreate.

Politics are so strange, though. Up until 2001, the rich cities probably would have been in favour of a fusion with Paris while the poor cities would have been against it. But in 2001, the majority in Paris switched to the left, and the left has been gaining ground ever since then. So now, the poor cities would love to merge with Paris, which would look after their interests (supposedly) and the rich cities absolutely do not want their wealth drained away to help the poor.

More changes are possibly on the way on the regional level, but it is too soon to fantasize about the possibilities.

Anyway, after that last garden (having lost control of my map as usual), I was suddenly back at Porte de Montreuil again.

I actually decided to do a bit of shopping at the Carrefour hypermarket before making my way to the Porte de Montreuil tramway station to go home. This was a Monday, so the flea market was also going strong. I just skimmed the edge of it as I walked back into Paris, but it certainly became clear to me how desperately poor it is, compared to the main flea market at Porte de Clignancourt. There were huge piles of clothes everywhere with a multitude of people pawing over everything. The price of almost every item was one euro, except for children's clothing which was 0.50€. When you think of what people pay for things just over the city limit, it really sends a major economic message to your brain.

There is usually a ragpickers market in the huge area covering the périphérique, but it was not there today, due to the mounted police.



Nevertheless, the trail of trash made it clear that everybody had been there very recently.





It was a relief for me to be back in Paris with my beloved tram.



A day later, guess what, I was back in Montreuil for the fourth time. This time I took the bus from Porte des Lilas, through Les Lilas and Romainville to get to a different corner of Montreuil...





My first garden of the morning was theoretically located at the far end of this little park...

[htmb]

Learning the reasons the people of these suburban areas would or would not wish to be annexed is something I'd never before considered. It's nice you included that explanation.

[lagatta]

I see that Rosny-Sous-Bois, where several people have died in what appears to be a gas explosion, borders Montreuil, obviously on the side away from Paris.

[Deleted]

This garden was operated by a local elementary school, so after 2 months of summer vacation, it was pretty much left to its own devices...









The next garden on my map was about two blocks farther along, but it has been abandoned for far longer than two months. I'd say at least two years.

I came across one of the numerous neighbourhood parks, and it improved my mood for this frustrating outing. One thing that is very clear is that Montreuil associates the local residents when new parks are created, and in this case the park was perfectly well respected and well tended because clearly the local people took pride in it.

The streets of Montreuil have always been quite militant.

[lagatta]

I wanted to point out that there is a new Ibis Styles hotel at la Mairie de Montreuil, next to the town hall but also a métro station heading into Paris (line 9). This used to be Le Franklin and this summer, has been transformed into an Ibis Styles.

There are three rooms for people with limited mobility, and family suites.

www.tourisme93.com/document.php?pagendx=749&engine_zoom=HOTIDF0930000004

www.ibis.com/fr/hotel-9880-ibis-styles-paris-mairie-de-montreuil/index.shtml

[Deleted]

Ibis Styles seems to be spreading rapidly because it is the Accor brand for 'atypical' properties that they have bought in the middle range category. I know that Mossie's preferred hotel near the Buttes Chaumont also suddenly became an Ibis Styles about 2 years ago. Although the rates always go up, one of the reasons is that the breakfast buffet is always included in the rate at Ibis Styles. I always pay close attention to this when comparing an Ibis to an Ibis Styles, because the cost of breakfast at a 'normal' Ibis is now usually 9.50€.

Anyway, you have brought to my attention that I never finished this thread, even though I had uploaded quite a few more photos, and also needed to make another trip or two to see more things there.









definitely unused garage!



Most of the suburban mosques around Paris are improvised from industrial buildings rather than having been built for a religious purpose.



Traffic problems are a constant source of amusement.





The vegetation has not said its final word about accepting asphalt or not.

[lagatta]

I presume the top building is some kind of (Catholic?) current or former religious building.

The garage is definitely not used for parking a car, but it might well be used for other things...

Yes, I'd pointed out Ibis Styles to people visiting Amsterdam. I was sure it meant a price increase, but also some standardized features, such as WiFi, important for people on a work visit. They don't say what is included in their breakfast buffet, to judge whether or not it is worth the price. For me it would be whether there is some kind of protein; I need a bit of protein in the morning (I don't mean a greasy full English).

I'd been looking at Hôtel Rhin et Danube in the 19th in one of the villas you showed us, but while they have a kitchenette and a lot of amenities I don't need, they don't mention WiFi, which I do in an area where they might not be an Internet café nearby.