Reve General? Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of the French Dream

Lots of people are familiar with the American Dream. My French students have even asked me if I believe in it, if I feel like my family illustrates it. Originally, it was of course for immigrants to come from their home countries to the new land of opportunity where the streets were paved with gold and pull themselves up by their bootstraps and make a better life for themselves and their children, since at that time there was no food in other countries like Ireland. Ellis Island, Lady liberty, give me your poor huddling masses, or whatever. In the more crass commercial terms of today, the American dream is to make loads of money with no academic education and few, if any, real qualifications. However, in reality, considering the global crisis-induced recession post-bailout economy, to find the kind of opportunity that America was once known for, you’ll probably have to go to China instead.

Which makes many expats abroad think about the national dreams of their respective chosen countries. Since Parisian life is very different than life outside of this great city, I thought more about what a Parisian dream would be, rather than the French dream. I don’t feel like I know enough about the entire country to generalize here, only having lived in Paris.

In Paris, I think there are a few contenders that rest below the collective consciousness as secret cherished hopes. The first one that comes to mind is to have your children attend a grande ecole(the equivalent of an ivy-league university) and thus be assured future success in the French ruling classes. Almost all politicians or people in impressive managerial positions in France attended not just a grande ecole, but probably the same one.

Another possibility is becoming a fonctionnaire (a French civil servant or state employee), possibly just because this is MY Parisian dream, and thus being garunteed lifetime job certainty regardless of actual job performance. This system, while great for the fonctionnaire, is highly illogical and makes it impossible for everyone else who has to try to work with fonctionnaires, like the general public. It explains a lot about why the bureaucracy is the way it is...

So what is the Parisian dream, ultimately? I often joke to the French that to me, it seems that the Parisian dream is to have a country house in Normandy. This is like having a big stamp of approval (stamps are important in the fonctionnaire-run bureaucracy here) of being bourgeois and successful. Country houses are shared within families and passed down among the generations like rare jewels. The best ones are in remote scenic areas within a 1-2 hour drive from Paris that get lots of sun and have strategically placed cows that dot the landscape. This is both aesthetic and functional. Pretty to look at and ensures locally available dairy products, which all French people are obsessed with.

The most successful Parisians then are those who can leave Paris every weekend if they want. On any given Fri evening, traffic getting out of Paris is so bad that it often takes about 3 hours just to get on the beltway and get the access ramp to the highway you need for your remote country house destination.

Sometimes Parisians look offended when I reveal my irreverent observation. Sometimes the laugh and agree by admitting that oui, bretagne est moins bien que normandie (see the bit about sunny weather). The thing about Paris is that although it’s a huge tourist destination, all actual residents love to leave Paris and spend the weekend in remote countryside villages instead. Paris is crowded, people are rude and everyone hates taking the metro. It’s polluted and “speed” (meaning fast-paced) and stressful. The countryside, however is the opposite of all these things. Petting the neighbor’s scenic goats or hiking through attractive forest trails or picking non-poisonous mushrooms or eating cheese on your terrace and sipping cocktails outdoors are apaysant and reposant, these are all the ways in which nature helps us forget the trials and tribulations of the city of light. The weekend in the country house in Normandy is not only relaxing, but allows urban escape, brings a family closer to the region where some or possibly most of its members grew up and reaffirms that generations of that family worked hard to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and make a better life for future Parisian generations.