When stock markets everywhere went into kamikaze nosedives three weeks back, my French friend Edmee was trying to convince me that the boat we were about to take across a lake in Paris would not go belly up.
'Pas problem (no problem),' said the boatman with a wink, taking my hand in his and helping me, and then Edmee, sit down for the ride.
We were in the Bois de Vincennes, one of the city's largest parks, and running late to meet her fiance Frederic and his mate Eric for lunch there. It was a long walk around the lake, which was why we ended up wobbling across water to the other side.
'Bonjour,' said Frederic, a quiet, thoughtful man whom I was meeting for the first time. 'As you can see, you brought the sun from Singapore.' Turned out it was Paris' first hot day this autumn.
So began my surreal week in Paris.
Each morning, I tried to sip my tea nonchalantly while horrific headlines screamed at me from the morning's international papers. Then it was time to step out and join the 16 other Asian journalists on our study tour hosted by the French foreign ministry.
We listened to politicians and policy wonks dissecting the causes of the current financial fire and brimstone and how France, as Europe's current leader, was trying to orchestrate a global plan for redemption.
At dusk, I would slip along the well-swept lanes of the Left Bank and soak in the yowls, howls and growls of Parisians stealing kisses in cavernous doorways, jostling for dark, round loaves at the fabled Poilane bakery or just sitting higgledy-piggledy outside cafes and debating whether they preferred the views of author Michel Houellebecq or those of his nemesis, the philosopher Bernard-Henri Levy. Everywhere, the crisp, cold air sizzled with the electricity of life.
Nobody seemed to bother about what their friends might think if they went about in compact cars or, as it increasingly happened, the Velib, which is the city's new self-service bicycle-for-hire scheme. Arguments were more likely to break out if, say, a child had been rude to another or if the peaches at the local grocer's were not as sweet as they were said to be.
Living well, as Paris showed, is a matter of choosing well and giving each moment one's full heart and mind.
The popular perception that the French are arrogant and rude is true up to a point. They will not give the time of day to anyone who has little regard for manners or the language and way of life they so fiercely defend.
But if you are polite and genuinely keen on learning how they live, well, they can be the most gracious and hospitable folk around - in their inimitable cool, chic way, of course.
One evening, I stopped by a florist's near the Musee d'Orsay to buy a box of scented stones for Edmee's birthday. It was past 9pm by then, but the girl serving me wrapped the gift lovingly in grey-green tissue, slipped it into a paper bag, scattered red and cream rose petals onto the contents and tied a perfect white rose to it.
At times, the sheer loveliness of it all was hard for me to take in. How strange it was for me to be cossetted in light, love and luxury while most of the world was sinking into economic quicksand.
How strange it was that playful lads were flirting with me in the Jardin des Tuileries, pretending to snatch my bag of books while, 7,300km away, my husband-to-be was herding his parents' oxen in the hills of Nepal and texting me by moonlight.
On my last morning in Paris, I watched from my hotel window as three planes from the city's ever-busy airports criss-crossed each other in the baby-blue sky. Their smoke trails formed a nifty figure 'A' or, as I liked to think of it, a stirring sketch of the Eiffel Tower.
A fitting sign-off to a surreal week.
suk@sph.com.sg
This article was first published in The Straits Times on Nov 8, 2008.
