Before the End

not a prostitute -  © 2015 Jordan P. H. Stein 

Have you ever expected to be slapped by a prostitute? Hopefully you have not, but I imagine there a few situations where this could be expected. For some reason or another, mine was not the case. 

Walking down the dank and dirty streets of Rue de Saint Denis, it yields itself as a wonderful place to photograph. 

Something to keep in mind is the difficulty a photographer is faced with in Paris. This is of course, the sweeping volumes of photographic information which has clouded our minds and labeled Paris as the most romantic city. This has lead to the overtly cliche nature of all things photographic in Paris. 

In the beginning of the afternoon, around 12:00, men are running along the streets carrying rugs, garbage, and pushing ice from the fish markets into the sewers. Along the streets of Saint Denis women are by no means absent, however the working women of Saint Denis are actually 'working the streets.' Door after door, women stand draped in fur coats, which usually one would wrap around their body to keep themselves warm, but these just so happen to leave a wide gap below their necks, accentuating the size of their bossisms. 

Moving on, as I was walking down Saint Denis, yielding my vintage Mamiya C33, I stopped to photograph a middle aged man, skinny, with a posture that suggested malnourishment. As you must with a camera like the Mamiya C33, you must bend your neck slightly to look through the viewfinder. After focusing my camera, I pressed the textured metal shutter and 'click.' Relying on my faulty memory, I believe my next move was to remove my light meter from my pocket and obtain another reading before creating a second image. As I held my light meter up, my focus pushed passed my hand and onto a woman, approximately 50 feet away. She looked at me, and then began to scream words in French. Unable to understand, I lowered my light meter and began to walk away. Unfortunately, this did not satisfy the lovely woman, and instead, she began to charge. Like a fur covered bull with large breasts and high heels. Her next move was to  continue yelling at me and once I started to move away from her, she grabbed the camera strap around my neck and pulled in a way that led to a lack of air reaching my lungs. I immediately attempted to push her away, but apparently her intuitive response is to slap. And slap she did. This continued on for a few minutes until a young guitarist decided to help alleviate the situation. 

As I walked away from the situation, disfigured camera in hand, I noticed a police car around the corner. I debated wether or not it was worth involving them, and eventually I agreed that was the right choice. Unfortunately, it appears that the French police do not take kindly to foreigners. Although this may have been unique to these officers, two separate cars consisting of six men and women appeared. A certified diverse crowd. 

In reference to A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway, Hemingway starts off his first chapter, by titling it, "A Good Cafe. . ." and in the processing of finding such a good cafe, Hemingway happens upon cafes filled with filth, wreaking of booze and fumes. Walking the withered and slanted streets of Paris is no different from his quest or documentation of finding such cafe. The streets of Paris are unique, but different in a way that London and New York City fail to resemble. Each street has a culture, an economy, and natives. Rue de Saint Denis is no different from the cesspool of rue Mouffetard mentioned by Hemingway. Fortunately for the piétons of Paris wearing white shoes, when it rains, as Hemingway has mentioned, the sadness of the city flocks indoors and the windows and doors of homes shut when the rain begins to fall. This is of course true for my beloved street, oh sweet and savory Saint Denis, and when it rains, my street becomes passable.