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| The old Gendarmerie in Montauban |
It was a dark and stormy night… Quit that and get to the story... A long, very long time ago when I was a young, very young woman, my sisters and I used to spend our summers in Southern France doing what we did best in those days, party. In the summer, most French villages down south have block parties. Their block parties consisted of the entire village participating. Sometimes, they managed to get some famous singers to perform. Between block parties, discotheques, getting up late in the morning, sunbathing in the afternoon, we had a great life; a shallow life one would say, but we were young. We had an apartment in one of those converted townhouses, with only one main entrance. The old man living in the apartment facing us didn’t like us at all. Actually, he didn’t like Asians, and he didn’t like noisy girls. We came home late, and according to him, we were not nice. One night he decided to teach us a lesson; and locked us out, putting the wood latch down. The young man that drove us home lived with his parents, and couldn’t take three Asian girls with him to spend the night. I am not sure why. His mother had a painting with three Japanese girls on it. All he had to say was that we popped out of the painting, ha ha! We spent whatever money we had on drinks, and we had nothing left between the four of us. The young man had to go home, because his father needed the car to go to work in the morning.
So there we were, left out in the street without money, without a car to spend the night until day light. I was not going to sleep in the street, so I asked the young man
(who, by the way, married my sister a couple of years later) to drive us to the Gendarmerie. I went in and asked if we might have a bed for the night. After the initial shock, the nice policeman gave us a cell. We bid goodnight and as soon as our heads hit the pillow, we were snoring. I must say that those Gendarmes had a hard time waking us up in the morning, well at 6:00 AM before the next crew came in. They fed us hot chocolate and fresh warm croissants. They drove us home in the paddy wagon. It was a memorable night, but not so memorable when we were living through it. I cannot imagine my grandchildren doing the same thing, really not…
I really like this story - it makes me feel like I missed out on something in my own childhood by not sleeping in the local jail! Although, in retrospect, I was related to half the force in my home town so they would have likely put me up in one of their homes...
ReplyDeleteHa ha! I really had fun. I have been to Montauban two weeks ago, and I will take a picture of the Gendarmerie... I also went to the local Night Club "The Vieux Moulin," and sat at the river bank where we use to "sleep" when we were too tired to drive home... Ah, the good old days. It's was so good being young and stupid.
ReplyDeleteTon histoire a dû susciter de nouvelles vocations chez les policiers. En effet, savoir qu'il puisse arriver que 2 jeunes et belles asiatiques demandent à se faire coffrer dans une cellule de gendarmerie peut nourire quelques fantasmes.
ReplyDeleteNow that you are mentioned it Yolande, I don't even want to know what was going on in those policemen's mind... OMG!!! Yep, it could be some fantasy for some people having 3, not 2 young Asians walking in teh gendarmerie and asked for a cell to spend a night, LOL!!! Too young to care or too young to know better...
ReplyDeleteBonjour Laure.
ReplyDeleteEt bien moi aussi (et pour cause), je trouve cette histoire tout a fait charmante et reflêtant parfaitement la mentalité du Gendarme.
En lisant Barnett (si je puis me permettre), je découvre que ça se passe à Montauban.
Dans ta narration tu parles de Gendarmerie mais aussi de policiers. Est-ce que c'étaient des policiers ou des gendarmes ?
Tu sais qu'en France ces deux corps de métiers sont similaires ou complémentaires, mais ils ne travaillent pas de la même façon et leur image n'est pas la même aux yeux de la population. S'il s'agissait bien de la brigade de Gendarmerie, la réaction de ces militaires (car se sont des militaires) est normale et avant que je ne le lise, je me doutais qu'ils offriraient le p'tit déj au réveil.
Dans un commissariat de police (sans vouloir être chauvin) je ne pense pas que vous ayez eu la même chance, ni au niveau de l'accueil, ni au niveau de l'hébergement et de son suivi.
Moi qui te trouvait au demeurant charmante, je m'aperçois par ce récit, que nous avons une "racine" commune (lol).
En quelle année ça s'est passé ?
Je t'embrasse et te renouvelle mon amitié.
Lebogeorges