But enough about dead people. Don’t worry, I get it. You come to Paris and you want something fun, something colourful, not a pack of clichés about how every street echoes with history, how you’re walking in all these people’s footsteps. You want something different, you want some pics no one else is going to have. Absolutely. It’s like they say in your country: the customer is always right.
So here’s an idea. How about wildlife? You didn’t see that coming. And no, I’m not just talking about pigeons and seagulls. Did you know Paris is home to several thousand ring-necked parakeets? Yes, I said parakeets. Psittacula krameri. Step into any park and listen for long enough, and eventually you’ll hear a shrill, excited screech. Look up and you’ll see it: a flash of green darting frantically above you like some indignant party-guest who thinks the food will be gone by the time they arrive.
Now here’s a secret. One of the best places in the Paris region to see ring-necked parakeets is the Cité de la Muette in Drancy. Trust me, this spot is way off the beaten track. You’ve got to take the RER B train and then the 143 bus, but it’s worth it. If you cross the road from the Square de la Libération bus stop, pass the sculpture and the railcar, and take the tree-lined path across the first patch of grass, you’ll reach a shady, fenced-in park in the middle of the U-shaped apartment complex. There, thanks to an old man who lovingly fills, cleans, and tends them, a set of hanging feeders draws a regular flock of parakeets.
Ignore the cigarette butts, beer bottles, and plastic scraps in the grass; ignore the pigeons, some pecking for food, some lying dead on the ground. Look up among the plane trees, and you’ll see them, the beauties: neon green, with curved red beaks, orange circles around the eyes, and a stripe around the neck. The ones with the bold pink and black neck-rings, those are the males.
Take a few minutes to walk around while you’re there; get to know the birds’ natural habitat. The Cité de la Muette – City of the Speechless – is a social housing community dating back to the 30s. A grim, industrial sort of place, the pinkish paint is chipping, black grime creeps over the pebbled panels, and a few white blinds dangle limply, half-detached. The two long, skinny flanks of the U-shape, dotted with dark windows, look like exhausted skyscrapers that lay down for a nap and couldn’t get up again.
You might see a pair of phone-scrolling young men perched on the metal steps of the railcar on the lawn. If you make eye contact, they’ll smile at you obligingly, stand up, and step away, as though they know they might come off as mildly disrespectful. Still, it’s their backyard. Smile back. Take a look at the railcar if you’re interested – it’s authentic SNCF, from 1941.
But you’re here for the wildlife. Head back to the central park. Watch as the parakeets tilt their heads in curious ways, hop and scramble along the branches, grab at the feeders, crunch with their beaks. There’s something about them, how unselfconscious they are, how loud and eager and earnest. Real bons-vivants, those parakeets. They eat everything. They sometimes attack or chase away bats and native birds and nab their nesting holes in the trunks of old trees. Some say they should be put down. Either rounded up and sent back wherever they came from, or just shot en masse. The pun-inclined support wring-necked parakeets. Practical folks suggest poisoning the feeders.
The residents of Cité de la Muette disagree. Largely immigrants or children of immigrants, they’ve been called invaders themselves – as though they’ve snatched this crumbling nesting hole from anyone. They’re just the latest people to find themselves crammed together here in Cité de la Muette, out of sight like the skeletons in Paris’s closet. Closet, cage, call it what you will. A U-shape’s ideal if you’re in the market for a concentration camp; three sides of the prison are already there, ready to go. And the location – unbeatable. Quick bus ride to Le Bourget station, and from there it’s a snap, a one-way train ticket east.
But on a sunny spring afternoon, the sound of children screaming won’t remind you of any of that. After all, they’re only playing soccer across the hedge from the railcar. Next door, more children pour through the gates out of Joliot Curie/Pablo Picasso Elementary School, joining hands with their chatting parents. Before you is the full gradient of human skin-tones and a dazzling variety of forms of dress. The sound of French blends brightly with snippets of other languages as the kids skip along, swinging their parents’ arms, over the burgundy sidewalk beneath which the prisoners dug a 36-metre escape tunnel back in 1943. They were caught just before making it out: Three more metres to freedom! cries a plaque in the grass.
Take a seat on a warped metal bench. Let the parakeets zip giddily above you. Let the sun and the happy chatter wash over you. Don’t worry if it all feels like a hallucination. Eventually, the last of the children disperse – some across toward the bus stop or nearby buildings, some into the shabby stairwells of Cité de la Muette – and a contented quiet descends over the complex. You might wonder, does it ever feel cramped, growing up alongside sixty thousand ghosts? Does this place ever feel like a trap? The doors to the stairwells stay open. A gentle breeze blows, rippling the huge French flag by the road and ruffling the hair of the homeless man who sleeps on the sun-warmed grass by the railcar; in the shade of the plane trees, a dented Fanta Orange can rattles along the bumpy ground.
But stay focused. You’ve got a Seine dinner cruise to catch, and you’ve got to get back to your hotel to get changed. Snap a few more photos of the birds before the feeders run out. Here’s a tip: shots with food in their beaks tend to get the most likes. And try to get a close-up of the eye, or the band around the throat that looks like a garrote. Then leave the City of the Speechless and head across toward the road. You’re almost back at the 143 stop, where you, too, can catch a bus to Le Bourget station, where a long, dark train will be awaiting you. Just a bit further. Three more metres to freedom.
