Us vs. Them

It's become so normal for me now.

On Friday night I had dinner with an American, a Tunisian, a Venezuelan, and a Dominican. On Saturday night I went out with the Tunisian again. I work with a Moroccan, a French man from Martinique, a French woman born in Paris, an American, and an Englishman. During the one block walk from the metro to work, I pass by shops run or staffed by Kabyles, Tunisian Arabs, Romanians, and Syrians. When we go out to eat for lunch the ethnic foods available within walking distance include Chinese, Vietnamese, Thai, Laos, Italian, French, Turk, and American (that is to say Subway and McDonald's, if that counts).

Like New York and London, Paris is a world city. You can find someone here from almost every corner of the world. Very few people are actually from here, and those that are keep to themselves. Most French people in Paris were not born in Paris, so even if they share the French culture, they share the feeling 'I'm not from here'. Most places in the world, the locals outnumber the non-locals. Everyone remembers a time when they were the locals and also when they left home and became the non-locals. In Paris, though, that sense of 'us vs. them' is virtually nonexistent. Because, when it comes down to it, we are all them.