Like many people, I was at home relaxing after a tough week of work with a bottle of wine when news started to come through that something was happening in Paris. Explosions had been heard during France’s friendly with Germany at the Stade de France, and there had been news of a shootout in the city. Everything was confusing, but we knew that something terrible had happened.
In Paris, only a short train ride from London, people had been doing the same. Football fans had taken their children to watch their heroes, couples were out having a glass of wine and a bite to eat – a chance to unwind on a Friday night. Scores of people had gone to watch a rock band play at a popular concert venue.
Some of those people didn’t come home.
Some are still missing.
Some will forever bear the scars of what they witnessed that night.
Their families and friends too are suffering.
Today, the fallout from Friday night’s tragic events continues. The French authorities are hunting for those who might have helped the attackers carry out their deadly plan. Families continue to search for their loved ones, desperately hoping for good news. Parents wait, and pray at the bedsides of their children in hospital. Tales of the heroism of those who were in the Bataclan concert hall and helped fellow fans are emerging, along with grisly mobile phone footage of the horror that unfolded inside the venue.
And this is the second time Paris has been the subject of a devastating terror attack in less than a year.
People are asking why?
And people are thinking “what does this mean for us?”
One of the subplots to emerge from the Paris massacre is why it does matter to those of us on the other side of La Manche?
In a show of solidarity, Facebook offered users the chance to lay a Tricolore filter over their profile picture – an opportunity seized by many, only to be followed by a backlash from others who questioned why their friends were so concerned with Paris, when similar tragedies had unfolded in Beirut and Baghdad in the days leading up to Friday, while Japan was hit by a powerful earthquake.
Were those who turned their snapshots blue, white and red and re-posted their holiday photographs of the Eiffel Tower prioritising one set of deaths over another?
Perhaps the answer lies in the fact that so many of us have holiday photographs of the Eiffel Tower.
At its nearest point, France is just 20 miles from the UK. You can fly to Paris from Heathrow in an hour, and take the train in not much longer. Our children beg us to take them to Disneyland Paris, while we enjoy more leisurely trips to the Loire Valley or Provence, stock up on bargain wine in Calais and come winter we go skiing in Chamonix, each time eager to show off what we can remember of our GCSE French lessons.
The entente between our two countries may not have always been quite so cordiale, and we may still jovially trade the insults of “frogs” or “rosbifs”. But we have by-and-large muddled along for more than a century, notably helping one another out in times of trouble.
That’s why many of us Brits were so moved by the events of Friday night. We aren’t ranking tragedies by order of preference, we are grieving for our neighbours, our friends, and, given that at least one Briton was killed on Friday night, our own.
Already, thoughts have turned to the knock-on effects that this tragedy will have on our own streets. Reports that Special Forces will be on high alert, having been given orders to “shoot to kill” if needed, and that extra spies will be recruited are filling the newspapers. Armed police will be on duty as England take on France at Wembley tomorrow night, with English fans practising La Marseillaise as a show of solidarity and support for the visitors. Talk again returns to whether we should ramp up our own efforts in tackling the scourge of Isis in Iraq, and particularly Syria, while those of us with loved ones in the Armed Forces wonder how a decision on this may affect them.
Friday night was the most deadly attack on French soil since the Second World War. And newspapers aren’t ‘ignoring’ events elsewhere in the world (read any broadsheet or click on the world news section of a website if you don’t believe me) but are responding to the concerns and interests of their British audiences, who are saddened by the losses in France, and who want to know what it means for them.
Just a few days before the attacks devastated Paris I was lucky enough to spend the weekend in what is one of my favourite cities.
I took one of my best friends with me, who had never been before, and as we set off back to Heathrow we remarked how we much we wanted to return as soon as possible. That still rings true.
We admired the gargoyles of Notre Dame and the more conventionally beautiful light show at the Eiffel Tower. We browsed the shelves of Shakespeare & Company, stocked up on beauty treats at the nearest pharmacie and took a boat trip along the Seine.
The weather was warm for November and the city was soaking up the Autumn sunshine as Parisians played pétanque and read L’Equipe in the Jardin des Tuileries. Merchants were setting up a Christmas market and tourists were excitedly craning their necks in an attempt to fit the entire Arc du Triomphe into a selfie.
Everywhere we went we were greeted by friendly people who were eager to show us the best that their great city had to offer, drawing maps so we might find the best place to get ice cream or the quickest route back to our hotel.
This is the Paris we all know, and love.
Right now, Parisians are shocked, they are scared and they are hurting. Their city may well have changed forever. But they are remembering the words of their national motto: Liberté, égalité, fraternité, and they are determined not to be defeated.
They will never forget what happened, and in the coming weeks returning to a sense of normality will not be easy.
But they will continue to take their children to the football. They will continue to go on dates to their favourite restaurants and they will go to listen to their favourite bands play.
And so must we.
Army WAG 