Gavin Mortimer

If there is a God, He's not French. Last night I was on the balcony of my apartment in Paris enjoying a celebratory 'deconfinement' bottle of wine; this morning on my first day of (partial) liberty there is heavy rain and high wind. So much for getting out and about on day one of post-lockdown life in France. Not that it will be that easy even when the weather does stop misbehaving. Paris is in the 'red zone', one of four regions of France that still has many restrictions in place, affecting 27 million people. In the 'green' zone, effectively the west and south of the country, parks are open, primary and secondary schools and shops are reopening and some beaches are also accessible. In Paris, however, while most shops will reopen the parks remain closed, as do secondary schools.

Today marks the third month of my confinement in my fifth floor apartment in Paris. As I wrote all those weeks ago, shortly after president Macron declared his 'war' on coronavirus, I had adopted a prisoner psychology to see me through what I suspected from the outset would be six weeks minimum of lockdown. I wasn't wrong. I'm due for release on Monday May 11th but I can't say I'm counting down every second with a sense of impatience. Not that I want to stay locked up but I'm not sure life will change that much in the short term once I've regained my liberty: no bars or restaurants to visit, no cinemas or theatres open, no sport to watch and no travelling beyond a 100km radius. It's not going to be a summer of fun.

One of the persistent misconceptions of the riots that swept through France in the autumn of 2005 is that they were solely the result of the deaths of two youths as they ran from the police. The deaths of the teenagers on October 27 in Clichy-Montfermeil provoked unrest in the north-eastern Parisian suburb but it was what happened three days later that led to three weeks of nationwide riots and the declaration of a state of emergency by the then president of France, Jacques Chirac. According to Gilles Kepel in his 2015 book, Terror in France: genesis of the French Jihad, it was a stray tear gas grenade fired by police that landed close to the entrance of a mosque that lit the touch paper.

A couple of hours before Emmanuel Macron addressed France on Sunday night I received a meme on WhatsApp from a French friend. It was a game card for 'Macron's Aperitif Bingo', the rules for which were simple: swigs of a drink of your choice would have to be downed every time the president said a certain word or phrase during his latest declaration about his 'war' on coronavirus. 'War' incidentally was two swigs, while 'shortage of masks' was three and 'sacrifices' was four. I imagine that by the end of the president's speech quite a few players were somewhat unsteady on their feet. One suspects that Macron would not have been amused to learn that while he was making his solemn address to the nation, many of his 'chers compatriotes' were guzzling at his expense.

What with the wall-to-wall media coverage of the coronavirus pandemic it had rather slipped one's mind that there are other serious issues confronting Europe, but France got a bloody reminder at the weekend. On Saturday, a knifeman ran amok in the south-eastern town of Romans-sur-Isere, killing two people and wounding five. According to eyewitnesses, the alleged perpetrator, a Sudanese national who was granted asylum in 2017, accompanied his deadly assault outside a boulangerie with cries of 'Allah Akbar'. It is claimed in the French media that when police searched his flat they found handwritten documents in which he complained of living in 'a country of non-believers'.

When I left my apartment for my morning run today I saw that someone had scrawled on the courtyard in large chalk letters 'Tenez Bon, Les Voisins' (Hang in there, neighbours). It could have been a message for the whole country. France is flagging after two and a half weeks of complete lockdown and the fact that today is the start of the official Easter holidays will only fray nerves further. To make matters worse, the country will be treated to a taste of summer this weekend with temperatures from Paris to the Pyrenees forecast to touch 23C on Sunday. In an interview today the Minister of the Interior, Christophe Castaner, revealed that since France went into lockdown on March 17 there have been 6.

As France prepares to enter its third week of confinement the Prime Minister, Edouard Philippe, has warned that ‘the fight has only just begun’. Coronavirus has claimed 2,606 French lives to date, but at a press conference on Saturday evening Philippe said: ‘The first 15 days of April will be even more difficult than the last 15 days.’ Earlier in the week Philippe had praised the resolve of the vast majority for respecting the lockdown, and he urged France to hold the course while announcing that the confinement will continue until at least April 15. ‘This struggle will last,’ he said. ‘We will only win by being disciplined and observing lockdown measures.’ But how long can the French hold out?

There was a touch of schadenfreude as I heard that Britain has followed France, Italy and several other European countries in locking down. In the last week or so there have been a number of articles about how Britain would never impose on its people the draconian measures taken by Emmanuel Macron and others because their countries, unlike ours, have a history of authoritarian government. Boris Johnson was admirable in his wish to avoid locking down the country but the indiscipline of millions of his people left him no choice. Boris can't be blamed for the packed pubs last week, the teeming parks at the weekend or the street barbecues this week. Nor can he take the rap for the stripping of supermarket shelves up and down the country, a phenomenon which in Europe is unique to Britain.

Any hope that the two week 'confinement' imposed by President Macron would heal France’s deep divisions has vanished as swiftly as food on the supermarket shelves here. There is growing anger in the provinces at the sudden arrival of thousands of well-heeled Parisians, who have fled the capital for their second homes. Many seaside residents in Brittany and the Côte d'Azur are senior citizens and they are furious about the sight of selfish Parisians stripping their stores of essential goods. Back in Paris, meanwhile, video footage has been uploaded onto several right-leaning news outlets of some mild disorder outside shops in districts such as Barbès, Château Rouge and La Chapelle.