May 1, 2012
Adaptation (2)

Up at 7:30 a.m., I am ready to start walking by 8:30 a.m. This time I walk along the West side of the port, passing cafe after cafe, as far as Fort Saint Jean. I turn up hill towards Place de Lenche and rue Montee des Accoules neighborhood in the Panier quarter. This is one of the oldest neighborhoods in Marweille, a cartier populaire --a working class area. I walk to Place des Moulins, a quiet residential square with lilac trees in bloom, spilling their scent. However, the CAthedrale La Major, the brown and white striped church, is nowhere to be seen, although I saw it peeking out above the buildings when I first ascended.

A woman I find walking in the area sends me bak down Monte des Accoules, and tells me to turn right at rue de l'Eveche when I reach Place de Lenche again, then to take rue des Repenties (street of the Repentent). I do so, passing a large dead rat lying in the street, followed by two cats running in the opposite direction, and feel reassured. following rue de l'Eveche I come upon the cathedral, which is flush against the Gare Maritime the harbor where cruise ships and cargo ships settle when they reach Marseille. In front of the church there s a giant statue of Monsignor de Belsunce, the bishop of Marseille during the plague of 1720, his arms open in welcome. Belsunce devoted himself to the sick, saying that he was, in God's name, responsible for them, their father and would not abandon them. There is a square Belsunce as well.

Along the plaza in front of the cathedral (which unfortunately is open only three days a year: Palm Sunday, Easter and for Christmas Eve Mass) are sitting various solitary men, ship-spotting. A young woman, a jogger, goes by, oblivious. The area is probably not anywhere to be at night, but in the brilliant sunshine, Fort Saint Jean is a marvelous alternative vantage point to Fort Saint Nicholas on the other side.

Thinking I am going to walk to the Memorial to La Marseillaise on rue Thubonneau, I walk back to the Panier towards rue Belles s'Ecuelles. I see a covered stairway, a dark passage covered with graffiti. I guess it leads to Place Sadi Carnot, which I think will lead me towards the memorial. I ask a Maghrebien gentleman whether I will, indeed reach Sadi Carnot this way, and he affirms I am on the right way. I walk down the stairs with him and find myself on rue de la Republique, one of the longest streets in the city, where a group of CGT union members are assembling to march, as is traditional on May 1, all over France. I follow the street to rue St. Cannat, where a group of young men sans domicile fixe --the French term for "homeless" are camped out on the steps of the church of the same name, along with a German shepherd. I turn on rue Close Precheurs, and all of a sudden I am in front of the Galeries Lafayette next to my hotel. I have circled the Panier and back and still have time left over. I go to the hotel to freshen up, and go out again, looking for the memorial to the Marseillaise.

It turns out to be difficult to find. I pick up rue d'Aix going west, stopping at a Maghrebien bakery to buy three crescent shaped cookies and a sweeted mint tea, all of which are delicious. After following rue d'Aix (where all the shops, run by Maghrebiens, are open), I find myself in front of an arc like the Arc de Triopmphe. I think I am at Square Belsunce, but the police disabuse me of the notion that I am anywhere near where I want to be, and I retrace my steps, waving a greeting to the man who sold me the tea and cookies to let him know how much I like the tea, especially. rue d'Aix becomes Cours Belsunce, a pedestrianized area of cafes and shops, off of which is rue Thubonneau, where the memorial is located. I can see a giant replica of the tricolor swirling: I have found my destination, and I know it must be open, because the brochure I have says that on the First of May it is.


It is not. A man parked in front of the entrance to the memorial looks at the brochure and erroneously tells me several times the first of May is not listed. Finally conceding that the brochure does say the memorial is open May 1, he says "Maybe they open after two p.m." Allons enfants de la patrie, le jour de gloire est arrivee --but the memorial is closed. It cannot be assumed that because a brochure says a naional monument is open on a particular holiday that it is open the hours it is normally open --although the brochure makes no mention of special opening hours on those holidays.
Once more, I go back to the hotel.

This time I set out along the Canebiere towards the Reform Church, which is not Protestant, but actually Catholic. Beyond that I take rue Franklin Roosevelt, then rue Monte Cristo to Place Sebastopol, an area Fabrice Busconi told me to take in. The square is nothing special, but in the vicinity are some lovely apartment buildings in a bourgeois neighborhood. I see a park and walk towards it, tumbling upon Boulevard Phillipon, which is having a vide-grenier an annual flea market that gives residents of the neighborhood a chance to sell clothes, books, bric-a-brac, DVDs --anything they are tired of. The flea market runs all the way to the Palais Longchamp (which houses Marseille's Fine Arts and Natural History museums). I do very well here: two new dresses for 2 Euros each, two pairs of long pants for 50 centimes and 2 euros each; and two books, for 2 Euros each --plus a free tote bag to carry it all in. (--In France plastic bags cost from a few centimes to a few Euros at the supermarket, depending on the quality, and not ever clothing store gives them, either.)

I walk back to the hotel, drop my loop, shower and put on one of the dresses, a lilac cotton shirtdress with hidden buttons. It is nice to put on a dress after so many weeks in pants. I make my way back to the Memorial de la Marseillaise, hopefully. It is, indeed open. A very tall young man, very neatly turned out in his t-shirt and casual pants, explains that the visit is done in three rooms: the first introduces the many different versions to which the music of La Marseillaise has been set; the second sets the stage, by providing background about the French Revolution and Marseille's role in the events of 1789; the third room explains the role of the federes marseillais --the five hundred or so volunteers who marched from the city to Paris and on to Valmy, where the untested French volunteers defeated the anti-Revolutionary forces led by the Prussian Duke of Brunswick, on September 20, 1792. The end of the monarchy was declared after the Prussian defeat near the village, which is in Champagne-Ardenne.

The first room features many versions of La Marseillaise --one is anti-clerical, another is for peace, another is feminist. Each version is sung by a performer in costume, and with feeling. Following these, tapes of famous figures singing the song are shown: De Gaulle singing it after presenting the French people with his plan for a new constitution, which created the Fifth Republic in 1958; Oberkampf, a punk band singing it at the eponymous Metro stop in Paris.


And finally, Serge Gainsbourg singing his version Aux armes, etcetera, a reggae recorded with Bob Marley in 1978, a version that caused outrage and triggered death threats against Gainsbourg. In defiance of the berets rouges, the French soldiers who fought in the Algeria, who had assembled to prevent his 1979 concert in Paris --and did so-- Gainsbourg sang La Marseillaise. He preceded singing the song with his declaration Je suis un insoumis --I am a rebel-- and launched into the song, which the berets rouges joined in singing.

The cause of the anger of the berets rouges? That the song was sung to a black beat, and that at the chorus, Gainsbourg did not sing the full chorus,

Aux armes, citoyens!
Formez vos bataillons!
Marchons, marchons!
Qu'un sang impur
Abreuve nos sillons!

but merely--

Aux armes

followed by "etcetera" to the song's end.

The story does not end here, though. The following year Gainsbourg bought the original manuscript of La Marseillaise to show that in the original version Rouget de Lisle, the lyricist, literally wrote

Aux armes, citoyens...

--rather than writing the full chorus six times after the first. Gainsbourg considered this a kind of vindication of his version.