Ritika Janiya
It proved to be a grand success after the massive outflow of Parisians from that city. In so many competing and spectacular events, with excited tourists filling the streets and venues, the Games presented Paris at its best. The townspeople may have missed it, though the city never shone brighter in the glow that remains in everyone’s memory.
While Paris is often called the City of Lights, it more rightly was called the City of Tourists during the year 2024 Olympic Games. Very few of the millions of ushered visitors remained in town. Instead, they were heading for the hills and everywhere else, allowing the entirety of the city to view some of the most hopeful Olympic Games of the century. Imagine a movie scene where everyone’s running away, leaving a ghost town, except instead of a disaster, this was one of the best things to happen to Paris in years!
Here, my friend—a postgraduate not a fool—works in a fancy research laboratory in Montparnasse and realized how empty the city had become. “My office was barely 20 or 30 percent full,” he said. Most of his colleagues took the opportunity to work from home, or more likely skipped town to avoid the crowds and chaos.
Even President Macron joined the exodus. After opening the Games and attending a few events, including the watching French swimming star Léon Marchand win four gold medals, Macron retreated to his countryside island fort. Only tourists like us have remained here, turning Paris into a playground for Olympic fans from all over the world.
All in all, though, for all the flight, Paris 2024 has been an absolutely brilliant Olympiad. It’s probably in the top three of 21st-century Games, along with London 2012 and Sydney 2000. Sadly, however, most Parisians never saw a second of it. August is when everybody deserts Paris. The business districts notoriously empty out; the locals head for the coast, and the city is left entirely to the tourists. They started their vacation a week early to avoid all the headaches expected to be caused by closed Metro stations and walls built around Olympic venues, such as Place de la Concorde.
It was foreseen also on the same scale before the London 2012 Olympics, with a feared mass exodus of Londoners from the city to prevent transportation mayhem. It did not quite have the same feel as Paris, where bistros were full of out-of-towners. Imagine sitting at a table next to a group of Dutch fans in their full orange regalia, Americans who cannot keep their voices down, or a Chinese group that goes into panic mode seeing a wasp! Amazingly, apart from a few exceptions, the Parisian waiters were friendly and even pulled out the English menu with a handshake.
This international flavor did not, however, deny the very French feel of the Games. The French are passionate fans. Their support was enthusiastic and at times electric, raising the emotion of every venue. It was just like the London Olympics, with all stadiums jam-packed and all fans on their feet. But most of those cheering were from the provinces, not Paris.
The first week of the Games attracted around 1.73 million overseas visitors and 1.63 million day-trippers from departments such as Gironde, Loire-Atlantique, and Haute-Garonne, the tourist board has said. Did it boost the economy? One might struggle to conclude so. Some restaurateurs claimed that this summer spell they saw lower business volumes than usual, but according to figures published by the government, everything was super. In any event, the beautiful TV images of Paris will prove to be a great investment in the reputation of the city in the long run. After all, what more could one ask than to be fencing under the shining dome of the Grand Palais?
One stereotype thrown at the French is that, living in one of the most beautiful countries on earth, they sure are a sour bunch. As French travel writer Sylvain Tesson once put it, “France is a paradise inhabited by people who think they are in hell.” But at Olympics time, Paris felt different. A city that has had its fill of tough times—with protests and political tensions—seemed unusually cheerful. As one ex-pat Parisian reporter commented in a social media post, “I haven’t seen the city so carefree and happy in a long time.”
The two-week Olympic party—complete with breakdancers and other performers—was when Paris came alive in a way it hasn’t in years. Gracious volunteers, a huge police presence to control everyone’s safety, but the real star—the city’s transport system—whizzed people around really fast and with great efficiency.
In the end, this could be what happens: most likely, the French will be the first to look back at it all, at Paris 2024, with the sort of wistfulness that the British always seem to be able to muster for London 2012. The Games have gone well, and the opening ceremony is remembered as a cultural high-water mark for France. Even those who left the city are starting to feel a little regret. One artist, Guillaume Sardin, admitted this to Conde Nast Traveller, “I watched the first week of events on TV and definitely felt some regret.”
But then again, this is France, and they will have moved on from that quite soon. Most Parisians would behave as if they had been here all along and lived life to the fullest during these Olympic Games. And who can blame them? Paris 2024 was Games worth remembering, either present or just watching.
