The Pillars of Hercules

I had a pizza, and walked around, but all my attempts to start conversations with the Monagasques ended in failure. That was another unhelpful personality trait of tax exiles—paranoia.

Farther down the railway line, nasturtiums grew like weeds at Rocquebrune, and in Cabrolles there was space and light and a great valley slotted into a range of high snow-dusted mountains, with stony features that matched those of the local bourgeoisie.

Menton was a Victorian-looking seaside resort of indescribable dullness. The fat, philandering Edward VII used to like it here, for the apparently limitless opportunities it afforded him to eat and chase women. Menton was having its own celebration today, the Lemon Festival (Fête du Citron). This one was obvious and programmatic, and it was watched without much enthusiasm. The floats were constructed of lemons and oranges in the shape of whales, dinosaurs, the Eiffel Tower, airplanes, full-figured women, windmills and so forth. It was neither as rich nor as revealing as Nice’s parade with its flowers and oddballs.

I had decided that if I grew cranky I would simply move on to a better place, but it was not convenient for me to leave Menton. I did see the reality of United Europe at Menton station. Here we were on the border between France and Italy. A group of elderly Italians, none of them younger than seventy or so, were trying to buy cups of coffee and some cookies. The French woman at the counter was snarling at them.

“If you don’t have the money stop wasting my time,” she said.

They did not have French money, they did not speak French. The woman at the counter, a mile or so from Italy, did not speak Italian.

“What is she saying?” a man asked plaintively in Italian.

“She is asking for money.”

“If you want to buy, change your money!” the woman said in French.

“For francs, I think.”

An Italian said to her in Italian, “All we want to buy is coffee. It’s not worth changing money for that.”

Another Italian said to her in Italian, “We will give you a thousand lire apiece. You can keep the change.”

“Don’t you understand me?” the French woman said.

So there was no sale, nor were the Italians able to eat or drink anything; the border between France and Italy was simple to pass through, but the language barrier was insurmountable.

The European Union, seen from the Mediterranean, was full of misunderstandings which made that argument a trifle. People were so confused about EC regulations in the Mediterranean that Euro-rules had become Euro-myths. They were ludicrous, but still they were believed, and they made EC nationals angry. Fishermen will have to wear hair nets, it was said. All fishing trawlers will have to carry a supply of condoms. There would be a ban on curved cucumbers. British oak would no longer be used in furniture because it was too knotty. Donkeys on beaches would have to wear diapers because of droppings. Henceforth, all European Community coffins would have to be waterproof.

There were advantages to being in the European Community, but the Mediterranean was a community, too. At the fruiterer’s in Menton in February there were grapes from Tunisia, strawberries from Huelva in Spain, tomatoes from Morocco and Sicily, mandarin oranges from Sicily, and the North African dates, figs, prunes, nuts. Clementines from Corsica. And locally grown artichokes and lemons, and apples (Bertranne and Granny Smiths)—all from Provence. In addition, there were cheese, sausages, honey and preserves, and ten varieties of olives. Almost the whole of the world’s production of olive oil came from these neighboring Mediterranean countries. The suburban density in Menton and on the Riviera generally was misleading; the shoreline catered to the hordes of tourists and the complacent rich, but just across the coastal highway and railway tracks the land was still profoundly agricultural—both in mood and culture.

Back in Nice, I did my laundry, sitting in “Albertinette,” the launderette, and writing notes. On my right was a housewife folding clothes, on my left an Arab watching his clothes revolve in the washer. With maintenance in mind, I got a haircut afterwards. The woman cutting it was interrupted by a man who came up and began gesticulating and complaining.

He said in French, “Your hair is too long!”

“That’s why I am here,” I said.

“But it’s still too long, the way you have it.”

“You don’t approve of my hair?”

“No. You need to emphasize your body,” he said, becoming passionate, plucking at my hair. “Cut the hair shorter, show the energy of the face. Make it so you can run fingers through it—like this! Get some harmony!”

I was not sure whether he actually believed this or was simply teasing me by pretending to be a stereotypical Frenchman and demonstrating how passionately he could talk about trivialities. On the other hand, maybe he was serious. In any case, I ended up with very short hair.