[column]Notre Dame de Paris on Fire : past and future

There are some famous monuments that do not belong neither to only one nation, nor to only one civilization, but to the whole human kind such as UNESCO cultural heritages.

Notre Dame in Paris is one of the most iconic cathedral in the world. Without any doubt, this historical monuments are much more than just stone, metal or wood. She has a big symbolic value that bring us together. This could explain why so many million of people visit them every year. It looks like a pilgrimage, going back to our common roots. And this could be the reason why so many chiefs of state and chiefs of government, such as Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Angela Merkel, Theresa May reacted immediately after Notre Dame’s fire in Paris.

And this could also explain why a few days after the fire, bistros around Notre Dame are now full of tourists, much more than before. Spontaneously, people reacted in such a way after what happened. This looks very interesting in today’s world, theoretically speaking, dominated by individualism. In fact, people still share common values nowadays. Perhaps much more than we think.

The church of Notre Dame (Our Lady) was built 850 years ago thanks to the bishop of Paris, Maurice de Sully. Construction started on 1160 A.D. and finished two centuries later! It’s one of the most beautiful buildings of the French gothic architectural style during the Middle Ages and which was spread all over Europe from Portugal to Poland and from Italy to Norway. Then, Notre Dame was restored by Eugène Viollet-le-Duc during the XIXe century.

In 1831, the famous author Victor Hugo wrote his novel Notre Dame de Paris, converting this beautiful cathedral into an endless source of inspiration, for authors, painters and artists. Notre Dame and the Eiffel Tower incarnate Paris, as well as the Sacre Coeur church and the Louvre museum. We should never forget that Notre Dame was built on the tiny island of La Cité on the Seine river, which with the other tiny island of Saint Louis, where the Celtic tribe called Parisii was living more almost three thousand years ago.

But Notre Dame is not only a strictly Parisian symbol. It is also representing the whole France. Just in front of the cathedral, there is the point from which distances are measured in France! It is there the beginning for all French roads… This means that, after all, Notre Dame has also a very practical role. And we should never forget that every year, between 13 and 14 million of tourists from all over the world visit it.

During the last 850 years many historical events took place in Notre Dame, implicating kings, emperors, as well as the General De Gaulle himself. Just like his visit on August 26, 1944 while Paris was not completely liberated by the Nazis, and everybody was afraid of snipers hiding on the roof! 72 years later, a mess was celebrated on July 27, 2016 after terrorist strikes. All this shows why Notre Dame has become one of the most important monuments for the French people.

On Monday April 16, 2019 in the afternoon, I was sipping my double espresso in a bistro in North Paris, having a very interesting discussion with a friend when someone told us: “Notre Dame is burning!“. I thought it was a very bad joke! This could never happen, because in my mind, Notre Dame was something really untouchable. Something that was there more than eight centuries ago, and that will be there for the centuries to come.

But, unfortunately, I was wrong. When I saw on TV Notre Dame’s roof on fire, I was in a state of shock. I could not believe what was happening. Everybody was watching the fire on TV and remained silent.  Then, the arrival of the firemen reassured me. I have seen Parisian firemen many times. They are extremely efficient, and they have an important know-how of how to deal with fires on historical buildings. In such a way, I was hopping that they could save the building, some relics and art crafts I admired every time I was at Notre Dame in the past.

Little by little, some good news arrived. The fire seemed to be under control and most relics and art craft was saved by firemen and the police, who risked their lives for that. Then the firemen announced that they had extinguished the fire. Only the roof was burned not the rest of the building. I was feeling much better, when conspiracy theories appeared on the Net.

Some, so-called “specialists” were saying no matter what and frankly some of them seemed really ridiculous. One of the most important monuments in the world was burning and this horrible event gave the opportunity for some to write or say such a nonsense!  For the ones, the fire was a political diversion for helping the French president, Emmanuel Macron! For the others, a Yellow Vest protestor was on the roof when the fire started (which turned out to be a statue)!

Or, there was a terrorist attack (after what happened in Paris a few years ago I find it horrible to talk about terrorism without any proof and without any news releases by the police or the ministry of justice). because of a huge conspiracy theory, we will never learn what really happened! Or, according to another commentary, the wooden roof should not burn so fast. Finally, for the far right politician, Jean-Marie Le Pen, the Notre Dame’s fire was a criminal act because 700-year-old oak wood cannot burn so easily…

I found a commentary posted online by an officer of the French firemen, specialized on the fires of historical monuments. He was really exasperated by all those so-called “imaginary fire experts”, who spread crazy rumors. Being a fireman is a very serious job, and being a fireman trying to save a historical building is even much more complicated!

This situation reminded me of the thousands of “imaginary football experts” who had never played in a professional level game in their lives, and who were heavily criticized the French National Team in the beginning of the 2018 World cup in Russia. According to them, the French team was doomed. Despite that, finally France won the World Cup by beating Croatia 4-2 in the final game…

This could probably explain why the French police sent a team of fifty investigators, working also with the firemen, in order to find out what had really happened! This reveals the determination of the French authorities. According to the first information published, it seems that it was an accidental fire and there is some link with the works done on Notre Dame’s roof. It also seems that some of the workers were smoking there even if it is strictly forbidden! However, it’s too early in order to arrive to any conclusions.

So, in my opinion the only thing to do, for the time being, is just to wait for the official report of the French police. With fifty investigators implicated, I truly believe that it’s practically impossible to hide something or not to tell the whole truth. So, there is no much place for more fake news in this case. Notre Dame’s fire was a big trauma for everybody. This is the reason why people should remain calm and look for reliable information sources.

Another good news was the rich French people’s reaction for the Notre Dame’s fire. Within a few hours, the richest families in the country donated one billion euros. There was so much money donated that Notre Dame will be repaired without any cost for the French public authorities. In my opinion, this could be interpreted in the following way. Despite what it is commonly said, there is still a lot of solidarity in France, especially when there is a big crisis.

I will never forget the biggest demonstration in the history of contemporary France on January 11, 2015 after the assassination of some French journalists, policemen and civilians by terrorists. I demonstrated with 3.7 million people for defending French values of freedom, of liberty of the press and of the Parisian way of Life (according to Hemmingway, Paris is a party). Four years later, some wealthy French businessmen giving such an amount of money for restoring Notre Dame is another example, of an up-bottom solidarity, after the bottom-up one of 2015 and I find it great.

But, in such a heavily politicized country like France, all this money donated turned out to be an issue for a political debate.  Some commentaries appeared in social media criticizing the donors. The first reason was that according to the French law, there is a 66% tax-relief for every donation. The second reason was that, according to some, all this money should be used for helping homeless people in Paris (known as SDF, sans domicile fixe, in French) or for social programs for the poor.

There was someone who considered that restoring an old monument was useless when human beings are suffering. According to one or two, Notre Dame is a very rich institution and there is no need for funding restoration works! Of course, all this seems quite shocking, but it could be explained by the deep impact of the Yellow Vests’ crisis, as well as of the longstanding French secular tradition. Since November 2018, there is a very strong demand from blue collar workers for more social justice and for more purchasing power.

This could also explain why, for some protestors, Notre Dame’s restoration became another symbol of the huge gap between the French elites and the ordinary citizens. Even though a well-known Left-wing political leader (and a well-known atheist) Jean-Luc Mélenchon published an article explaining his love for Notre Dame, a historical monument! In the meanwhile, thousands of donators from 160 different countries offered money for the restoration of Notre Dame. Giving from 3 to some thousands of Euros. Confirming in such a way the international interest about this historical monument.

For the French president, Emmanuel Macron the Notre Dame’s fire obliged him to cancel the announcement of the measures for responding to the Yellow Vests’ crisis for a few days.  On April 16, Macron went to Notre Dame, with the Prime minister Edouard Philippe and the mayor of Paris, Anne Hildago. Then he declared that he wanted to restore Notre Dame in five years. This was immediately considered as a political maneuver and almost 1200 specialists on the restoration of historical monuments signed a petition explaining that Notre Dame’s restoration should take all the necessary time in order to be done well.

In the same time another question was raised about the use of woods again for the roof, or concrete (just like to the cathedral of Sarthe in the past) for eliminating any danger of fire in the future. This dilemma of restoring a historical monument using modern or traditional materials seems to be one of the hot potatoes of the Notre Dame’s restoration. And a friend of mine support that the new roof should be made by glass by allowing in such a way natural light to arrive in the interior of the burnt cathedral. I don’t share his opinion, even though I found it quite original.

I always consider myself as open-minded and realistic. Thus, I believe that all that shows how people are really interested about Notre Dame. I am 100% sure that Notre Dame will be restored in a few years without any problem. What happened revealed us not only of how important old monuments are for all of us, but also of how fragile they are.