Paris Insights - The Blog

by Tom Reeves

The first time
Usually I do not pay much attention when someone stops me on the street to ask for directions: I offer what information I can muster and then I continue on my way.  But on this particular day, as I was making my way up Avenue des Gobelins toward Place d’Italie, someone approached me from behind and tapped me on the left forearm.  I turned to look, and a young man asked me where the metro was located.  I replied that it was back in the direction from which we were walking.  He turned to walk in that direction and at that moment I was aware that another young man had been on my right during the encounter.  I realized that the second man had probably tried to unzip the bag that I carry, bandolier-style, over my right hip.  I thought that he probably failed, and, when I inspected the bag, I was right.

I put the incident out of my mind.

The second time
The second time occurred a day or two later as I was making my way up Passage des Postes, a walkway that links two parallel streets.  Just as I reached the end of the passageway, a man approached me from behind on my left and asked me where the metro was.  I turned to him and replied that it was in the direction from which he came.  He thanked me and turned to walk in that direction.  This time, there was no one with him, so I imagined that his inquiry was sincere, although I began wondering if there was some new phenomenon occurring that was inciting people to begin asking for directions so frequently.

The third time
The third time occurred just one or two days later when my wife and I were making our way up a narrow stairway that leads from one platform to another in the Ecole Militaire metro station.  This time a young man tapped me on the left forearm and asked me if I could tell him the time.  I thought that it should have been obvious to him that I was not wearing a watch, and replied that I did not know.  When my wife and I arrived at the upper platform, I realized that another young man, who was associated with the one who asked the question, had been behind us and to our right.  For some reason I did not attribute any malicious intent to this encounter.

The fourth time
The fourth time occurred the same day as we were making our way up Passage des Postes.  Just as we got to the end of the walkway, a young man, approaching from behind, tapped me on the left forearm and asked me where the metro was located.  I turned to him and indicated that it was in the direction from which he was walking.  Then he asked again, and my wife repeated what I had said.  At that point I saw that there was a second young man who had been following us on our right.  We watched them walk away.

Just five minutes later, arriving in our apartment, my wife realized that her wallet was missing from her small, zipped purse, which she was carrying over her shoulder along with a second, larger bag.  We concluded that it must have been the man on the right who stole the wallet while we were distracted by the first man in the Passage des Postes. 

My wife quickly called all her credit card companies to alert them to the theft. 

About an hour later, a woman who lives in the Passage des Postes contacted my wife to tell her that she found the wallet in front of her door.  My wife rushed to retrieve it and found that the small amount of cash in the wallet had been stolen as well as two local credit cards.

The conclusions that I draw from this
I think that a group of thieves has swept into Paris and will pull this stunt for as long as they can get away with it.  And then they will move on to another town.

Whether I am right or not, I write this to alert people about what is happening on the streets of Paris.  It is not sufficient to carry a zipped purse or zipped bag to prevent pick pocketing.  The bag that I carry also has a clasp, which, until now, I never used, because it requires so much fumbling to secure it to the pull of the zipper.  But that is now the point:  if is difficult for me to secure, then it will be difficult for a pickpocket to open quickly while his partner tries to engage me in brief conversation. 

Be aware and alert!

Raymond and Tamella Trapp with Monique Y. Wells
Photograph by Discover Paris!

Raymond and Tamella Trapp pose with our own Monique Y. Wells in front of the obelisk at place de la Concorde. Monique led the Trapps and their friends (not pictured) on our black history tour called “On the Grandest of Avenues” yesterday. Mr. and Mrs Trapp came to Paris to celebrate their 10th wedding anniversary.

A good time was had by all!

Click here for information about our black history in Paris tours and our gourmet activities: discoverparis.net.

We published blogs on a wide variety of topics in 2014. Here is a list of some of our best:

Book Reviews
Le Guide Hachette des Bières
Are We There Yet? – 90+ Ways You Know You’re Becoming French
Angels of Paris

Wine
Tasting Greek Wines at Mavrommatis
Thierry Givone Opens New Wine-tasting Room
Neige – An Apple Ice Wine from Quebec

Chocolate
Santiago Peralta Talks about His Chocolates at Mococha
Whisky and Chocolate Paring at Maison Claudel
Chocolat Elot from Martinique
Champagne and Chocolate at Mococha

Food Festivals
Noël Gourmand
I Love Italian Food – The Furoi Show
Les Delices d’Haïti at the Foire de Paris
Paris Street Food Festival
A Visit to the French Overseas Departments at the Paris International Agriculture Show

Miscellaneous Fun
Cocktail Party at Nose
52 Martinis Paris Cocktails Meet-up at Club Rayé
CitizenM’s Launch Party
How to Find a Party in Paris
Tropical Stars Shine over Paris
A Hands-on Pastry Workshop in the Town of Saint-Ouen

Bonne lecture et Bonne Année!

Like our blog? Join us on Facebook!

Paris Metro on Pont Bir Hakeim
©Paris Tourist Office – Photographer: Marc Bertrand

Entering onto the platform for eastbound trains of metro line 7 at the Palais Royal – Musée du Louvre station, one can often see groups of girls of slight stature – young teenagers – milling about. Their behavior is strangely childlike for girls of their ages. They move about playfully and noisily, and roughhouse as they grab each other by the necks as if to whisper secrets. They move in circles or move erratically making it difficult for passersby to walk through the group. Sometimes one of them freezes in her tracks when a person tries to pass by, forming a temporary impediment to the traveler’s forward motion.

I encountered such a group just a few days ago when my wife and I entered onto the platform to take the metro. I recognized the girls, not individually, but by their comportment and appearance. I said to my wife, “Here are the thieves.” We passed through the group and my wife later told me that one of the girls froze in front of her, hindering her passage.

As we moved mid-way down the platform, I thought that that would be the last I would see of them. However, when the train came into the station, the girls moved toward us and made a movement as if to board the car behind the car that we were about to board. Then, they collectively changed their minds and rushed to the door that we were about to step through, boarding ahead of us. A man who accompanied them boarded, too.

I sensed trouble, but my wife had already stepped aboard, so I followed. She walked to the other side of the car and stood with her back to the far door, a vigilant posture when riding the train. I followed to fill up the space next to her, but as I tried to enter the space, the man who accompanied the girls stood in the middle of the car, partially blocking my way. He stiffened his body as I tried to pass by. It was an obvious attempt to force me to stand in the middle of the car in front of him where, as soon as the train doors closed, I would be an easy target for the girls.

I forcefully pushed by the man and took the space between him and my wife. He seemed interested in the bag and camera that I was carrying, both of which were slung over my shoulder and which I gripped tightly with my right hand. I looked like a tourist with my baseball cap, my camera, and my bag, and I suspected that he and his gang of girls had targeted me for robbery.

The girls entered into a nearby space at the back of the car and made a lot of giggling noises. Whether they robbed anyone there, I don’t know, but when they emerged from the space one of them was carrying a purse that she passed to one of her cohorts. No one in the space protested, so I suppose that the purse belonged to one of the girls.

The girls and the man exited the train at Pont Neuf, the next station down the line.

I was lucky to have been able to squeeze into the space between my wife and the man, because this is what I believe would have happened if I had stayed in the middle of the car: the girls would have emerged from the back of the car and surrounded me, playing their “innocent” games, running around me, bumping into me, distracting me, and finally robbing me. I would not have been able to retreat from them, because the man or one of the girls would surely have blocked me.

Although I have never seen this technique of thievery in action, I have heard about it. I remember the words of a dazed man who stepped from a train at the Pyramides station with his companion saying, “They cleaned me out!” At the time, I remember hoping that that would never happen to me.

I’ve also encountered the following over the years:

• A girl with another group once tried to pick my pocket on the same metro line at the same station.
• A distraught American man in the Pont Neuf metro station cried out to some girls, whose cohort apparently had stolen a camera from his young son. He tried to elicit their support to find the culprit to get the camera back, and succeeded in getting them to follow him out of the station.
• Once, when I was riding metro line 6, a group of girls entered the train. As they entered, I wondered to which adult they belonged, and I wondered why they all had blank stares on their faces. They got off at the next station, the doors closed, and a woman shouted, “They got my passport!” She and her companion got off at the following station, but it was too late to do anything but report the incident to the police.
• Once, when riding metro line 1, a group of about ten girls got on the last car and then walked rapidly in single file to the front car. (Line 1 trains are designed to allow free access from one car to the next.) They brushed people as they walked by, and brushed me even though I had allowed sufficient space for them to pass. One of the girls feigned interest in looking out the window every few feet. At the next station, the girls got out and, laughing and giggling, ran down the platform to the last car to begin their game again.

Paris, alas, has become a den of thieves, and tourists and residents alike are victims of this scourge.

For more information on this increasingly worrisome phenomenon, consult these articles:

17 Paris Scams Gypsies and Thieves Revealed
The Art of the Scam: The ‘Artsy’ Side of Paris You Don’t Want to See
Caught on camera: Moment brazen cashpoint thieves swarm around tourist near Notre Dame cathedral in Paris