Seduction and Sexual Harassment in Paris
The city is a little grungier, and a good deal more fucked up, than the movies show.
True stories from the streets of what is still seen as the world’s most romantic city…
The Banks of the Seine
I am eighteen, and new to Paris. It is a sunny September day, one of those evenings that feels like it will last forever, where the light of the dimming sun tinges buildings pink. I’ve just finished my first day of university.
I am a student now. I left home and I’m living in Paris all on my own, and I feel so elated. I want to know everything about my new city, and I want to bathe in its beauty and romance. I stare at every building along the banks of the Seine as I walk along it, getting further and further from the tourists and revellers of Saint Michel to a part of the bank which is completely empty. And that is when he starts to follow me.
He is tall and bulky. Probably about 35. He says hi and asks me how I am. He asks me if I have a boyfriend. He asks me to kiss him. And when I say no, he kisses me anyway, and laughs.
I walk on. He walks beside me. Making me touch him. Touching me.
