On an unprepossessing street corner in the 10th arrondissement in Paris, the 2024 Olympics came to an end via a giant TV screen for around 30 people inside Le Mondial brasserie and 20 others listening and occasionally looking in from the chairs outside. Some 10 kilometres to the north in Saint Denis, 75,000 spectators were packed into the Stade de France for the in person experience of a closing ceremony,
Marie, ensconced on a stool a few metres from Le Mondial's counter and awaiting a drink, readily conceded she had been an Olympics doomsayer. “Well, I am a Parisienne,” she added with un petit soupcon of self-mockery to justify the default cycnicsm.
