Duck and cover

Today is the first Wednesday of the month. And so, as I sit in my arm chair at noon watching the clouds being swept swiftly across the sunny Paris skyline, a siren reverberates across the centuries-old rooftops of the city. For a minute the quotidian sounds of traffic and voices that drift up from the street are drowned out by the eerie tones of the air raid siren. The haunting cry echoes across the city unheeded by people sipping coffee in sidewalk cafés. It is an old thread in the tapestry of Parisian sound. As historical as the countless monuments and plaques plastered on every building, and as such Parisians pay little attention to it, except to maybe set their watches. I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that people here don’t notice. Parisians live with history the way Floridians live with mosquitoes- to them it’s just a given.

Nevertheless, there was a time when the siren’s wail commanded notice. It sent hearts racing and people into the basements of buildings (or up to the rooftops in the case of the crowds watching air raids during the Great War). I have to wonder if there are any people left in Paris today who remember when the sirens used to pierce the night to warn of German attack. I wonder if the monthly testing of the civil alert system that happens the first Wednesday at noon sends them back nearly 70 years. It’s strange the effect that sound can have on a person, even one who has no firsthand experience with it. I’ve seen enough movies and old newsreels to recognize the moan of an air raid siren when I hear it (although in my mind it is equally connected with Nazi bombers and an approaching tornado-neither of which are extremely prevalent in Paris these days). I remember the first time I heard the sirens in Paris, before I knew it was a test. My pulse quickened and I turned to the window in confusion, almost expecting to see bombers in V formation descending through the thick grey clouds of Parisian winter. It’s an unnerving sound.

Why do they continue to test the civil defense system? Beats me. Other than the siren, I don’t know what the civil defense plan is, and I doubt most Parisians do either. I imagine if the siren was ever actually used it would A) be ignored- people would look at their watches and furrow their brows and wonder why they are being annoyed with that noise when it is clearly not noon on Wednesday. Obviously there’s a short in the wiring. Or B) cause mass chaos- people might realize it wasn’t a test, but they wouldn’t have the slightest idea what to do. The problem being that nowadays we lack the commonly known threats that defined past generations. If you know your enemy is a Luftwaffe squadron or a Russian nuke, at least you have some idea of how to react (although in the later you may rather climb up to the roof and get a front row view since crawling under your desk and covering your head obviously isn’t going to help). But in today’s world, where the danger comes primarily from non-state actors in untraditional methods of warfare (i.e. terrorism), the civil defense system loses its effectiveness. If Paris is attacked it will likely be in a way that allows no time to warn people, as we have seen elsewhere over the past years. At this point I could launch into a nice rant here about the ridiculousness of the French tendency to cling to the obsolete, but I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt in this case. I don’t think the French are blind to the changing nature of the threats they face. I doubt they really believe that their siren will even again save Parisian lives. In my mind, the siren’s ominous call is a memorial. An auditory monument to the events that unfolded when the sound was first heard all those years ago. A baleful tone recalling the dark days of Paris’ past. And maybe it’s a reminder that the peaceful city we live in is never really as secure as it seems. Paris has fallen before, don’t let it happen again. Remember the past, prepare for the future.

Perhaps I’ve over-romanticized what is simply the result of a culture that likes change about as much as a cat likes a bath. Whatever the reality of the situation may be, the noon test on the first Wednesday of the month in Paris will continue to make me pause long enough to remember.


I read this in a travel guide online and thought I'd share it since I got a chuckle out of it:
Nota Bene - every first Wednesday of each month at midday you will hear the air raid siren.  For some obscure reason the Parisians keep this thing going month in, month out.  So if you're an enemy of France, they ask please don't invade during the lunch hour, on a jour férié, or on the first Wednesday of the month.  Thank you, and bon appétit.