Paris syndrome

When we reach Paris, the coach remains gingerly on the outskirts, a vast spaghetti of motorways, concrete tunnels and tower-blocks. We peel off a six-lane motorway and into an underground bus depot in a place called Gallieni.

This place must be a textbook trigger of what medics call Paris syndrome: a feeling of complete disorientation experienced on arrival, when the reality of the city fails to live up to the visitor's romantic expectations.

To reach the centre of Paris, I take the metro. The trains of the Parisian metro run like clockwork. I refer not only to their punctuality but also to the mechanical charm with which they barrel along the tracks. The opening of doors is still operated by the passengers themselves. At stations, the most impatient passengers press their ears to the train door and await the click that unlocks the doors, their cue to flick the handle.