I have yet to meet a person who has not suffered a major/minor depression after having lived two years in Paris! Paris, the city of love, promises to many way more than it can offer sometimes creating in individuals a delusional acute state known as the Paris Syndrome. Japanese tourists, dreamers, cinephiles, wanderers are only few amongst many susceptible to the Paris Syndrome. However, people that are destined to Paris for more than a couple of years experience the city and its people differently. At the beginning, Paris' inhabitants may experience an overwhelming child-like appreciation of the beauty of every street, cafe, or park, sometimes to the point of experiencing a Stendhal Syndrome. With time, however, this beauty fades as we cement our images of Paris, even of the Paris we have not explored. We assume many places are reincarnations of others and we are so convinced that our perception is biased to prove our intuition right regardless of what new places might offer. This slowly leads to anhedonia, the loss of pleasure, and perhaps existentially and morally towards nihilism. And based on our genetic and environmental predisposition to depression, this eventually leads to mild and long depressions, such as dysthima or major acute depressions that are all vicious and bottomless circles that are only curable with enough will power and support from family and friends. I shall call this last phase "le mal de Paris" which hints to Baudelair's "fleurs de mal" and almost every poet's and artist's "mal de vivre" althought perhaps I could just update Baudelair's "Spleen de Paris" by calling it "le NeoSpleen de Paris" such that it accommodates a century of human progress or regress.
Le NeoSpleen de Paris, is contagious! You might get it in the metro when nobody is smiling, not even musicians as they play or kids as they don't. You might get it on the streets whether from the homeless beggars or from fellow inhabitants that have so much convinced themselves of being busy to avoid the void, or you might as well get it in restaurants when your waiter does not expect to be tipped or rewarded and has been already suffering that NeoSpleen for years!
It is only after the second year that you become aware of the NeoSpleen epidemic and the options to cure it are expensive and limited:
- You are suddenly convincing yourself that alcohol/drugs are inevitable to calm you and many of your alcoholic/drug-addict "friends".
- Your friends have talked you into medication for depression or seeing a shrink
- You decide that Paris is not for you and pack your bags and try to settle elsewhere
- You spend the money you would have spent on alcohol, drugs, medication, or shrinks, traveling back and forth to always see Paris as a child sees candy, and I am talking about forbidden and rare candy!
I am guessing you have already made up your mind. If you happen to have chosen the last one, I might see you tomorrow in RIO de JANEIRO!
Le NeoSpleen de Paris, is contagious! You might get it in the metro when nobody is smiling, not even musicians as they play or kids as they don't. You might get it on the streets whether from the homeless beggars or from fellow inhabitants that have so much convinced themselves of being busy to avoid the void, or you might as well get it in restaurants when your waiter does not expect to be tipped or rewarded and has been already suffering that NeoSpleen for years!
It is only after the second year that you become aware of the NeoSpleen epidemic and the options to cure it are expensive and limited:
- You are suddenly convincing yourself that alcohol/drugs are inevitable to calm you and many of your alcoholic/drug-addict "friends".
- Your friends have talked you into medication for depression or seeing a shrink
- You decide that Paris is not for you and pack your bags and try to settle elsewhere
- You spend the money you would have spent on alcohol, drugs, medication, or shrinks, traveling back and forth to always see Paris as a child sees candy, and I am talking about forbidden and rare candy!
I am guessing you have already made up your mind. If you happen to have chosen the last one, I might see you tomorrow in RIO de JANEIRO!
