LET THEM DRINK (BURNT) COFFEE: The Starbucks invasion

The art of brewing coffee and the café culture that it engendered has long roots in France. The first café in Paris dates back to 1665. At the time of the Revolution, there were no fewer than 2,000 cafés in Paris. One could say that the Enlightenment was fuelled by caffein: Voltaire is said to have downed a dozen cups a day. During the Revolution, legendary establishments like the Café Procope (still in business) hosted stormy meetings by the likes of Robespierre, Danton and Marat. The nearby Café Les Deux Magots and Café Flore were favorite haunts of the Parisian intelligentsia—Camus, Sartre, and Simone de Beauvoir wrote whole books while sitting at their sidewalk tables, sipping coffee, and chain-smoking Gauloises. Today, there are no fewer than 45,000 cafés in France. 

From all of this, one could conclude that the French know something about roasting, brewing, and drinking coffee. So why does an upstart, greedy, endlessly expansionist outfit out of Seattle—an outfit that burns its coffee beans  on the mistaken assumption that an espresso should taste like smoke, an outfit that commits the travesty of  serving coffee in cardboard cups, that adulterates this noble brew with soy milk and hazelnut syrup—why does such a company think it has a right to plant its all-too-familiar logo in France? 

There now some 50 Starbucks in France—the most recent one (pictured above) is located 200 yards from the chateau where Louis XIV was born in Saint Germain-en-Laye, just west of Paris. Where are the barricades? Where are the sans-culottes? Where are the legions of French cultural purists calling for boycotts and picketing these alien intruders? Nowhere to be found. The French will embrace this new outlet as they have embraced its predecessors. Like blue jeans, rock n' roll, action movies, and cheeseburgers, Starbucks will attract French consumers precisely because it is so...American. Not that the French particularly like Americans, or approve of American policies, or applaud American leadership of the so-called Western world. It's just that the American lifestyle is considered—especially by the young—to be modern, cool, hip, non-stodgy. And so the homogenization of world culture continues. 

Once upon a time, Napoleon's armies conquered most of Western Europe. Now the invasion is led by Starbucks, McDonalds and Disney. In Napoleon's day, at least, the conquered nations put up a fight. Now they blow down their own gates and line up for soy cappuccinos. Call me a snob, an apostate, whatever, I'd just prefer to sit at my local Café de l'Industrie, savor a real espresso, or express as the French call it, and read the papers.

WHERE KINGS ONCE TROD

Saint Germain-en-Laye lies 12 miles west of Paris. This is where I spend my summers in a house we bought when I worked in the Paris bureau of TIME Magazine. We lived here full time from 2000 until our move to New Orleans in 2007. Now it is our vacation house, where we come each year to escape the New Orleans heat, get back in touch with our French friends, and soak up the food and culture for which France is famous. But the most significant thing about Saint Germain is not that we have a house there. It is the fact that Louis XIV was born here in 1638, in a chateau built by his ancestor François I. The chateau still stands majestically in the middle of Saint Germain, surrounded by manicured gardens and parks laid out by Le Nôtre.

       Another vestige of the former royal presence here is the nearby Forêt de Marly, part of the royal domain surrounding the former Chateau de Marly. For years

I have jogged in this forest. Apart from the narrow roads and trails, it has been left in its original unspoiled state, with dense stands of oak, beech, birch and plane trees. I always take the same path: Route de la Dauphine. I know every tree, every clearing, every bend in the road by heart. But every time is different. The light changes, the weather, the wild flowers come and go, marking the seasons. The smell changes, too—pungent and sappy in the spring and summer, dank and musty in the fall and winter. 

      In the old days, the forest was teeming with deer and wild boar, and foxes, and the king and his courtiers would hunt them and serve them up in sumptuous spreads of wild game back at the chateau. Today the king and the hunters are gone. The chateau is gone. But the deer, the boar and the foxes are still here. Along with the trees, some of them hundreds of years old. Some of them were here when Louis roamed the forest; maybe a few still bear the scars of his stray bullets or arrows.
      The other day, as I was about a third of the way into my five-mile run, I saw something moving out of the corner of my eye. Then I heard the rapid clump of little hooves. It was a fawn, come to drink in the little ditch that runs along the path. It retreated into the forest, then turned around for a moment and studied me. Seeing that I was not a predator, she continued calmly along her way and soon disappeared behind the thick trees.
        I witnessed another interesting thing as I was doing my cool-down stretches. In the distance, on the same path I had taken, I heard the chatter of children’s voices, and saw a group of little kids on bicycles. A man was walking with them, wielding two walking sticks. When they drew closer, I saw that the man, apparently in his late 40’s, was blind. He advanced at a good clip and, judging from his well-developed calf muscles, was a serious walker. The kids surrounded him on their bikes, two in front, two in back. They laughed and chatted and rang their bells and did what kids do when they are riding their bikes and having fun. In the middle of them, the father (for I assume it was their father) strode along with no hesitation, guided by the little voices around him. His children were protecting him, showing him the way.
       They passed by me and continued down the path toward the busy two-lane highway. When they reached it, the kids looked left and right, then proceeded across. The father advanced with them, unable to see if any speeding cars were approaching, but trusting his children to make sure the way was clear. When they reached the other side, I kept watching this marvelous display of mutual aid, until the forms of father and kids finally disappeared into the woods.