THIS WAS PARIS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 221, 17 September 1940, Page 5

THIS WAS PARIS.

RATIONING OF COAL. BLEAK WINTER PROSPECTS. (By Air.) 'PARIS, August 28. Paris is preparing now for the worst Winter in her 'history. Every niglit along the left bank of the Seine, under cover of a severe black-out, great German lorries lumber towards thq east taking French food and fuel to Germany. Every day trains and motor coaches come in from the east bringing thousands more German families to make the most of what food is left in Normandy and Brittany. First thing most of these Germans do when they get to Paris is to rush to the Eiffel Tower and stand gazing for hours at the big, specially made swastika flag flying on the top of it (writes Walter Parr, former "Daily Mail" Paris correspondent). Goebbels has given special orders for the Eiffel Tower to be "boosted" in all German papers and magazines. It was difficult to get a picture of Hitler walking underneath the tower taking in its full height, so a composite picture was made showing an enlarged Hitler emerging from the arch, the whole of the tower and the huge swastika flag. German ex-servicemen stand near the tower selling the picture in postcard size for the Nazi visitors to send home." Remember those little metal models of the Eiffel Tower in the Paris shops? They've all been bought up long ago by the Germans to adorn thousands of mantelpieces in the Reich as "symbols of victory." The Germans have found yet another Use for the Eiffel Tower. They have turned the top of it into an observation post where look-out men £eep watch for our "planes.

The onoe-gay Bois de Boulogne, where normally there would be strolling crowds admiring the autumn-tinted trees is now the world's saddest beauty spot. The public are not allowed to go because the German authorities discovered that many hundreds of Jews and fleeing politicians were trying to hide among the trees. The only people permitted to walk there up to a few days ago were men who could produce a card proving that they were unemployed. A special regulation has been made that they may gather up the broken 1 branches for firewood. I They move in dismal groups along thej paths where once walked the happy-go-lucky racegoers on their way to Auteuil or Lpngchamp. For months after the war started there were rumours in France that coal was going to be rationed. By the time coal ration cards were actually issued most people had got in huge stocks. In many parts of Paris these stocks are now being confiscated by the authorities. Police go from house to house with lorries, saying: "All coal must be shared out among the community as a whole." The German families coming into the Paris region from the Ruhr and the Rhineland get plenty of coal and plenty of food. Not so the French. They form long queues outside the municipal offices to get their coal rations, while the Germans, by a special arrangement, get theirs without difficulty. Gaiety by Order. The, first chill winds of autumn are whistling down the boulevards these days. At this time of the year, war or no war, there always begins a battle royal between the fiat-dwellers and their proprietors as to when' central heating should be put on. The dispute this year is not about the date for turning on the heat, but about whether there should be any central lieatjng.at all. In thousands of blocks of fiats there is not enough fuel for the furnaces. The Germans are trying to" create a "Gay Paree" of their • own. ' 1 Before the fall of Paris most of the j Montmartre night' clubs and cabarets i were run by Jews. The dance-hostesses 1 were mostly Jewish refugees from Ger- < many and Central European countries, 5

Now that they have all moved out, the Germans are encouraging ordinary French people to open up night clubs with pure-blooded German and French artiste. Some rather crude, childish cabaret turns have been brought from Germany to help create the atmosphere of the new Paris." There's a scarcity of chorus girls in the capital. Music-halls such as the Folies Bergere are trying. to put on shows for the coming winter, but they can't get together attractive choruses. Paris in the past has recruited practically all its girl dancers from Britain and America. The Germans have placed a ban on coloured artists in Paris. In fact, special regulations have been framed regarding all coloured people in occupied French territory, restricting the areas where they can travel and hinting that they should leave the country altogether. Not a single one of the celebrities of the Paris bars has stayed on to entertain the conquerors. Frank, of the Ritz bar, who disappeared during the invasion, is still missing. When I last saw Pierre, of the Scribe bar, he was making arrangements for huiTied departure from France. Harry, of. "Harry's" (Sank Roo Donoo) is, I understand, now running a bar in London. Carpentier, the boxer, who used to manage a bar on the Etoile, has just been demobilised from the French Air Force, and at the moment is having a battle of words with Jean Borotra (France's new sports Fuehrer) in unoccupied France as to whether professionalism should be banned from French sport. I remember Frank, of the Ritz, tell in.2 me just before France broke up: "I'm counting now on this being a ten-years war. But when it's all over Paris will be just the same as it ever was. Of course it will . . . ."