The Week of the Paper

Boulogne Is Still There Too

Paris:- Monday, 16. November 1998:- This issue contains a feature about acquiring administrative papers. Doing this is not as interesting as walking around Paris and goofing off, but it was what I was doing for most of last week.

No matter where we live, we are 'papered.' Bits of paper and plastic we carry around with us, are physical elements representing data files someplace - and the how, why and wherefore of these vary from country to country.

How this works in France may not be terribly interesting - but the way of it will tell you a bit more about the French, and the nuts and bolts of 'Liberté, Equalité, Fraternité.'

This week's feature entitled 'Paper Chase' is mainly about finding some papers necessary for a foreign use. But it starts with some comments about the 'carte de séjour,' which are purely French.

In Europe, it is common for residents to carry some sort of government-issued identity paper - and I liken this to having an 'internal passport.' The concept may be strange to you, but it is a fact of life here. Eventually these ID cards will serve as European Community-wide 'passports,' and in many cases already serve this purpose.

If you are visiting France and Paris from outside the European Community, you will probably have your own country's passport already.

My wife has to renew hers. Luckily, Irish passports have versions that can last up to ten years, so their renewal is not something needing to be done frequently. She has all of her bundle of papers ready, but she wants one extra item - to put our two boys on it too. If she doesn't do this all at once and she wants to add them later, then she'll have to get a whole new passport.

When you live in France, a lot of your family data is stored at your local city hall. When you are married here, you get a booklet called a 'Livret de Famille,' which also contains the same information.

When you are required to produce this information for some reason, you do not show off your 'Livret de Famille.' Instead you go to your local city hall, and they produce a paper 'extract' of whatever it is you want. There is no charge for this. Then you add this paper to your bundle.

To put the two boys on my wife's new Irish passport, she has to furnish copies of the 'long form' of their birth certificates. Although this info is in the 'Livret de Famille,' it is not in its 'long form,' and this 'long form' in not in our local city hall; it is in the city hall of the place where they were born.

Fortunately, both of them were born in Boulogne-Billancourt, which is just a bit closer than Paris. On Friday, with our 'Livret de Famille' in hand, I drove over there. It's a good thing we don't live in Santiago, Chile.

After being lost for awhile in Boulogne I found myself sailing past the city hall and miracle of miracles, found a parking place almost right in front of it.

Inside the '30's-zoomy building, the reception desk pointed me to a line of windows; a lady took the 'Livret de Famille' and found the two birth references in big ledger-books. She made photocopies of the originals - typewritten entries - stamped them, had them signed by a 'higher authority' and turned them over to me, all within five minutes.

These are not 'long form;' these are certified copies of the originals - and they better be good enough! They look phoney as three-dollar bills; no letterhead, typed originally on an Olympia manual machine, hand-cut photocopy paper, official rubber-stamp for Boulogne and another for the date, and hand-signed by 'somebody.'

The Irish are a bit casual - or they seem to be - about their passports, so I'm sure the copies will be acceptable. How much 'better' can they be anyway?

I should know that Boulogne does things a bit differently too. I got a taste of it before, which was written up in Metropole's issue 2.03 of 20. January 1997, as 'Boulogne-Billancourt - In a Worker's and Architect's Paradise.'

Boulogne must have its fans, because between 10 to 20 Metropole readers find the old feature every month and once found, I presume they read it.

Here's the update for Boulogne: the Musée des Années '30 did not move across the street and reopen in 1997. Instead, Boulogne has built a whole new building, called the 'Espace Landowski,' which is right beside the Hôtel de Ville.

In addition to housing Boulogne's '30's museum, the building will also be the médiathèque, a cinèma, a cultural centre and an atelier-cum-babysitting centre. It is now supposed to open next month, on Saturday, 5. December.

When I last visited, in January of 1997, the ANPE employment office - which had dislodged the museum - had hooked itself up to the Internet. For this, it was the first in France to do so.

On Friday, the location was the same but the name is now 'Espace Cyber Jeunes' and it seems to be a purely Boulogne initiative, because ANPE agents are on hand only two half days a week.

This office is reserved for Boulogne residents aged 16 to 26 and has a program quite a bit wider than a typical state employment office - with offers of training as well as job hunting tools. It is also a centre offering everyday practical information in the areas of health and lodging, and other social benefits.