Marseille Magic “A Deep Dive : Why People Either Love It or Hate It”

October 3, 2024By maverickbirdPosted in Europe, France, Outside India

Table of Contents

About Marseille magic

Marseille magic..does it really exist? Can a tough city charm you off your feet and knock your socks off? I had heard a lot about Marseille from George Simenon´s ´´Inspector Maigret´´ series. In his books, Marseille is the bad boy of the south of France; a place where gangsters came from. Simenon is a powerful writer and his descriptions of Marseille are very evocative. You can almost smell the city´s strong sun, feel the salty tang of its sea breeze, and hear the raucous tongues of its residents. There is nothing subtle about this city: nothing chic, or genteel. It is rough, full-blooded, and vibrant with brilliant streaks of style and panache.

Our first day in Marseille

On our first day, the Marseille magic was nonexistent. The city did not welcome us with the promised blue skies and balmy breeze. Instead, a dull, leaden sky hung over the city like a damp cloth and sharp gusts of wind made us shiver in our spring jackets. Flowers, however, bloomed everywhere, and bright yellow mimosas, those typical flowers of southern France that delighted Queen Victoria, created a heady perfume. Marseille showed its true colours and we caught snippets of its characteristics from then on. The departure from the airport was chaotic and the queues for the transfer buses were nonexistent.

I had not realized

How much Germany had trained me to be a good citizen until I found myself automatically queueing up for the airport transfer buses, only to be elbowed out of the way by pushy locals. Marseille magic taught me its first lesson. The good, old Almagne courtesy did not exist here and my Calcutta instincts of jumping queues, pushing, and jaywalking came back with sharpened claws. These skills helped me not only survive Marseille but also enjoy its rough and heady pleasures immensely. After that, I never feared ignoring traffic lights and jaywalking boldly, grabbing seats on the bus, and bargaining hard for every penny.

The Marseille magic begins

You can say that my manners were quite atrocious and I have to admit that they were. However, if I am giving the impression of Marseille to be a kind of a thug city then I am doing it an injustice. It is also a city with immense charm and I was so floored by the old-fashioned etiquette of the brasserie owner near our rental apartment that we dined nearly every day. Marseille magic is made up of heady experiences. On one hand, the city offers sublime experiences like catching arabesque shadows of the lattice walk at the Mucem; enjoying stunning views of the blue Med at Notre-Dame de la Garde; walking down the artistic alleys of Le Panier, and exploring hidden gems like the picture-book fishing port of Vallon des Auffes beyond the Corniche.

Important thing of Marseille

On the other hand, you may be put off by the city´s intermittent squalor, its broken, bottle-strewn streets, its lung-bursting steep streets, and the way some areas smelt as if every dog in the area had chosen that exact spot to do its business. If you don´t like your city’s gritty, then Marseille might not be for you. However, if you choose to overlook its grimness and focus on its quirks then you might enjoy the morning fish and flower markets at Vieux Port, soak up the sun at one of the artsy cafes at Cours Julien, and eat really good couscous and fish stew. So, love it or hate it, either way, Marseille is unlike anywhere else you´ve been in Europe.