At the beginning of the 20th century Paris is the city of predilection for bombing - bombing if you prefer - ripailler, feast than devil! And with a few bucks in your pocket, you could do a thousand crazy things. But to do so, it was necessary to venture into the maze of alleyways in the capital and mingle with the rascal. The Parisians thus travelled to the populated suburbs, where they met midinettes (fashion and couture house workers), students, cooks and chambermaids, butchers and hairdressers, along with the Apaches and other prisoners of the city. In short, all the youth of the asphalt of Paris reunited to make the wedding!

Bistro and troquets

The Parisians met there as soon as they got out of the turbin to drink a few beers or rinse their tonsils with a decanter of good wine, I hear everyone! How about a glass of absinthe before you leave? To make ribote (picolate) costs only a few bullets at the time, so we could leave this atmosphere full of tobacco and continue our evening by going to do the party elsewhere. However, the terraces of Parisian cafés were the best places to catch chicks according to terms already used at the time.

Cafés-concerts and music-halls

After leaving the bistro, some people chose to go to the café-concert - the bawling for the intimate - where we watch more than we listen to beautiful singers with broad necklines. For a somewhat more razor-sharp atmosphere, you can go to the music halls, most of which still exist today: the Folies-Bergères, the Moulin Rouge, the Casino de Paris, the Olympia...

Bal-musette

For those who weren't sitting around and liked to be in the heat of the action, there was the bal-musette, the ideal way to go knitting jigsaws! One of the most frequented was the Moulin de la Galette ball, where dancers with the sweet names of La Goulue, Grille d' Égout and La Môme Fromage amazed the spectators with their wide gaps. Far from the ballroom waltzes, the partygoers gathered there to dance the drunken one while making vigorously crack the floor of their big shoes. The orchestra that accompanied the dancers was composed of a single instrument, you guessed it, the musette! You could also sometimes hear biniou, an accordion... Ah, the beautiful atmosphere!

Guinguettes

Let's finish our tour of the places of joy and fun with the family atmosphere of the guinguettes. These offered the possibility, until late at night, to play balls or bowling, while descending some of them! After wild farandoles, and once you were sufficiently greyed out, you could also sit in gigantic swings like those of the Plessis-Robinson and let yourself be rocked under the stars...

Paris at night, it screams, it sings and dances until the early morning. A century later, lifestyles have changed somewhat, but the festive spirit has remained, and with Ernest Hemingway we can only affirm that Paris is a celebration, the city of eternal enjaillement!