It's the big bazaar at Saint-Lazare station! In the access hall to the platforms of line 14, fully saturated this Monday morning around 9:30 am, hundreds of travelers from all over the Ile-de-France congregate. There is tension in the air. "Oh but that one is stupid!" Gets angry a lady shaken unfortunately by another galley-slave. In the background, Sophie, in her fifties "from the depths of the Yvelines" takes her trouble patiently. "I am waiting for the flow to pass, I do not want to be crushed," she says.
She draws her smartphone to immortalize large crowds. “I take a photo, I need it to justify my delay to my managers. But this delay, I will have to make up for it, it is an additional fatigue ”, blows the one who works in“ urban planning ”in the south of Paris.
Yoga, reading, telecommuting
“We understand the reasons for the strike, but there, when we are hit in this way, we no longer support it because we are suffering. We must find other solutions to contest, "she exasperates herself while an audio announcement signals that" the RATP apologizes to users ". “I have colleagues who have told me that they are going to be prescribed a work stoppage. To relax, I have yoga and reading, but not TV. I watch the news as little as possible because the images of strikes are very anxiety-provoking, ”she underlines.
Nourdine, 25, computer scientist from Seine-Saint-Denis, too, stays away from the hustle and bustle. "I just released my PC because I had to respond to a work emergency," he comments. "My box allows us to telecommute but twice a week, we have to come to the office," he explains.
VIDEO. 33 days of strike and the crowd persists in the metro
Sandrine, who lives in Meaux (Seine-et-Marne) but rolls up her sleeves in the 13th century, tries to sneak into the anthill. "We're penned like animals," growls this library employee. "It's a mess," synthesizes another Sophie, 50, who officiates in the publishing world. "I spend up to six hours a day in transport, I'm exhausted," said the Versaillaise. However, she returned from vacation in Isère. "In the provinces, people do not imagine how difficult it is in Paris," she says.
Contagious bad mood
Carmen, 60, is “looking forward to the end” because she is “on the knees”. "They are on strike for us, for the future of my children, we understand them, but it's a real mess," said the housekeeper crossed on the platforms of the Grands Boulevards metro station. When the oars are stopped, she is condemned to walk, hurriedly, towards the homes where she does the cleaning. "It is said that it is good for health, but with me, it is the opposite, I have a terrible back pain," she says.
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The bitumen anarchy is also getting on his nerves. "The cars stop on the pedestrian crossings, the bikes and the scooters tumble at full speed ... You have to constantly look to the right and to the left, it's tiring," she says. "Me, what stresses me is the return, the fact of not knowing if I will be able to go home," says Ekaterina, 30, an employee of a tea company. What starts the morale of Olivier, 27, programmer, is not so much being crowded, but "the general atmosphere" and the contamination of a bad mood. "People make heads," he describes.