ReportageIn roadsteads! 4 | 6. Since 2019, photographer Guillaume Blot has been scouring the bistros of France. When the cafes reopened, “Le Monde” accompanied him to six of them. This week, L’Annexe, in Reims.
She remains standing, hesitant, halfway between her counter and the table of four where we are installed. “But I am only the shadow. You better talk to the star! “ The star polishes the beer mugs before arranging them methodically, small dry gestures, in perpetual motion. William Jaczminski shakes his head, says softly “No, no, go ahead Murielle, stay discussing with them”, and goes back to his glasses to, this time, prepare a fruit juice to his wife and bring it to him, without even asking her what she wanted to drink: these two know each other.
Murielle ends up sitting in the middle of her customers, on a piece of chair, in her neighborhood bar-tobacco, in the heart of Reims. “I am in the business by mistake. I did everything to escape it, at the bistro, but I did not succeed! I even studied, you know, the Beaux-Arts in Reims. But it caught up with me. I married a bistro. “ She was 2.5 years old the first time she walked into a bar: her parents had taken over a business. “My father was born in it. ” Inside, outside: you don’t walk through the bistro door with impunity. “One moment he did something else, and then he needed to take one back. ” Need ? “You know, when you’re used to it, it can be hard to find yourself with nothing to do on Saturday and Sunday. In a bistro, the weekend has a bit of a festive air. ”
Daily party
Murielle grows up on a counter stool, spectator and host of this everyday celebration. “On the one hand, I would have liked to return to normalcy. I had a totally different life than my high school friends. “ On the other hand, she does not manage to live without it. “Around 14-15 years old, when my parents had another activity, I was a little depressed. I missed that atmosphere. The smell of the bistro, the noises. And then, it takes up so much space in life that we have trouble seeing ourselves differently. “
“With William, we have lots of things to say to each other, but we can’t: we always have people! We don’t even have time to argue ”- Murielle Jaczminski
A few screening attempts later, Murielle returns to work with her mother in a tobacco press between Reims and Vouziers. In the village next door, a competitor: William, who runs a bar-tabac-pension. “In real life, we were helping each other out. We got to know each other, and then there you go… ” And then there you have it: twenty-two years working together, seven days a week. She is 57, he is 52. The couple has a daughter and two “businesses”: L’Annexe, where they spend the week; and a pond-side fishery in the Ardennes.
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