I wasn’t always a Count, and wasn’t always called Saint-Germain either. I was born about 2200 years ago, on a dirt islet that eventually became Paris’ Île de la Cité. My parents were poor boatmen from the Parisii Gaulish tribe.

I lived through the Roman invasion, the mixing of Celtic and Latin cultures into Lutetia, the christianization and secularization of the region. This land changed borders and names so many times over the centuries that, to this day, I feel more Parisian than French. I know that the country called France today has never been a monolith, but an ever-reinvented hub of cultural, ethnic, religious, and political exchange.

I have been a boatman, a farmer, a merchant, a monk, a soldier for hire, and an alchemist. I became rich and famous under Louis XV, grew politically during the French Revolution, and fought weapon in hand, in the streets, for the last time during Paris Commune.

I sometimes get lost in the Spirit of Paris, the city’s collective unconscious, its fantasized image. Shaped by Hollywood, Netflix and Instagram, by the minds of billions of humans who think about Paris without living there. Hence why it’s so important for me to take you to the city’s lesser known areas, off the beaten path. To share both Paris’ ancient and recent history, its incredible inhabitants, famous and unknown, beyond the clichés.

The streets you will walk will often be named after old, white, bourgeois men: I will gladly mention them, but will also show you that Paris became what it is thanks to young people of color, women, and members of the working class with equally important fates!

You can expect some debunking of French myths, sound effects conveying the spirit of the city, and personal stories told by someone who survived through the best and worst of Paris' tumultuous history.

Be my feet, I’ll be your ears!