Publication Pays d'Auge

Translation of the Newspaper”Pays d’Auge”’s article published 2008:
Culture-“Only in New York, Darling!” a book available on line.
A French girl from Normandy conquered New York.
This French artist live in New York since ten years. In her unusual book she writes about her first steps in the Big Apple.
What did you do before coming to New York?
I am born in Lisieux and I spent all my youth in Normandy.
I went to school in Saint Jean-Baptiste de la Salle then “Notre Dame de Lisieux” and then in Cornu. I did my Art studies at the University of Paris viii. After my Master , I open an Art Gallery in Paris , we were selling only dance photographies. but I did not like the selling aspect of it. Then I opened my own dance school in Paris. I went to New York for the first time in 1992 for the holidays. I loved it so much that I went back during 6 followings summers. I decide to live in Manhattan in 1998.
But I come back to Normandy once a year, back to the roots.
Did you click with the city right away?
YES! The first thing that surprised me is the kindness and the spontaneity of the New Yorker .They have a very innocent , fresh attitude that I do not find in Paris even if Manhattan is far from be an easy city to deal with.
What make you write “Only in New York, Darling!”?
I was in Paris during 9/11/2001.
I felt so chocked, sad and very pest off that Manhattan was attacked that I decide to share my life, my experience in the city with others and break the prejudices. The French population think that they are the best in everything : best food, most elegant, very articulate and I was thinking like that until I came to New York.
Now I think we are not bad at all but different or complementary.
What is the structure of your book?
In the three first chapters, I hold the hand of the reader so he can discover the city through my eyes. Then I leave him alone and he has to discover by himself. He can receive the slaps that I took in my face in this city!
The reader will find interviews, illustrations , urban texts, chapters about parties, art opening, underground Manhattan in Chinatown.
What are your next project?
I want to find a publisher in New York!

Journalist: Marie Vermeersch.