As the Games approached, school was out for the summer, and posters popped up on métro billboards inviting Parisians to work from home, avoid public transport, avoid the stations of the Games sites, and generally stay away, when we’d been sold on the Games as a “Grande Fête Populaire” (a big party for all).

We considered the very large security zones surrounding the Games sites exaggerated, and the Paris mayor’s attempts to relocate the Bouquinistes, you know, those traditional vendors of old books, maps, assorted stuff (and nowadays souvenirs), away from the Seine quais in view of the opening ceremony on the river were greeted with an outcry. She backed off.

In short, Parisians weren’t happy, and we weren’t looking forward to those weeks of projected chaos.