Katie Using Words

I hadn’t been to the Louvre in thirteen years. This was my second visit, the return trip that this time included my teen daughter. I was psyched. This was a Wednesday in September, so by my calculations, the crowds should not have been too bad. Most people were past their summer holidays and kids are just back in school–but probably a bit too early for a field trip to be organised. Plus, it’s a weekday. The weather was sunny and a bit blistering, but I clutched my ticket printouts with glee as we exited the cab just ahead of our booked 12pm ticket slot. It was go time!

I have been to several prominent museums before, including in Paris. I’ll admit, that had made me cocky.

I can’t tell you how many times the person with the time-stamped tickets sails right past all of the unprepared hordes waiting to buy their tickets. I have to say, it’s a feeling of giddy privilege and a glorious tribute to pre-planning. We are not wealthy by any means, so strolling in like a VIP is one of the rare times when I feel like doing the Queenie wave at people and twirling in my outfit–which, let’s face it, was just blue jeans and a simple blouse. Then I want to slightly lower my sunglasses and give a knowing wink to the ushers.

Such was my fantasy as I emerged from the cab and saw the sea of people outside of the glass pyramid. Wow. This was a lot more people than we saw in 2012. I mean, a lot more.

There were also a lot more rope lines so it was hard to even get very close to the pyramid for an amazing photo moment. But I exhaled with pride and walked up to the museum lady at the nearest rope slightly jostling my paper tickets. “We’re booked in for noon, can we go through here?” She gave me a wry, sad smile and then pointed at the rope maze to the left, full of probably at least 150 people, all standing and unmoving. They all had tickets for noon. Dozens upon dozens filed in after us for the same labyrinth of midday slot disappointment.

Slightly after noon, the line began to slowly lurch forward into the maws of the security scans. As I fanned myself with my stupid tickets, ink now running from sweat and hand lotion, I quietly cursed at the families with strollers and the groups crowded around a single wheelchair-bound person. They all went straight to the front of the security line.

That is when I started to lose my cool. Listen, I was no more special than any of the other poor bastards trapped in that rope maze. But we’re stuck here while other people get to cut ahead because some lady pooped out a baby last year? Or granny’s in a wheelchair? I can get a damn wheelchair. I know a guy.

I slightly joke, but it very much struck me as problematic. My teen daughter has ASD to the point of barely functioning. It isn’t just that she has to line up throw pillows by size. We’re talking, the girl has paralysing meltdowns. It’s sensory-based. Crowds and noises make it much worse. I had several strategies in place for managing a crowded museum, but did not anticipate 40 minutes in a hot queue just to get in the building.

Poor thing, her ailment didn’t include four wheels and a push bar, so she had to stand there with her hand twitching against her chest, face pinched in horror for that miserable wait that seems about eighty times longer when your child is struggling. She wanted this, though. That stubborn gorgeous baby of mine dug deep and made it through security. I was really proud. (Just to be clear, if she said the word, we would’ve left straight away.)

Sweaty and flustered, we were finally through the doors and onto the downward escalators. The excitement could return. We were finally here!

Everything was arranged much differently than I had remembered. What the what? Confusingly, everyone had to go all the way down just to go back up. Some escalators and staircases–mind you, to galleries that were open–were randomly closed by security and then reopened at seemingly random intervals. All we wanted was to get to a gallery. Any gallery. Chinese history? Dutch masters? You name it, I would have been thrilled.

Instead, us patrons were collectively swept by an unseen riptide into another compacted mobform being squeezed into a single-file queue.

It was another ticket check, this one more thorough and punishing in a mind melting anti-climax. There were two or three booths where each person’s ticket was scrutinized. The whole mob radiated sweat and disappointment. We were all exhausted and we hadn’t gotten to a single work of art yet. At this point I really started to think that this just wasn’t going to work. I was rooting for the mob, but given my daughter’s issues, I knew I was pushing her way beyond what would normally be her limits.

Then the ticket lady chose violence.

I gave her the three sheets of damp paper and she put up her hand to stop. She needed to see my daughter’s ID to prove she was an EU resident. She doesn’t have any ID that lists her residence. “What, she doesn’t have a driver’s licence?” “No, she doesn’t.” “Let’s see her passport.” Crap, I had left the passports safely back at the hotel not supposing for an instant that we would be accused of perpetrating a grift to save the €22 admission fee. I gritted my teeth while explaining that we are her parents and lady can see that we live in Ireland. Nope, we have to go back to the beginning–outside to the start of it all to buy her a ticket. The giant line that came before the giant line that came before this giant line.

I think I heard something pop or ping in my head.

In a last-ditch effort to salvage the visit I openly begged her–maybe with some daggers in my eyes. “Please, she is autistic and is really struggling”. The lady glanced at my daughter, who is roughly the size of a normal adult, but clinging to a stuffy, cuffed hand beating against her shoulder, and eyes staring somewhere very distant. “She has problems? Okay, she can go.”

That’s how we got into the first gallery.

The visit had begun and it really was exquisite, in spite of the overcrowding. Fortunately, some of the Greek antiquities that most fascinate her weren’t necessarily captivating to others, so we had a little breathing room.

By the time we got to the Grand Gallery, though–home of the Mona Lisa, it was back to Sardine City. This is, of course, typical for the Mona Lisa. Such an underwhelming little lady she is. She hides behind not only thick bullet-proof glass that distorts your view like grandpa’s thick bifocals, but she also keeps her distance well beyond a permanent rope. Then there is the ever-present gaggle of people who become gladiators in the hope of a splendid shot of the lady. I’m not willing to fight them for any legendary look. A fleeting glance is a sufficient tickmark in my bucket list.

I was struck, though, that the museum had put up additional tall solid partitions flanking either side of her. That meant the corridor to view her was narrower than it should have been. Why? It certainly hadn’t been in place years ago. In footage I’ve seen since, it wasn’t in place.

At this point, most of the patrons were worn out and surrendered themselves to the circular seats in the gallery, almost all staring at the phones incessantly. They weren’t just lazy, they were cooked. Getting this far had been a feat, when typically you think of strolling through a cool art museum as a relaxing pastime.

I looked at all of them in pity and envy. We had all jumped through so many hoops to be in this remarkable place and we were ground into dust.

I’ve wondered since that day what possessed the museum to take such draconian measures with its patrons. Indeed, an agent with the purpose of making a museum as miserable as possible could not have done a finer job.

Firstly, it’s clear that they admit too many people. Each timeslot should have been limited by half. Since I delayed buying my tickets online until the trip was almost upon us, I should have gotten a “sold out” flag for our dates. The facilities simply aren’t designed for that size of influx. I couldn’t see how they could fit in more scanners easily or more ticket booths. It isn’t a lack of infrastructure or staff, I wager, but just an overwhelming body count.

Not only does cause severely diminished experiences, such as ours, but there has to be a major safety concern lodged at this point.

Almost exactly one month after our visit, The Louvre was robbed of jewels in what I’ve heard was a smash-and-grab from an exterior window. Immediately, the museum was evacuated in what turned into a crushing panic as people found locked doors at every turn.

This did not surprise me. Much of the museum has been rendered inaccessible, locked, or covered. As I paused in the Grand Gallery for some water, it didn’t escape my notice that if there was a true emergency, such as a fire or a gunman, the place would turn into an inescapable bedlam. There is no way to safely evacuate such a massive mob through a building designed to corral them while securing the priceless works of art.

Heed this warning. Massive changes are needed at The Louvre for the safety and wellbeing of its patrons and its contents. Forget the jewels, somebody needs to start treating this site as the danger it really is.