Confidences of neighbors | The Press

“I had to say goodbye to my neighborhood because the new owner wanted to raise the rents. I had cancer at that time. Let’s say that receiving a letter at the hospital saying that you have been evicted is quite hard to live with… All the happiness, all the beauty of my neighborhood, all the beauty of the people who live there; I will really miss my village. »

The woman testifying on camera fights back tears. To the question: “What was the most significant farewell of your life?” is the loss of his home that came to mind. His home was his world.

In this same episode of the web series Chronicles of ordinary life, three other residents of the Centre-Sud district gave themselves up. A lady recounts the last goodbye of her spouse, who benefited from medical assistance in dying; a man highlights the death of his 96-year-old mother; another remembers his last visit to his grandmother, in Morocco.

In four minutes, what was just a neighborhood now has a face. (A face whose tears you want to dry.)

The series is broadcast on TV5 unis and is available in 10 episodes. In each of them, a few residents of a given neighborhood of Montreal parade in a photo booth to answer a big question. What thoughts keep them awake at night? What is the best advice they have received? And the lies they tell each other most often?

It is dazzlingly tender.

The idea was born from a thirst for meeting in the midst of a pandemic, director Amélie Hardy explained to me.

(Experiences named in the series include: growing up in a cult, saying goodbye to the love of your life over immigration issues, reclaiming your neighborhood after being raped there, ending up in an erotic photoshoot with his best friend or even being tired of helping our parents who understand absolutely nothing about Facebook… We actually end up recognizing each other somewhere.)

To break the isolation, therefore, the director took an interest in a dozen neighborhoods in Montreal. She has previously chosen a question for each of them, taking great care to avoid platitudes. Rather than talking about resilience or precariousness with the residents of Montreal North, she asked them what their best love story was, for example.

And how were the candidates recruited?

Amélie Hardy explains to me that a formidable researcher has joined virtual groups, participated in a plethora of neighborhood events and criss-crossed the parks of the metropolis. In other words: she approached complete strangers to ask them questions that are generally only addressed in her diary. (Greetings to the inhabitants of Verdun who revealed to him what they wanted to be forgiven…)

“She found so many people, adds the director with a touch of astonishment. It’s as if people wanted to tell each other! As if they needed to connect. »

A need that is understandable, if you ask me.

In fact, connecting to your neighbors is much less commonplace than you might think.

Listening to the woman evicted from her home in the Centre-Sud, we realize that the second we bond with the people around us, the walls of our home disappear. The borders are moving away, our home becomes a neighborhood.

Moreover, to the question “What do you need to part with?” “, another participant of the series replied: “From the nostalgia of past lives, past neighborhoods. »

A neighborhood like a life.

So how much can our neighbors transform us?

According to Pierre Boyer-Mercier, professor at the School of Architecture of the University of Montreal who is particularly interested in the sociology of neighborhood relations, “when we say neighborswe also say community. One says relation to the street where links are established between people. These ties influence our way of life by creating a sense of belonging, a sense of responsibility towards neighbours, a sense of participation and civility”.

To take root in a neighborhood is to become part of its ecosystem and to be nourished by those who live there. It’s caring about the community. This is precisely what Chronicles of ordinary lifein fact…

So does this mean that we should knock on the next door to swing deep questions at the person who answers?

Surprisingly, Amélie Hardy does not find my idea completely silly. “These questions generate a contact with integrity! Something real settles in, from the beginning of the discussion. And it’s surprising how open people are to this type of encounter… Perhaps even more than small talk ! »

If the company seems intimidating to you, tell yourself that by choosing your house, you have integrated despite yourself a whole network of stories that shape your neighborhood. Who, in a certain way, influence your daily life… You might as well know what they hide, right?