Les Olympiades du 13ème Arrondissement,
20 Avenue d’Ivry Paris 75013, France

I grew up in an apartment in an area of Paris called Les Olympiades, an urbanist housing project constructed between 1969 and 1974. At the northern end of the fourteen tall brutalist
apartment blocks is the Parc de Choisy — at the southern, Place d’Italie. Each tower is named after an Olympic host city; Tour Tokyo was the tower our apartment was in. My family and I became part of the Southeast Asian community that began to populate the complex in the late 70’s. This area became known as the Asian Quarter of Paris — Le Quartier Asiatique — my childhood home.

This chapter reflects on nostalgic memories of my time spent in Les Olympiades, the things and the people that make up this communal lifestyle — a way of living with our neighbours, together, within one building and the experience of what that was like. The contrast between individuals and their own narratives, their own aesthetics. The shared common areas, multiple floors, lobbies and lifts, intercoms and speakers, concierges and janitors, notice boards. Life in an apartment block.