I LOVE architecture.
And I find old buildings fascinating, so the destruction of the Notre Dame Cathedral in France last week had me a little sad, but not sad enough to necessarily do anything about it.
So when I hear that more than a billion dollars was raised to restore the building, I got a little upset.
In case you don’t know, this beautiful and centuries-old gothic building was nearly destroyed last week.
The setting for the Hunchback story, most of it was saved, but the roof and spire are, sadly, gone.
The smoke had literally not even cleared and more than enough money had been raised to start planning the reconstruction.
And the money didn’t come in drips and drabs either.
Notre Dame Cathedral
It was donated in massive chunks from some of the richest people in France and Europe. More than half of the total amount came from just FOUR companies and families within hours from each other.
Now let me just stress that none of the donations came after a request; or an official drive to raise money.
These were donations made spontaneously to restore a building, the destruction of which did not claim a single life, by the way.
In fact, Europe’s richest man, Bernard Arnault, donated 200 million euros (just over R3.1 billion), simply so he could double the amount given by Salma Hayek’s tycoon husband, Francois-Henri Pinault.
BIG DONATION: Bernard Arnault
These are dizzying amounts of money, especially when it is donated from one single bank account.
It obviously means that it won’t be missed, because there’s a lot more where it came from.
I don’t have an issue with wealthy people spending their money in any which way they choose.
But it does bother me that they spend their money in ways that drop the jaws of most of the world’s people and on things that most of us will never ever get to access, in this case, one single building.
Of course I get the sentimental attachment that the world (and the French people, in particular) have to the Notre Dame.
I would like to think that if the City Hall or the Castle of Good Hope ever fell victim to fire, that I would make a small contribution to the repair.
And that is the issue here. The contributions made by these people, is probably seen as “small”.
Are they that removed from the average person that they simply don’t understand what an insult that is to most of us?
If they look south across the Mediterranean, they will find millions of people in need of something as simple as a meal.
Never mind their other basic needs and not to mention the millions of other people elsewhere in the world.
How far would R14bn stretch in South Africa, I wonder?
I know I am being extremely narrow-minded and simplistic with this argument, but it pinches to know there really is that much money in the hands of individuals; and they’d rather spend it to preserve a building than human life.