PARIS (AP) Garbage. Heaps, mounds and piles of it are growing daily and in some places standing higher than a human being.

A strike by Paris garbage collectors, which begins its 16th day on Tuesday, is taking a toll on the renowned aesthetics of the French capital, a veritable blight on the City of Light.

I prefer Chanel to the stink, joked Vincent Salazar, a 62-year-old artistic consultant who lives in a tony Left Bank neighborhood. A pile of garbage sits at the corner of his building overlooking the Luxembourg Gardens.

Ive seen rats, he said.

But like many nonchalant and strike-hardened Parisians, Salazar doesnt mind.

Im fortunate to live here, but Im 200% behind these guys, Salazar said. Theyre smelling it all day long, he said, though it wasnt precisely the word he used. They should get early retirement.