Posts under "Culture"

Before any major election in France, just like any other country, les blagues politiques (political jokes) reign supreme!

The following French joke is actually quite universal, and can be particularly appreciated everywhere in the world where 2012 happens to be a Presidential Elections Year: In les États-Unis (USA), la Russie, l’Inde (India), la Tunisie, le Yemen, la Palestine, l’Egypte, Hong-Kong, Taiwan, le Turkménistan, la Corée du Sud, le Timor oriental, le Venezuela, la République dominicaine, le Mexique, la Serbie, la Finlande, le Sénégal, le Mali, Madagascar, Ghana, la Sierra Leone, Iceland, la Turquie, la Slovénie, not to mention the sovereign Republic of Palau!

◊ LA BLAGUE 
(the Joke):
 

- Un enfant demande à son papa: “explique-moi, c’est quoi la politique?”  
(A kid asks his father: “Daddy explain to me, what is politics?”)


- Le papa répond: ” c’est très simple. Je vais te donner un exemple : dans notre famille, c’est moi qui rapporte de l’argent, je suis donc le capitaliste.
(The father answers: “It’s quite simple, I will give you an example: In our family, I am the one who earns the money, so I am the capitalist.)


- Ta maman gère cet argent, elle est donc le gouvernement. 

(Your Mom manages this money, so she is the government.)

- Grand-père vérifie si tout ce passe bien : il est donc le parlement. 
(Grandpa verifies if everything goes well: So he is the Parliament.)

- La bonne est la classe ouvrière. 
(The maid is the working class.)

- Nous n’avons tous qu’un seul but : ton bien-être… Tu es donc le peuple.

(We all share one goal: Your well-being… So you are the people.)

- Ton petit frère est encore dans le berceau, nous dirons alors qu’il est l’avenir.”

(Your little brother is still in the cradle, so we’ll say that he is the future
L’enfant a bien écouté! La nuit tombe chacun s’en va au lit. 
(The kid listened very carefully! At night, everyone went to bed.)
L’enfant, dans le sommeil, entend son petit frère qui pleure. Il se lève et va voir. 
(During his sleep, the kid heard his little brother crying. He wakes up and goes to check on him.)

En fait, le petit frère avait fait dans ses couches! 

(As it turned out, the little brother had dirtied his diapers!)

Que faire? il va dans la chambre de ses parents et s’aperçoit que la maman est toute seule au lit en train de dormir.
(What to do? He goes to the room of his parents and notices that the mother is alone in bed, deeply sleeping.)
Ne voulant pas la réveiller, il va à la chambre de la bonne et là! il trouve son père dans le lit de la jeune fille. 
(Not wanting to wake her up, he goes to the room of the maid and there! He found his dad in the bed of the young girl.)

Il voit même le grand-père qui regarde par la fenêtre. Ayant peur, l’enfant va se recoucher et s’endort.
(He even sees his grandpa watching through the window. Feeling scared, the kid goes back to bed and falls asleep.)

Le lendemain le papa demande: “Alors mon fils, as-tu bien compris la leçon d’hier?”
(The next day the father asked: “So, my son, did you understand well yesterday’s lesson?”)

Le garçon répond “Oui papa, ta définition est claire:”

(The boy answers: “Yes daddy, your definition is clear:”)

“Le capitalisme profite de la classe ouvrière pendant que le gouvernement dort et le parlement regarde sans rien dire. On s’en fout de ce que pense le peuple et l’avenir est dans la m%$#&…”

(“Capitalism takes advantage of the working class while the government is asleep and the parliament watches without saying a word. Nobody gives a damn about what the people think, and the future is in deep s%$#…”)

 

Cancel all your plans and rendez-vous!

Whether you have to go à l’école (to school) tomorrow, or must be au bureau (at the office) at the first hour of the morning, put all that asidebecause we’re all going on a field trip to spend UN JOUR EN FRANCE (A DAY IN FRANCE)! 


Since you guys enjoyed the previous Noir Désir song, here’s another famous one featuring the same Bordelais group (“Bordelais” means to be from the Aquitaine’s capital, Bordeaux), ”Un Jour en France.” 

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N O I R
D É S I R
 

UN JOUR EN FRANCE           

 (A DAY IN FRANCE)

 
Au bistro comme toujours
Il y a les beaux discours
Au poteau les pourris
Les corrompus aussi
Dents blanches et carnassiers
Mais à la première occasion
Chacun deviendrait le larron
De la foire au pognon qui se trame ici
Allez dance avec Johnny
Se rappellent de la France
Ont des reminiscences
De l’ordre, des jeux, l’essence
Quand on vivait mieux
Il y avait Paul et Mickey 

On pouvait discuter
Mais c’est Mickey qui a gagné
Allez d’accord, n’en parlons plus
Un autre jour en France
Des prières pour l’audience
Et quelques fachisants autour de 15%
Charlie, défends-moi !
C’est le temps des menaces
On a pas le choix, pile ou face
Et aujourd’hui je jure que rien ne se passe
Toujours un peu plus
FN, souffrance
Qu’on est bien en France !
C’est l’heure de changer la monnaie
On devra encore imprimer le rêve de l’Égalite
On devra jamais supprimer celui de la fraternité

Restent des pointillés.


In the bistros as always 
There are the beautiful speeches
Get the rotten on the whipping post
The corrupt as well
White teeth and carnivores
But at the first opportunity
Everyone would turn into the scoundrel
Of the dough bedlam that’s going on here

Come on, dance with Johnny [Reference to Johnny Halliday!]
They remember France 
Got recollections
Of order, games, gas
When we lived better
There was Paul and Mickey (Mickey is of course ”Mickey Mouse”, and by extension, “American culture”)
We could talk
But it’s Mickey who won
So, alright, let’s not talk about it anymore
Another day in France
Prayers for the audience
Some fascists bordering the 15% (a reference to the 1995 Presidential elections, where the FN secured 15% of the votes.)
Charlie, protect me! [Allusion to the left-wing "Charlie Hebdo"]
It’s the time of threats
We’ve got no choice, heads or tails
And today I swear, nothing’s going on

Always a bit more
FN, suffering [Front National: Jean-Marie Le Pen's right-wing party]
We’re so good in France!
It’s time to switch currency [From le Franc to l'Euro]
We still got to print the dream
of Equality
Fraternity should never be removed

“Ellipsis” remains (Or “dot-dot-dot”, “… Égalité, Fraternité“: What else is left from the celebrated motto, if it’s not “la… LIBERTÉ”!)

 

As the national attention of her pays natal (native country), l’Égypte, was overwhelmingly occupied by the stunning popular uprising qui battait son plein (at its height) just a year ago, the disappearance from this world of l’enfant du pays (the native child, or literally “the child of the country”) -who was also of Lebanese extraction and later became French, par adoption- went by almost completely inaperçue (unnoticed)…

Andrée Chedid, romancière, mère et grand-mère (Novelist, Mother and Grandmother)

Born into une famille libanaise (a Lebanese family) who resided then in le Caire (Cairo), the capital of “la mère du mondeor “the Mother of the World“, which is how Egyptians famously nickname their country, future author and mother Andrée was to eventually settle in France in the aftermath of WWII, after spending half of the wartime in le Liban (Lebanon.)

Soon enough, la jeune adolescente (the young teenager) would emerge to adulthood as a prolific author, venturing in more than one literary genre: Essay, prose, poetry, drama, and even la littérature d’enfance et de jeunesse (children’s literature.)

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A conversation with Madame Chedid, mother of the famous Louis Chedid, and her even more famous grandson, the seven-times winner of les Victoires de la Musiquesinger, and “rock star” Matthieu ‘-M-’ Chedid


Her rich identity as une femme arabe (an Arab woman), une chrétienne (a Christian woman), and une francophone, finds a wide and profound réflexion in her literary works, which are translated today in nine languages around the world.

When she won le Goncourt of poetry a few years ago, it was by no means a new accomplishment for this grande dame.

She did just that more than 30 years ago, when she won le Prix Goncourt de la Nouvelle.

In fact, the literary prize was known back then as ”la Bourse” Goncourt de la Nouvelle (in the “short story” category), of which she was the recipient at a time when earning le Goncourt truly meant something in the French monde littéraire (literary world.) That is, way before the Goncourt morphed, as of two years ago, into a “Clonecourt“, namely the special award for unabashed plagiarizing “Raëlian” clones! (See the “Houellebecq dossier” for more details.)


Just as Mary N. Layoun, an author who often wrote about la Grèce (Greece), rightfully pointed out in her study “The Sixth Day of Compassion“, devoted to Andrée Chedid’s novel le sixieme jour” (“The Sixth Day”), the profound influence of Platon (Plato) is readily perceptible, and lies at the very heart of her works

Although Mrs. Layoun does not state it quite explicitly in the aforementioned study, one must think of the allégorie platonique de la caverne (Platonic allegory of the Cave), illuminating the true sense of life and reality, the source ola lumière et les ombres (the light and the shadows), when Madame Chedid pens these magnificently memorable lines (Page 85, of the Flammarion edition) through the mouth of her character, Om Hassan:

L’ombre, c’est la maladie du soleil, et rappelle-toi, le soleil gagne toujours. Toi, tu es mon soleil. Tu es ma vie.
(“The shadow is but the disease of the Sun, et remember, the Sun always triumphs. You, you’re my Sun. You’re my life.”)

To this day, only a handful of people can positively state how the first spark of the “French Touch” Electro music scene came to be ignited.

To have an idea, you’ll have to travel in time more than 20 ans en arrière (20 years backwards.)

L’Angleterre (England), 1988: Thousands of diehard Techno devotees turn “barking mad” all over the country when la Dame de Fer (the Iron Lady), Margareth Thatcher, proclaims that they were all to be forever “privés de sortie” (“grounded”), in the wake of the Ecstasy-filled mayhem of madness left by the so-called “Second Summer of Love” (the first one took place in 1967 in San Fran‘…)


Overnight, it became illegal to throw “rave” parties anywhere in the UK

Ensued a massive exodus of soriées Techno unleashed upon France, which were, a few years later, to propel into le devant de la seine (the front stage) world-wide famous French Techno Stars, such as David Guetta and Daft Punk!

Almost à mi-chemin (halfway) between la place Charles-de-Gaulle and Place de Clichy, the Lycée Carnot (Carnot High school) saw many young and ambitious students graduate to become influential men and woman in the world: Some, as Jacques Chirac and Dominique Strauss-Kahn (aka “DSK“) became de fins politiciens (shrewd politicians—except maybe for DSK); others, like Louis Aragon were to become famous écrivains (writers); des acteurs remarquables (remarkable actors), like Jean Reno, also attended classes there (remember him in le Grand Bleules Visiteurs, Léon, Ronin, Da Vinci Code, etc.); and finally musicians, such as the duo who, to this today, many people “around the world” (…) are still surprised to discover that that they are actually FrenchDaft Punk!

When Thomas Bangalter, the son of a noted musician (his father worked with la Compagnie Créole), met like-minded Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo at the lycée Carnot, les deux sont devenus amis (the two became friends) and decided to start a band they called Darlin’, which they named after the 1967 song of The Beach Boys.

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In 2002, Thomas Bangalter composed la bande originale (the soundtrack) of the movie “Irreversible“, starring Vincent Cassel and his wife Monica Bellucci. A deliberately provocative, ultra-violent, and particularly disturbing movie (causing quite an uproar in the Cannes Festival of the same year), it features a rather horrific scene shot in a now-closed Metro station (most likely ordered to be closed due to this movie) located within a few blocks from the lycée Carnot, where the Daft Punk duo attended their high school years—Needless to say, you are definitely not advised to watch this movie

In an amusing ironie du sort (irony of fate), shortly after Darlin’ performed two gigs or so in the foggy pays des Beatles (country of the Beatles), the now defunct UK magazine Melody Maker issued a very unflattering review of their songs, dismissing their music as mere “daft punk“— That is, the very same sobriquet they would later adopt as their stage name, and under which they would become mondialement connus (world famous.)

How about that for bouncing back from un échec (a failure)!

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Daft Punk – “Alive


Daft Punk released their premier (first) single titled “The New Wave” in 1994, a track which would then turn into a final mix, “Alive“, which eventually made it into “Homework“, their debut album.

Released trois années (three years) after their first single, “Homework” also featured some major hits, such as “Da Funk” and “Around the World“, which earned le duo français a worldwide fame.

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Da Funk” (1995), directed by Spike Jonze (later of “Being John Malkovich” fame, also director of “Sabotage” by The Beastie Boys, and Björk’s “It’s Oh So Quiet”), the Daft Punk music video features un homme-chien (a man-dog) carrying a radiocassette (boombox) in the streets of New York City!

 

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Daft Punk – “Around the World

Only a year after Kylie Minogue‘s single “Spinning Around” came out, heralding a new “synthpop” era that would dominate most of the past décennie (yes, “décennie” means “decade”, because we’re in 2012!), Daft Punk released their second album titled “Discovery

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Ok, just “One More Time”? (from the 2001 “Discovery” album)
Could it really have been plus de dix ans (more than ten years ago?)

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Also from the “Discovery” album, “Aerodynamic” appeared the following year in the critically-acclaimed French movie “l’Auberge espagnole”, the prequel to Les Poupées russes” 

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Daft Punk’s “Robot Rock” (“Human After All”)

In 2005, Daft Punk’s album “Human After All” received mixed reviews: Considering that it was conceived in barely three weeks, many a critique accused it of being nothing less than “du travail bâclé” (“a botched job”)!


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Finally, in 2010, the Frenchy duo Daft Punk “went Hollywood” to meet TRON: Legacy
À vous de juger mes amis (You be the judge my friends)

Napoleon on horseback

L’Homme Providentiel“, the “Providential Man, (or “La Femme Providentielle” this year), the “Savior of the Masses”, is one of those “dynamite figures”, so to speak, which have for long jalonné (punctuated) the History of France: From Louis XIV, le Roi Soleil” (The Sun King)to his Supreme Highness, le Grand Empreur Napoléon Bonaparte—To, finally, the much less sophisticated “parodical figureheads” of later pedigree…
Much to the “déception“, of course, of the overwhelming majority of the French people!
But to each their own disappointment, to each their own “Waterloo“…

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What a Corsican with a “Napoleon complex” would have probably looked like deux siècles plus tard (two centuries later)!

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SILMARILS – “L’Homme Providentiel” (“The Providential Man”)


* S I L M A R I L S - “L’H o m m e  P r o v i d e n t i e l” (“The  Providential  Man”):

Dormez, dormez tranquille quand je vous l’ordonne

Sleep, sleep tight when I order you to

Placez vos espérances en moi et que Dieu vous pardonne

Put your hopes into me and may God forgive you

Applaudissez mes actes et buvez mes paroles

Applaud my actions and drink my words

Affichez ma photo dans toutes les écoles  

Display my picture in all schools

Assez! Nous allons dire, nous allons faire

Enough! We will say, we will do

Nous allons bientôt rendre sa fertilité à la terre

We shall give to the land its fertility back

Nous allons faire de vos femmes de bonnes mères 

We shall make of your women good mothers

Votez pour moi vous aurez la lumière

Vote for me and you shall see the light

Voyez je n’ai pas un seul ennemi

Look I have not a single enemy

Car mon discours se situe bien au-dela des partis 

For my speech is beyond patisanship

J’accueille à bras ouverts tous les nouveaux venus

I welcome with wide arms all the newcomers

L’heure de changement de vestes est enfin venue

The turncoat time is finally upon us

Merci aux ralliement de dernière minute 

Thank you to the rallying of last minute

Aux Stackhanovistes du demi-tour aux fils de @#%$&!

To the Stakhavonites of about-turns, to the sons of @#%$&!

Vous avez tellement tellement fait pour moi  

You did so much for me

La nation ne vous oubliera pas

The nation won’t forget you

Je rendrai fertile la terre 

I shall make the land fertile again

Je changerai en or la pierre

I will turn stones into gold

Les hommes seront de bons pères 

Men will be good fathers

Je suis l’homme providentiel

I am the providential man

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