Le bacchu-ber du poisson

La gifle atterrit // The slap is landing

A few days ago we went for a short walk along seaside promenade towards San Cristóbal. When coming back, I suddenly felt something wet and cold touching my neck. Turning, I discovered a very embarrassed-looking fisherman with a small stripy fish on the end of his line. It was obvious that I was subjected to fish slapping as a result of an over-enthusiastic pull of the rod. He was very relieved when we started laughing instead of berating him.

The episode made me think of The Fish-Slapping Dance, of course. Unfortunately, the Wikipedia article doesn’t have a French equivalent, so I looked around a bit. Clearly, the fish-slapping dance is a variety of weapon dance (no French equivalent either). But I did find one French weapon dance — Bacchu-ber, name origin unknown. So, here we go: Le bacchu-ber du poisson, le style de Las Palmas!

Alors, vous parlez français?

ça va? -- Alors, vous parlez français? --Non, mais je peux dire "ça va?" // How are you? -- So, you speak French? --N o, but I can say "how are you?" :))

Yesterday on a hike (une randonnée) with Arawak there was a French guy who speaks very little Spanish (He might well speak perfect English, but I didn't ask). At some point, when we were trudging up a slope, I asked him how he was doing (ça va?). He asked if I spoke French, and, lamely, I replied "yes, a little" (oui, un peu). 

Later I thought that Non, mais je peux dire "ça va?" would have been somewhat less  lame, and also more truthful, thus showing L'esprit de l'escalier. 

In Russian, this "staircase wit" will be"задний ум" - sort of "back mind", or even "back brain", like what the dinosaurs (not) used to have.

Il n’existe pas de règles officielles

Il n’existe pas de règles officielles. Celles-ci se transmettent entre enfants //
There are no official rules. They are passed on from one kid to another.

Inspired by today’s French word of the day “la marelle” (Les enfants français jouent très souvent à la marelle pendant la récréation // French children very often play hopscotch during recess), I read a bit about the game in various languages.

The English Wikipedia article has a brave go at explaining the rules, and gives a few examples of possible variations. The “Popular culture” section mentions the novel Hopscotch by Julio Cortázar. I looked because I expected to find it there.

The French version is much more circumspect about the rules, as you can see from the phrase I used as a caption to the picture. The rules, it says, can vary between regions, towns and streets. Still, they do give “Règles les plus communes” (you can work out what that means). There is no “Popular culture” section at all.

And finally, the Russian article explains the rules in a (patchily) detailed fashion. Problem is, these rules are quite possibly applicable to just one place and one particular childhood (the author’s). The Cortazar’s novel, together with its Russian-only wordplay* contained in the title, is sadly missing from the article.

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* In Russian, the novel is called «Игра в классики», which is quite literal translation of Hopscotch (or Rayuela). The word “классики” in Russian means “hopscotch” or “classics”. The title, therefore, can be read as “The Game of Hopscotch” or “The Game of Classics”. I must add that when I heard of it first, I assumed the latter.

Je suis exténué

Je suis exténué ; je ne peux plus rien faire ! // I am exhausted; I can not do anything anymore!

And once again, French Word of the Day to the rescue!

I am not sure why the cat is exhausted, I think he is just pretending to have a good long snooze.

I myself, on the other hand, feel exhausted since this week was dedicated to all things bureaucratic, and that takes it out of you. I even wanted to do a picture about the only two certainties in life, but couldn’t think of how to tax a cat. Cats are essentially untaxable, aren’t they.

Pictures related to cats @ Shutterstock.