C’est Manifique

Alright... first off... I apologize. I should have given you this link earlier and totally spaced. So! Mom, before you jump off of the pop-culture bridge, here are the photos:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=21213&id=1323450019&l=0b2f9ea022


*phew* narrowly rescued from the clutches of the might Red Social that is sweeping the world. (You think I exaggerate? oh-ho... I do not!)

Anyways, I think I left off when I had just arrived in France and met up with my friends. We had a lovely “tea-time” at a cafe just below the pope’s palace (yes. THE pope) in Avignon and then proceeded to where the car was parked. From there, we headed off to a supermarket/shopping mall that would put “stuffmart” from Veggie Tales to shame. We shopped a bit (...er... followed his mom around and got lost in the dog food section looking for BBQ coal) as I chattered away about... everything (the kind of verbal spewing I tend to do when excited).
From there we headed over to the car in the parking lot, and to our surprise (well... more my surprise than anyone else), Thomas’s younger brothers had succeeded in nagging their father into buying a soccer ball for them. Awesome! And best of all, there was a lovely field not five minutes from where we were staying. SWEET! So, we played soccer (futbol) the second we got settled into the house. Noticing that my English (and dependance on the mercy of my friends speaking to me in English... I really should have keep up the French lessons) was a bit uncomfy for my hosts the first day, I attempted to branch out a little (very little) and learn some words and phrases. One of them came very naturally. While we were playing soccer, I asked one of the boys how to say “that’s awesome” (more or less) in French. After a few seconds of chattering amongst themselves, they came to the decision that “c’est manifique” was as close as they could come up with off of the top of their heads. I meekly repeated it after them, making the rather rookie blunder of pronouncing the last syllable of “manifique”. (kinda came out like “manifi-queh!”) ... they giggled and then corrected me. So, that began a long and very interesting series of confusing encounters with my friend and his brothers. If you haven’t already said the word “c’est” in your head, or hear it spoken by a french person, it sounds a little bit like the English word “say”. And, by “little bit,” I actually mean “exactly.” For the next few days, whenever something interesting or entertaining would happen, one of the boys would look at me and say “c’est manifique.” Makes perfect sense on paper, but when one’s mind is being slightly scrambled by attempting to understand a Romance Language one has barely studied... it tends to register as something else. In my case, I heard: “say ‘manifique’!”, and took it as a command for me to say the word out loud (to check pronunciation, possibly?)... to which I responded, “manifique.” At first the boys would look at me a bit confused and then laugh, and I would get touchy or defensive, thinking that they were laughing at my accent; when in reality, they were actually wondering why the heck I was repeating every thing they said to me after the word “c’est” (meaning: that is). This continued throughout the week until we were seated at the dinner table of Thomas’s girlfriend’s family's house (*phew* that was a long strand of possession!). During a conversation about nuclear fusion, the phrase “c’est manifique” popped up (I’m not exactly sure why... I don’t even have the vocab to talk about nuclear fusion in English!), and in front of about eight to ten incredibly intelligent people, I turned to Thomas’s brother and said, “NO! I will NOT say ‘manifique! You can’t make me anymore!” ... once again, silence filled the room and all eyes were on me. After his brother looked at me with total confusion etched into his face and gently asked “what?”, I suddenly came to the realization that I was misinterpreting a French word for an English one... and had been doing so all week long. I could have died, but I didn’t. After the bursts of chuckling dissipated, we moved on to other activities. The evening was actually quite lovely. Good food, great friends, and an even better language blunder. Almost as good as the time my British friend asked an American for a rubber... which I guess means “eraser”... awkward. And, another story for another time. Speaking of which: more to come!

Love you all!