Mes Lointains Rivage (FAWM 2011 #3)

Chatting with Elisabeth Beucher, a friend who lives in Paris, I discovered she’s a poet. Of course, I immediately asked if she’d share a poem I could put to music. She chose well, and we’re both delighted with the U2/trance feeling of it.

She said I pronounced all the words correctly. Since I don’t speak French, I’m pretty pleased.

The only instrument is a single track on my Strat, with the reverb and echo set to stun, played by thumping my thumb against the strings right above the pickup.

Listen to ‘Mes Lointains Rivage’

Lyrics:

Bleu nuit
Bleu du ciel
Bleu du lagon.

Bleu de tes yeux
Et de la glace en feu
Bleu de mon univers.

Bleu de mes rois
Bleu de mes racines
Bleu de la distance
Et de la différence.

Bleu de mes voyages,
De mes lointains rivages
Et de mes océans.

Bleu de mon ancre.

Translation:

Blue night
Blue sky
Blue lagoon

Blue of your eyes
And ice on fire
Blue my world

My blue kings
Blue of my roots
Blue distance
And difference

Blue my travels
From my distant shores
And my oceans

Blue my anchor

Nomads Adapt

I seriously underestimated the disorienting effect of being surrounded by a language I don’t speak, don’t understand.

Because the friends we’re staying with speak perfect English (despite conducting much of their life in French) I assumed this part of Quebec would by like my experience in Ireland: everyone could speak Irish, but everyone also spoke English, often as their first language.

Nah.

Brush up on your French before you visit Quebec. You can find English; there are, I’m told, towns nearby where everything is in English. Just not here. Road signs, labels in the grocery store, even the ‘Open’ sign on the door (if Ouvert means ‘Open’, as I assumed) is in French, with English added almost as an afterthought.

From the age of 8 I lived in California, nearly always in San Diego. Everything was bilingual there, too. English first, then Spanish, often spelled wrong or using bad grammar. (For years, decades, perhaps, the signs in the bathrooms said Lave Sus Manos which would be like seeing a sign tell an English speaker to Wash You Hands; it should, as an Spanish-speaker knows, read Lavese Las Manos; there was a parody adventure show on one of the radio stations where the bad guy was the notorious Lave Sus Manos, so dangerous his name was posted in every bathroom in the state.)

At least here, the English is correct. It’s just smaller. Underneath the French. Not where I expect it.

And that’s what’s wrong. Clearly it’s not wrong for folks in what is legally a bilingual country to speak two languages. (Yet another aside: what do you call someone who speaks many languages? A polyglot. What do you call someone who speaks two languages? Bilingual. What do you call someone who speaks only one language? An American.)

What’s wrong is, as is often the case, my expectations. Had I kept my eyes and ears open; had I allowed for the possibility that reality might not perfectly mirror the image in my head, I might have spent a little time learning a few phrases of conversational French; I might have planned for an experience I’ve already had before when we moved to San Diego and thereafter spent lots of time in Mexico where my father worked, surrounded by a language I knew even less than I know French today.

My Spanish is okay; as a kid, we spoke Spanish at home quite a bit ’cause Dad was too tired to switch over after a long day of conducting business in Spanish. I’ve lost and remembered it twice over the decades. It helps with reading French. It also helps that I used to read the etymologies in my Dad’s giant Webster’s as a kid so I’m familiar with the Latin origins of much of the English and Spanish and French languages.

But I still feel like a fish out of water; un poisson sortie de l’eau. Which is literal; even Cristina doesn’t know French colloquialisms. I’ll have to ask Fred what the locals say.

About a hundred times a day, I’ll have to ask what the locals say.

Our First Full Day In British Columbia

Yesterday, Tuesday August 3, 2010, was our first full day in British Columbia. We slept with the windows open; it’s very quiet. As soon as I was up I took the dog for a walk and then came home to make our morning tea. Joel and I drank our tea while sitting on the front porch.

We set  Fiona up with a laptop and she worked at one desk while I worked at another close by. Joel sat in a comfy chair in the living room a few feet away working away on his laptop. It was work as usual. We stopped at lunch and ate in the dining area that leads into the back yard through French doors. In the afternoon we had two business calls via Skype that went very well.

Fiona’s enjoying taking the dog for walks and making sure he has his food and water. Last night he was comfortable enough to sleep on his pillow in Fiona’s room. She loves to read in bed and has lots of books to read. We will have to go to the local library still. There’s a huge park nearby and tonight we may explore it. Fiona thinks it’s a forest and I’ve heard they may have an animal petting area.

Tomorrow we’ll go to the local Waves Coffee House and check it out. So if you happen to be in the area of New Westminster, come on by about 11:30 am and say hi!

Updated August 19, 2010 with this picture:

Fiona