Bonjour,
I hope that you and yours are well.
Well the big thing this week is Bastille Day. The French don’t call it Bastille Day, they call it Fete Nationale (National Festival), or Quatorze Juillet (14th July).
Bread Man, the man who delivers cakes, croissants and pastries to the little villages in my part of France, is nonplussed by our name for this most important holiday. “Why do you call it Bastille Day?” he said. “We French don’t say Bastille Day, and we find it very peculiar that you do!”
“Peculiar” is his new favourite English word, it’s “very Donton Abbey” he says (everyone I know in France is mad for Downton Abbey but pronounce it Donton, like wanton!), and he actively looks for things to be “peculiar”. If he burns the bread a bit he says, “I don’t know ‘ow that ‘appened, it’s very peculiar.” If a croissant is a bit flat “it’s peculiar”, if Madame Bernadette, who lives at the bottom of my hill comes out of her house to wave at him to hurry up with her bread because he’s nattering too long at my gate, “she’s peculiar.”
Anyway, I do actually know the reason we call it Bastille Day as I did a podcast on everything Bastille Day (you can find it here). In a nutshell, the Bastille, a prison in Paris, was stormed by the people of Paris on 14 July 1789 which kickstarted the Revolution. A year later on 14 July 1790, the event was commemorated with a one-off national holiday (a big deal in those days). 100 years later, the government decided to have a permanent annual day to honour the French Revolution. It was suggested that the holiday be held on 21 January as that’s the day King Louis XVI was beheaded. Other dates were put forward, but in the end, they went for July 14 – the date of two major events: the storming of the Bastille and the Fete de la Fédération holiday the year after. However, it was never confirmed which was the exact event that was being celebrated! English speakers decided to call it Bastille Day deciding for themselves that of course it made sense to go for the date which had the most drama.
By the time I’d finished explaining all this, Madame Bernadette was screeching “coucou, coucou” from her gate, at the top of her voice, trying to get Bread Man’s attention – and her lunch. “Coucou” is French for “cooee” or “yoohoo,” she hadn’t turned into a cuckoo – that would be peculiar!
Wishing you a very happy 14th July from a sometimes-peculiar little village in the middle of nowhere, rural northern France,
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Wishing you a bon weekend, a great read of the magazine and bisous from France.
Janine
Editor
Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream, My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online. Her new book How to be French – a celebration of the French lifestyle and art de vivre, is out now – a look at the French way of life.
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