Putting Lipstick on the Pig

Apart from yesterday's scheduling debacle, my first week back at ACCORD was really enjoyable; Our teacher, Oceane, who grew up in New Caledonia (sort of the French equivalent of Van Diemen's Land, regular readers will recognize it as the place of exile of that arch-anarchist, Communard Louise Michel) was enthusiastic, engaged, and highly motivating. Over the course of the week, we covered material as diverse as French outside metropolitan France, art and art history, feminism, careers and work, and beliefs and superstitions.

So, for example, under that last rubric, we learned today of the prevalent French belief that it brings good luck to walk into dogshit, provided you do so with your left foot, rather than your right.

That sound you hear is my irreverent guffawing. I'm sorry, citizens of France, and denizens of Paris in particular. But this is as good an illustration as you could ever want of the activity known to Americans as putting lipstick on a pig. When you kiss it, it's still a pig. And that brown stuff on your shoe, that's still merde.