BS: What have the French ever done for us ?

Subject: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Gareth
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 07:38 PM

A spin off from the What has the US of A ever done for us thread

Provided the Welsh Archers with targets.

Provided some delicious Cheese

Given us loaves of Bread you can not fit in to a Supermarket Carrier.

And a provided a European end to the Channel Tunnel.

Other than that - Not a lot.

Gareth

---

Search for "done for us" threads

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Lepus Rex
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 07:40 PM

Gave the world ME, you lucky bastards.

---Lepus Rex

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 07:41 PM

Georges Brassens. And that in itself would be quite sufficient.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Snuffy
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 07:43 PM

I thought he was Belgian?

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Bobert
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 07:49 PM

I was gonna say the Statue of Liberty, but then French Fries came to mind. Now its a toss up. Jus funnin'.

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 07:53 PM

LOL! My witty asides bear fruit...

Well...they have given us l'amour! L'amour fantastique!!! Yeah, BABY!!!

They have given us torch singers and cabarets and the Left Bank.

Cyrano De Bergerac and the Three Musketeers! Joan of Arc!

Marvelous disparaging phrases like "perfide Albion!"

Frilly underwear of a most risque sort.

Really dry wine.

An alternative to the bloody boring tedious English stiff upper lip...

A decisive American victory at the Battle of Yorktown.

The Marquis de Lafayette.

And Lepus Rex.

Man, talk about a gifted nation! Vive la France!!!

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Snuffy
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 07:58 PM

or perhaps when have the French ever done for us ?

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 08:19 PM

George Brassens a Belgian? No - he was born in Sète, 1921, on the Mediterranean coast and you couldn't get much further than that from Belgium and still be in France.

Here's a site about him.

The best reason I know for learning French. (But they don't teach you his French in schools.)

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: mg
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:03 PM

lavendar soap

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: mg
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:12 PM

they made American women feel unfashionable because we are always told that a French woman could have 5 pieces of clothing and always look perfect for any occasion.....I could have 500 pieces and still miss the mark. mg

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Fortunato
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:19 PM

Brie. Champagne. Bridget Bardot. Cul de Sac. Coupe De Ville. Cajun accordian, Creole cooking and Quebecois fiddling.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:21 PM

Chateau Neuf Du Pape

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: mg
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:36 PM

wonderful sea salt...hurdy gurdy????probably not...Breton???

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:36 PM

Edith Piaf.

They can keep Bardot, thanks anyway.
I prefer Belmondo and Binoche, but then that's me.

Haute cuisine, nouveau cuisine, etc.

Bastille Day.

Descartes, who thought therefore he was.

Marie Curie and Louis Pasteur.

Marquis de Sade.

Simone de Beauvoir.

Fairy tales.

Debussey.

Some of the most divine Impressionist paintings.

French cologne.

Le Petit Prince.

Braille.

Ballet. Actually, technically ballet was born in the Italian courts, but the first ballet for which a complete score survived, was performed in Paris in 1581.

"We'll always have Paris." (name that film!)

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST,ozmacca
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:37 PM

The metric system

The modern european code of justice...

and if those weren't bad enough...

Glow-in-the-dark Muraroa Atoll

Diving opportunities on the Rainbow Warrior

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: katlaughing
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:41 PM

Via Canada, my Rog and last name "LaFrance!"

Vive la France!

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:41 PM

"Diving opportunities on the Rainbow Warrior"

No shit! LMAO!

I think France has more nukes than any other European nation, IIRC.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: CarolC
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:42 PM

Provided me with some genetic material through my maternal great-grandmother (plus some songs and other cool stuff she taught me when I was little).

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:44 PM

The French kiss?

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:52 PM

Louis XIV.

The guillotine.

The first republican revolution in Europe, n'est ce pas?

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: DonMeixner
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:01 PM

Yeah then French are some of the ones who still owe the US for WW's one and two.

Don

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Sorcha
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:20 PM

In spite of the Vichy, the Underground saved a lot of Jews. Plus, all of the above.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: CET
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:26 PM

Wild lavender growing on the side of the road in Provence.

The victory over the All Blacks in World Cup 99.

One of the best Irish bars in the universe: The Quiet Man, rue des Haudriettes, Paris.

The battle of the Foreign Legion against the Afrika Korps at Bir Hakeim (yes, I know, mostly composed of non-Frenchmen, but led by General Leclair)

Charles Trenet

Those incredibly fattening deep fried dough things dipped in sugar that you can buy from street vendors in Paris.

Cassoulet

CET

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:28 PM

Camus, Sartre, Descartes, Merleaux-Ponte', Voltaire, Hugo, Moliere, Rabellais, Manet, Monet, Rodin, David, Debussy and Ravel (and if I misspelled any, please excuse - it's been a few years since college)

Also, lots of words with letters that are either silent or barely hinted at, making non-French-speakers absolutely incapable of saying them without making fools of themselves.

They also gave me my last name, though I have absolutely no idea how many generations back I would have to go to find a full-blooded Frenchman in the family tree.

Bruce

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:29 PM

Troubadour poets.

Chansons de geste.

Baudelaire, Rimbaud, Gertrude Stein.

And thank god, the neolyricists to replace the Structuralists.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:34 PM

Well, Don, if the US had joined those wars a little earlier, instead of when their own interests dictated that they could put it off no longer, then there might not have been a need for such "debts". But perhaps we shouldn't get started on all that. Britain had a revolution, and a republic, quite some time before France, of course; though it was called a Commonwealth, and, regrettably, did not last.

I like France, and the French, and lived there for a while. I had a nice time. They didn't invent the hurdygurdy (and it isn't a Breton instrument, though it used to be played there a bit, as it was in many other places) but they did perfect the design when it was fashionable for a while at the French Court. The bellows-blown bagpipes were also developed for the benefit of French aristocrats, and without them we might have neither the Northumbrian nor the Uilleann (Union) pipes. Or, perhaps, some fine traditional songs such as The Outlandish Knight and The Ship in Distress, both of which probably came to Britain from, or via, France.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:35 PM

I forgot one: Marcel Marceau. And I, for one, have not forgiven them for that one.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:41 PM

What country holds the distinction of being the oldest republic in Europe?

San Marino is the oldest republic in Europe, and it is one of the smallest as it occupies only 24 square miles.

That post was intended to be tongue in cheek, Malcolm. Sorry if it didn't work.

Now, who can name the Seven Summits?

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:47 PM

BTW, Louis XIV was the longest reigning monarch in modern European history. Just in case anyone was wondering.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: DonMeixner
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:52 PM

Malcolm , you may not be aware of how the US is such a stickler for proper ettiquette. We would have been there earlier but until we were invited, good form required use to stay at home. And then there was the matter of the right clothes, no whites after labor day except for Navy guys. things like that there.


As a total aside: Did we all known that French toast was originally German toast but then came WWI and the name was changed to an ally rather than use the name of an enemy?

Don

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:56 PM

OK, so explain Belgian waffles, then!

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: katlaughing
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 12:18 AM

Collette, brilliant, if controversial

Gerard de Pardieu(sp)

our own Auxiris who posts wonderful translations of stories AND propagates gorgeous irises

a very sexy, romantic language

and, way back about 5 generations and even farther back to the 1600's, a wee drop of French blood in our lines

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Bert
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 12:53 AM

Now Ozmacca would have to go and mention the metric system. That alone just about undoes all them other good things.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Don Firth
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 01:48 AM

Je ne sais quoi. . . .

The Peugeot?

Mais, Alexandre Dumas, Victor Hugo, Edmund Rostand, Edith Piaf, etc., etc. . . .

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Dead Horse
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 03:29 AM

Loads of Shanties. (even if they can't spell the word)
Snails in Fast Food restaurants.
The glorious British maritime tradition.
Soixant Neuf Du Pape

NOT the Cajun accordian, that came from German influence, later modified with Italian reeds.
And I believe the guillotine was first invented en Anglaterre?
(though not used to such good effect)

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Mr Happy
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 03:40 AM

French letters?

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Mr Happy
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 03:44 AM

le condom de monsieur condom.

le leotard de monsieur leo tard



RSVP

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: michaelr
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 03:58 AM

The actress to put all of Hichtcock's "ice blondes" to shame:

Catherine Deneuve -- too French to be icy.

Francois Truffaut and the other nouveau cinema directors of the 60s.

Musical tie-in: Charles Aznavour, Jacques Brel, even Maurice Chevalier, who was quite prominent in America.

Confit, Boeuf Bourgignonne, Bouillabaisse, Brioche, Foie Gras, Demiglace, and of course...




UNSURPASSED anywhere in the world -----




C H E E E E S E ! ! !

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 05:27 AM

French letters, French chalk, French leave, French cricket ... but aren't "French" fries Belgian? (Like a ot of famous "French" people!)

Steve

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST,Davetnova
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 05:44 AM

Underarm hair

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 05:51 AM

Jacques Tati

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: greg stephens
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 05:53 AM

Wine
cheese
Those "french tricks" without which our marital duties would be far too Anglo-Saxon.
Agincourt, and the subsequent invention of the whole concept of the "foreign holiday"
Cajun music (of surprisngly little interest to the mainland French, when you consider how much the English like Jamaican and American music).
The Eiffel Tower(when they do "tourist attraction", they do it in style).
Chirac, for being both rude and patronising to Blair.
Villon
An accent which it is great fun to imitate
Frere Jacque
Brigitte Bardot and Jeanne Moreau
Giving us the incentive to build boats and learn how to sail them.
Teaching us the invaluable lesson that if you're going to have a war, fight it on their territory, not ours.
Johnny Halliday,Eurotrash and the concept of Culture.
Centimetres, nanomegathingies and all that stuff which is apparently jolly useful.
Films to show in art theatres, particularly those ones where you used to be able to see things that weren't allowed to in Ealing comedies.
Jean-Paul Belmondo and the art of smoking Gsulloises.
Brigitte Bardot.
Brigitte Bardot
Brigitte Bardot
brigitte Bardot

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 06:05 AM

Flooding the market with disgusting French "Golden Delicious" (false on both counts) apples, while at the same time trying to get the EEC to ban our own (truly delicious) Coxes' Orange Pippins.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Ringer
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 07:47 AM

* Burnt a lot of our sheep-meat (some of it alive, I believe).
* Declined to import our beef, despite getting their wrists slapped by the EU.
* Extended (with German collusion) the life of that vile thing the Common Agricultural Policy.

Anyone ever noticed that the more beer you drink the more objectionable the French get? (Must be my frogophobia, because I've never yet met anyone from France who wasn't perfectly charming.)

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Peter T.
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 08:34 AM

Emmanuelle Beart and Fanny Ardant. What other nation can claim the same? yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 09:00 AM

The guillotine's origins are a mystery. Yes, there were "pre-guillotine" devices used in both England and Germany, I think.

But with which significant European historical event is the guillotine most famously associated?

Vive la difference.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Catarina
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 09:14 AM

Well, as far as Portugal is concerned:

The french invaded our country not once, nor twice, but three times and left really bad memories both on their way in and on their way out.

Plus they stole everytinhg they could and smashed what they couldn't take.

They provided a country for us to go to during the sixties, and then treated the portuguese immigrants like shit - but they were not the only ones.

They provided us with a place to dream about - during the fifties, the sixties and most of the seventies all portuguese leftists dreamed of France.

During those same decades, contraceptive pills had to be smugled into Portugal from France. Interesting books too.

Still during those same decades portuguese kids were made to learn french at school - learning english before 7th grade was considered freakish.

They have probably the most expensive books in the world.

They eat snails, for God's sake!!!!

They think of themselves as the guardians of european culture and try their best to make everybody else feel bad about it.

Paris is beautiful, french cheeses are great, french cuisine is YUK!, onion soup is yummy, french notebooks' pages are strangely squared (but I like that) and they must have the most incredibly obnoxious ortographic rules in the world.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: Schantieman
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 09:16 AM

Well, actually, once Golden Delicious are ripe, they turn rather more Golden and are slightly Delicious. Trouble is, they're always sold (like all other fruit) underripe and green - and taste like it!

Court Pendu du Plat, anyone?

Steve

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: GUEST
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 09:19 AM

Quebec......... fabulous part of Canada that both defines and divides the nation..never dull, typically French.

Subject: RE: BS: What have the French ever done for us ?
From: CarolC
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 09:41 AM

My understanding is that the Golden Delicious apple was first developed in West Virginia, USA...

Apples that originated in West Virginia