Sylvia, Your story reminded me that, many years ago I was walking through the students' union at Melbourne Uni, late on a Friday afternoon. In the middle of the concourse there were two tall blokes with backpacks looking very lost so I went over and asked if I could help. They asked whether student unions in Australia had crash pads that touring students could use.
I said we didn't have anything like that and they explained they were two architecture students, from the university in Paris, touring around Australia; they'd come to Melbourne to see the Victoria Market, the Melbourne Zoo and the National Gallery of Victoria (as it was then called) and would be leaving on the Tuesday.
I told them they could crash at my place as my lady and I had plenty of spare floor space and some spare sleeping gear. I also explained that the best time to visit the Vic. Market was Saturday mornings (and we routinely did our shopping there at that time, so could guide them around), Sunday was probably the best day to visit the Zoo and we could do the Gallery on the Monday. So we did, and had a great weekend of it.
On the Monday however, we found the Gallery was shut; apparently it was shut every Monday, for maintenance.
"C'est la vie!" I commented, although I pronounced it "Sest la vye." They pricked their ears up and asked me to explain.
So I told them there were people in Australia who wanted to 'put on side' or show they were culturally superior to everyone else; these people routinely used French expressions where ther were perfectly acceptable English ones. There were other people, of whom I was one, who routinely lampooned such pretenders by mispronouncing, in Aussie English and with very ocker accents, the sorts of French expressions used by the pretenders. I gave a few examples (Bong tong, mercy buccups, etc) and finished them with the comment, "When something has gone awry and youe could say "That's life!", the poseurs would, instead, say "C'est la vie" and the mockers would say "Sest la vye!"" And if something had gone really wrong, we'd say "Sest la fu**ing vye!"
Amused, they took their leave of us and continued on their way. Six months later, we received a postcard from them saying (among other things) that they'd converted the entire architecture faculty at the university into exclaiming "Sest la vye!" (with the expletive if warranted) whenever mishaps occurred.
Somehow, it pleasd me that I'de been able to do my bit for the French language.