My name is not nobody

The name of the doubt.

As you may have read in September, I am for a couple months the lucky dad of a young little fellow called Arthur.

Finding the name of your heir is probably one of the most complex tasks in early parenthood. You cannot afford to be wrong... (Un)fortunately the pregnancy lasts for nine months, which means that you have three quarter of a calendar year to make up your mind. But also as much time to hesitate.

Dilemma after dilemma, books after books, long list after long list, arguments after agreements... It is a never ending story. Well so to speak, because ultimately, one day the little one is here and you have to call him by something. On that note, it was interesting to discover that in the UK, your baby can remain unnamed for a couple weeks, so you can buy yourself some time (I love this expression).

The naming brief.

As a couple of migrating French, we had some kind of a brief for our child's name. First it had to be a boy's name... Probably too lazy to cope with the burden of stabbing in the dark, we had asked for the sex of our child and reduced the task by 50%. But then we wanted: a French name that was also international; a name that would be pronounced roughly the same way in the main European languages; a name that would not carry any chav connotation (I am sorry to say that English names have a negative connotation in France, due to the success of 90210 and the tsunami of Brandons and Dylans that followed); a name which would not create puzzling initial... And certainly a proper name, not a word turned into a name.

In the end, we opted for Arthur, a name which ticked all the above-mentioned boxes on top of having seduced us both. Our son is named after King Arthur, this Briton who successfully fought the Saxons in the 6th century. Being a French King seems to be a key factor of success to achieve great things on this side of the Channel. Think about William the Conqueror or, closer to us, Eric Cantona. French emperors are to that extend less likely to succeed...

Around the clock.

We were convinced that we had thought of everything. Acronyms, permutations, abbreviations... In French, in English, in Italian and Spanish. No flaws could be found. And yet, one of the first things our parents said to us after "oh my God, he is so cute" was "we hope he won't be too often called Arthur!". This was said with a smile, as if there was an intelligent pun or a spoonerism in the sentence. But we were completely missing the trick(another proof of our lack of intelligence it seemed).

At some point, we had to ask. It is painful to be parents and yet to have to admit your ignorance and go back to your own parents just like you were five again. My mother explained me that there was an idiom when she was younger: "se faire appeler Arthur" ("to be called Arthur") meant then "to be told of". She could not recall the origin of this expression though.

After a little investigation to crack the riddle, we finally identified the potential origin of this idiom. And I could not refrain to share it on this blog, since it is tightly connected to cultural difference...
So flash back. We are in the early 40's in France. The German army is occupying most of the territory. To prevent both the sabotage work of the Resistance and the night bombing from the Allys, the Wehrmacht has instored a national curfew. After 8 o'clock, no more light. And German troops patrolled to enforce this policy.

On the one hand, the traditional German uprightness, on the other a world famous habit to "interpret" the laws. You can easily imagine the German soldiers banging at the door of a café, pointing at their watch to explain to the locals that they ought to finish their Pernod in the dark. They would probably add to the pantomime some basic German orders to make their orders crystal clear, something like "8 o'clock!"... Eight o'clock, Acht Uhr in Goethe's language.

For the non-German-speaking, and probably inebriated, fellows on the other side of the machine gun though, Acht Uhr actually sounded pretty much like Arthur. So being summoned "Acht Uhr" was like being told of by your teacher. "Hey Paul, they called you Acht Uhr/Arthur, so you'd better swallow that last glass and head home before it gets worse".

Since the expression have survived, at least amongst the baby-boomers who were "called arthur" by their parents every time they burnt a bra or sprayed slogans on the walls. As a representative of the Generation X, I had never heard of it. My son is not even two month old and he teaches me some cultural insights. That is promising, a bit like that gesture he gave me the other day. No doubt about it Arthur is French, and that he will be called Acht Uhr in the next few years.


To read further:

• Tattling ta-ta! an article on how the second world war influences the perception of our grand parents.
• Forbidding is forbidden, on these iconic slogans the French baby boomers came up with during the May 68 protests.
• Lost time is never found again, a post on how the concept of time differs from one nation to the other.
• Watch your moves or how movements and idioms can be differently interpreted by various nations.

Published. I am published.

A year ago (ok, a little bit more I must acknowledge) I added to my resolutions that I would write a novel... That might have been a bit ambitious from someone that comes from the same city as Stendhal, but I kind of made it. Kind of.

16 months later, "La Loi du Milieu" (The Law of the Underworld) has made its way from my head to the printer. So here is a self-promoting post to make the French-speaking readers of this blog aware that the bespoke short story is completed and is available for purchase on blurb.com. Sorry for the English speakers but you will be missing out until Steven Spielberg decides to adapt it to the Big Screen.

The pitch? Well, I have spend so much time on the introduction wording that there is no need to paraphrase. It is best for you to read it by yourself by clicking on the below-stated "Book Preview" link (note: the preview application is a bit heavy, so you will have to wait a bit, sorry). It will give you a idea of the content, style and photographic illustration to expect, and hopefully interest you enough to click further:

La loi du milieu.

Une nouvelle de Cedric Chambaz

Book Preview

And because I am a model of generosity, I am happy to send a signed copy to the first person who drops me a line... Cheap incentive today, but hey, maybe one day this will worth millions, who knows:).

Ménage à trois

Once upon a time.

French are said to have developed the concept of love affairs. Bill Maher highlights that as one our key trait in his excellent tirade about "being French". But what people may not necessarily be aware of is our fantastic story-telling capabilities. You really have to be good at it when living two parallel lives.

Here is an illustration from Canal+, the French TV channel which is also one of the main cinema producer around the globe. Canal+ is an iconic advertiser in France served by a great creative agency BETC Euro RSCG. They have come up over the last few years with some great advertisements including The March of the Emperor, Broke Back Mountain or Mafia. A saga that is creating much anticipation...

To read further:

• Parisian, head of crustaceans... another French advertising saga for Paris newspaper.
• 8 years later... the Budweiser iconic advert revisited
• How's your job? another great spoof of teh MasterCard saga... A bit horny.

French clichés... Frightening

Just came across this ad from Burger company Hardee's, and I must say that I really don't like. Too many clichés, not enough twists in it. And the product ultimately is nothing but a good representation of what French cuisine can and should be. Anyway they forgot the French beans, the French letters, the French windows, the French doctors... Merci quand même.

To read further:

• And the burger started to rule the world, an article on Burger King immersion in the world of Burger-agnostic civilisations.
• American dream... a short video on how journalist Bill Maher sees France. Hilarious.
• Cuisine like no other a real location about food.
• Computer Generated Tourism or how cartoon can make the most out of France.

Long live the King

A few months back, the Evening Standard published an feature what some people were referring to as a new Baby Boom in the UK. This time around, it was not platinum blond teenagers who were getting on the maternity row, it was rather the thirty-something year old middle class executives who were facing the economical downturn in their own way.

Redundancy plans, reduced bonuses... The middle class had to find something less expensive to entertain itself during last winter. And it seems that it got busy around Christmas.

A few months later, nine in fact, the aftermath of this cocooning plus cuddling phase definitely shows. Prams are now overcrowding the pavements of London, and bumps can be seen everywhere.

On our end, we jumped the gun: this morning my wife gave birth to our first baby, Arthur. Welcome my son.



To read further:

• Don't laugh for me Argentina. or how to put the current economical downturn in perspective
• Now this is a downturn. An article on people who are really going downwards.

Language on a life line

I have already refered a few times to this series of humorous points of view shared by English comedian and actor David Mitchell on all things contemporary. I could do noting but point to this one, which touches base on a topic close to my heart: languages. Some great thinking included in this sketch, including the conclusion: languages follow natural selection.



To read further:

• Victim of your origins, an article on the bias associated to cultural differences and Mitchell's point of view on generation clashes
• Be Welsh! Mitchell's view on Wales and its green pastures

The cost of loving

More of these pictures on my Flickr account

The right agenda

If you are a re regular reader of this blog, you may recall that my wife and I are expecting a newcomer in the coming days. This new addition leads me to think a bit more about cultural differences and oddities around families. So expect a few blog posts in this area in the next weeks... Yes, maybe I will find some time to write articles during some of these promised sleepless nights. Today, I wanted to draw your attention on how finance and tax influence private family lives.

There are indeed two key dates in the diaries of engaged couples: in France that is June 30th; in the UK, September 1st. Although love is a blinding exercise that drives you towards irrational acts, I have discovered that most of the above-mentioned couples are nevertheless very sensitive about their wallet, when they are about to tie the knot, or procreate.

Yes, I will... Save tax!

Let's take things in the "right" order. I will explain to the non-French readers why June is a key month for couples that are looking at getting married. But first I have to make a slight, though critical, digression on the French tax system. Unlike the UK where you are paying your income tax immediately, the French system waits for your fiscal year to end, consolidates all your incomes including wages, rents, share earnings, etc. and then apply a progressive taxation rates on the last 12 months. As a result the higher your total income, the higher the tax rate.

The second main difference is that the income is calculated by household, not by individual. Two singles leaving together are considered as two separate households with different sources of income, as they are not tied by an official, contractual binding. Marriage is the most common way to be seen, in light of the law, as a household. So from the day you say "yes" in front of the altar, the tax office starts looking at your two incomes as one, with its consecutive taxation rate implications.

If you followed me so far, keep the focus on, as this is the part that gets tricky (and you thought French were crooked).

When Mister A marries Miss B, Mister A as a standalone household stops existing. So is household B. And here comes household A+B. At the end of year, the tax office will look at all three households, and apply the appropriate yearly tax rate on each some income generated during the course of the fiscal year. Mister A's yearly revenue only totals up to 6 months of salary. So is Miss B's. And the couple will only pay taxes on six months of joint income.

This is a fantastic tax saver exercise, as you consequently "half" your income that year, and the tax that comes along. So let's be honest, couples are not getting married during the summer because they want a beautiful blue sky as the background of their wedding picture. They are simply trying to save on tax... probably to afford the expensive wedding anyway.

Give birth, save money.

The myth of the romantic French might have been damaged by the previous paragraph, but I am about to bring the Brits on par. We personally got married in October, because we had found the ideal location, and because we were paying our income tax in the UK anyway, so the above did not apply. During our preparation for the Big Day, we once met with a priest in London who reminded us, and the other couples in the room, that a child was an act of love, not a financial decision.

His sentence made me smile back then. As if everything in London was dictated by finance. As if I had to call an advisor in the City before getting romantic with my better half... Well, now that I have started piling up baby clothes, prams, toys, nappies for a couple months, it might well be the case.

I got struck by the fact that all the Brits around me where congratulating me for my "three-second contribution, life-long commitment", highlighting the fact that our child would be a September baby. At first I thought the entire nation was into astrology and that Virgo was the zodiacal sign to have... But no, their comments were triggered by another, more down-to-Earth consideration.

The British education system seems to have a few rules, including a strict definition of the child's age to enter the system. The child must be 5 during the school year which is September 1st to August 31st. This means that a child born in August will start school just after turning 4. On the other end a child born in September will start school a year later. And it seems that this rule has different impact on who you are talking to. The mother usually feels great about September children, because that mean they can keep them close to their heart for one more year (the child is also likely to be more mature when confronting the harsh life of maths and grammar). On the other hand, some people realise that this additional year may translate into incremental costs: one more year at the nursery...

I pretty sure that some people may make procreation plans like they would manage a business plan. The famous, "not tonight I have migraine" might well be replaced by "not this month, my bonus is jeopardized".

Anyway, that is me being sarcastic. Love is beautiful, and all proof of its celebration, be it a wedding, children or even a small bunch of flowers handed over a departing train... are outcasting all financial considerations. After all, as John Lennon and the Beatles once said "All you need is love".

To read further:

• The end of a myth, or how in 50 years the British sex appeal has plummeted
• Now this is a downturn. a funny twist on what was happening in the City not so long ago
• The bad education. an article on the subliminal messages disseminated in children TV programmes

A colourful digital crystal ball

Tell me your name...

I have recently stumbled upon Steve Clayton's blog and my attention got attracted by this little experiment from the MIT. Some students from this university have developed a piece of software that browse the internet after you entered a name. It then associates the contextual information surrounding your name into pre-defined categories that should ultimately compose your personality.

In the words of its genitor, Aaron Zinman, personas can be defined:

In a world where fortunes are sought through data-mining vast information repositories, the computer is our indispensable but far from infallible assistant. Personas demonstrates the computer's uncanny insights and its inadvertent errors, such as the mischaracterizations caused by the inability to separate data from multiple owners of the same name. It is meant for the viewer to reflect on our current and future world, where digital histories are as important if not more important than oral histories, and computational methods of condensing our digital traces are opaque and socially ignorant.

I liked Zinman's approach, and accepted to test it against my own name, assuming that his alogorithm may find some qualifying stuff about me. And it did. This is who I am accordingly to Personas, pretty accurate I dare say:


To read further:

• From scapegoat to superhero, an article on how the web turned technology fans into contemporary heroes after years of bullying.

To Each Generation Its Own Branded Verbs

I wrote an article on another blog on how French and English differ in their language syntax, and how this can influence brand marketing. Here are the first few paragraphs:

As a non-native English speaker living in the UK, I am always amazed by how the locals manipulate Shakespeare's language. In spite of historical connections between French and English, inherited from years of reciprocal invasions, the two languages are significantly different in the way their syntax is constructed and evolves.

For instance, the French tend to turn everything into nouns. We don't "generalise", we make "generalisations". As a result, most additions to the French dictionary are nouns. In English, on the contrary, as soon as there is some level of interest in an action, people are likely to "verb" it.
And brands tend to trigger such interests.

It is therefore common to come across brand names in the English thesaurus. A British citizen is likely to say: "I'm going to hoover the carpets" because of the electrical appliance brand, Hoover, that has penetrated the collective unconsciousness after years of market domination.
Interesting enough, Hoover market share is now depleting in favour of Dyson, but the expression remains amongst older generations who had known its full glory. On the other hand, nowadays no teenagers would ever say "I will hoover my room" (assuming that a teenager knows what cleaning a room means). Note that they do not say that they will dyson either. They will come up with their own generational terminology once they will have figured out how dangerous for their health rotting pizzas can be.

(...)

To read the full article, simply click here.

No vacancy in the city

Languages and travel books

Some people pretend to master foreign languages because they can articulate two pseudo-sentences. Be careful if that is your case, as this can easily backfire. I have indeed come across this article from the BBC that describes the foolish adventures of a British tourist in Eastern France.

The first mistake might have been to visit the North-Eastern part of France... What was she doing there in the summer, seriously?

But the most hilarious part of the story lays in the fact that this modern Phileas Fogg was to learn that you should never extrapolate what's said on the tin. She indeed got locked in the Town Hall where she thought she could rent a room for the night.

This tourist should have known that in formal French a hotel refers to a large public or private house, the equivalent of a mansion if you want. When wandering in a city, you can thus come across "hotels particuliers" which are bourgeois private houses but also the "hotel des impots" (the tax office) or in our specific instance the "hotel de ville" (the city hall). Hotels -those were you can rent a room- are only called so by extension in reference to the fact that they are huge places owned by one landlord. They are certainly the most common hotels and refered as such by every living soul. Nonetheless you still ought to be careful when looking at a map, or you might have some unconfortable experiences...

To read further:

• Slick chop-stick-style. an article on the difficulties faced by Western tourists in Japan
• The Italian job, a classical on accents and misunderstandings
• Back in the office. another smart find from the BBC, when "out of office" change directions

Screwed?

Originally uploaded by Cedric_MountainDwellerViews.

Walking around London can make you bump into awkward shopping experiences like this one.

On the left hand side, a wine bar hailing the large portfolio of their beverage list and pretends that it "attracts bands of connoisseurs". On the right hand side, another sinfull location. Lust after glutonery. And one common need: to screw (sorry for the pun).

To read further:

• British heights. Another round of (usually poor) puns about English cities
• Good signs or how each country voices its specifities on the street signs

As it says on the tin!

Cheap flights, cheap cheats.

I am a citizen of the world and as a result I tend to travel quite a bit. Eurostar is my favourite transportation mean for Paris and some areas of my home country that are well connected by the French railways. Going from city centre to city centre without the hassle of commuting is just perfect for me as I don't have a car. But over the last few years, low-cost airlines have offered me new opportunities and I can now hop on to different cities in no time, and at very affordable prices.

Or at least that is what it says on the tin, or in this specific instance on the billboard displayed in my tube station.

Because everyone that has used the like of Ryanair or Easyjet know that the announced prices are hiding some further costs that make the final bill a "bit" more salty than expected. And that is what really made me smile on this promotional billboard. It is neither a fantastic creative nor a piece of art, but at least it cannot be condemned for being misleading...

The last city Monarch can fly you to for a mere £63 is Larnaca, in Greece. This sunny destination, once read with a French eye, suddenly reveals another truth: for £63, you could fly to the French equivalent of the "TheScama" or the "TheSwindlinga"...

Private joke or revelation... Maybe just a communication mishap, but in any case a grin on my face. And if that is not enough for you, here is a little video that will certainly touch most of you who have read about the intention of the above-mentioned airlines to make you pay for using their toilet, their seats...

To read further:

• Oral sex... With a fork! or a cautious reminder of what you put in your mouth.
• The Italian job , a video on language barriers and other misunderstandings
• A brief story of time , an article on what you can learn in and from the tube

The feet in the dish

Cop and Truth by Cedric_MountainDwellerViews

Nothing but the truth.

I have seen a billboard tonight and it triggered a question in the back of my mind. After years spent on school benches being asked to translate circumvoluted English texts into French, and vice versa, I cannot avoid to continue this exercise, even nowadays. As a result, everytime that I encounter an idiom or an expression I immediatly try to find out what is the equivalent in the other language. Have we got the exact same expression? Have we got a similar idiom but with slightly different words? Why are these words different? Etc.

The above-mentioned billboard promotes a film currently on the screens called "Ugly truth". In French, the equivalent of this expression would be "La triste vérité" (i.e. "the sad truth"). I have been thinking about the discrepency in the chosen adjectives to fulfill the same intention: depreciate life by adding a negative attribute to the noun. In the UK, the truth could be unsightly and not beautiful as one could expect; in France, truth would be at times synonym of sorrow... Two negative concepts that are however by no mean correlated. You can obviously be beautiful and happy, sad and ugly, ugly and happy and beautiful and sad (I let you categorise yourself in the appropriate cluster).

I cannot figure out why such a difference. There must be a cultural element to it, but I cannot put my finger on it. There is no particular evidence that one country would be more incline to favour the "intellect" to "appearance", the "inside" to the "outside". In fact, if I had to bet on such a taxonomy I would have probably associated France to appearance rather than the UK, but that is probably a personal bias. So if someone has a lead on that oddity, I would welcome it with great pleasure.

Culinary art.

In fact, it has been a while since I shared another of these awkward French idioms with my readers. But I seems that I got inspired tonight. So let me give you an odd one: "Mettre les pieds dans le plat" translates literally into "to put both feet in the dish" or "to step into the dish". This has obviously nothing to do with the reputable odour of French cheeses that are widely used in our recipes. No, this expression relates to a situation when someone would clumsily speak the truth whilst the social conventions would have expected more tact.

A few examples? "How you are not coming with your boyfriend John tonight? - No, he ditched me yesterday", "Congratulations on the future baby! - Actually, I need to get on a diet", "Oh, you are enjoying your holidays? Well, I was made redundant a month back!", etc. Got the idea? You probably remember one or more situations when you felt yourself with both feet deep-sunk in the dish, don't you? With the macaroni and cheese keeping you still in front of your unfortunate victim... Unable to make the next move being afraid to make another blunder.

The sole desire.

Well, truth is not always beautiful and that is sad. But sometimes people decide to step forward, put both feet in the dish voluntarily, so that the bold reality can no longer be ignored by others. Last week I have had the chance to listen to one of them, Blake Mycoskie.

As the following video explains it very well, Blake is the founder of TOMS Shoes, a company that sells one for one fashionable shoes: for any TOMS shoes that you buy, the company gives away one pair to a child in need somewhere around the planet. Blake was on a sabbatical in Argentina when he met with an association which was doing a shoe drops in the country to help young children attend school. That was a revelation to him. He decided to change his life, and create a business to help others:

The reason why I really liked this idea is because Blake's approach is genuine. He has identified a need, developed a business model to address that needs in a sustainable way. He does not rely on charity but on fashion, goodwill, solidarity, world-citizenship... He has created a different path to NGOs. I would not rate one against the other. I just acknowledge the fact that both are valuable, and help make progresses.

So thanks Blake for sharing this great idea. Truth is not always beautiful, but by putting both Toms shoes in the dish of poverty, you have removed sadness from a few children faces. And this is grand.

To read further:

• Shoot the stereotypes, an article on how some NBA players leverage their brand equity to give back to the poor areas where they are from.
• Before changing the world... Think about it. Or how some companies which pretend to go green can easily improve their carbon footprint.

Mad Men, for Mad Times

I often write about the cultural differences between two countries, two nations, two languages... But sometimes you can look back and consider the disparities between two ages. This came to my mind the other day when watching the last episode of the brilliant TV series Mad Men on BBC iPlayer.

The time difference.

This award-winning drama depicts the life of Don Draper, an advertising agency creative director in the 60s. Back then JFK was president, Cuba the devil, TV sets were in black and white, and so was the American society. Each episode is shot with great level of accuracy and realism, and can thus be watched from a sociological angle. For instance, I was amazed by how looking back in a mirror can be disturbing. Our society is evolving at fast pace, but as long as you live the change, you do not realise it. It is therefore good to step back and seize these opportunities to appreciate the progresses made.

In Mad Men, the hero smokes cigaret after cigaret, he drinks in his office too. Every man in the company has overtly affairs and nobody cares, as long as they are males. Homosexuals are bullied and seen as satanists, so are Jews. Women are discarded and can only be seen as mere complacent secretaries... Smoking, drinking, adultery, sexism, homophobia, anti-Semitism and racism, in the very first minutes of the series you had it all. You are unsettled, because all that seems so different from today's values. And none of these today's sins seems to be seen as negative. This NY Times article sums it all, I must say.

Things change, for the better.

OK, there are still some legacies of this conservative mindset nowadays, but overall, when watching the first episodes, it stroke me how uneasy I was by seeing this guy light his cigaret in front of his children (not to mention the rest). That was only 40 years ago, two generations away, but so alien already.

The scene that struck me most was a family picnic. The couple and their two chilren seem to be the perfect imagery from glossy magazines from the fifties. He stands by the flamboyant cadillac, she sits with their children on a blanket, smiling. You can almost hear the Coca-Cola music in the background. And then it is time to leave. Don finishes his can of bier... and through it away in a bush. The mother collates the cuttlery and shakes off the rest on the ground leaving behind them a mayhem of dirty papers, platisc plates and rubbish. Shoking? Probably by our current standards, but so the norm back then. Who cared about the environment? About the greenhouse effect?

And then when you think hard about it, when I was younger, back in the 70s, did we care much either? We probably started to have some ecological consciousness. But let's face it, ecology, sexual preferences, gender equalities, etc. were still no primary concerns despite pockets of protest and progresses. We have seen these cause cut through only recently, in the last ten to fifteen years. That is not much in light of our history.

TV series are rarely more than entertainment. Mad Menwas an eye-opener to me and for that specific reason, and also because it is simply a thrilling drama, I would strongly recommend it to anybody. Even if you don't care about these guys who tried to rule the world from Madison Avenue.

To read further:

• The bad education, an article on the hidden sexual message behind child TV programmes
• Forbidding is forbidden, an article on May 68 protests in France and their influence on todays mindset

Quote of the day

"The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men."
Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)