I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: BARBARA PRAVI-“Voilà” (France, Eurovision Entry 2021).

Eurovision 2021 is upon us.  It’s hard to really follow Eurovision in the States, but you can see highlights and most official entries online

I tend to think of Eurovision as over the top and campy.  But there are often many entries that are anthemic and inspirational.

And there’s also the super powerful ballad.  This entry from France is one of these.

If you play the song on YouTube the first comment is “This is the most French song I’ve ever heard,” and I have to agree.

The song begins with quiet keyboard notes and Pravi singing.  After a verse, the chorus comes.  It’s just one line this time.

Voilà, voilà, voilà, voilà qui je suis

Me voilà même si mise à nue j’ai peur, oui

Me voilà dans le bruit et dans le silence

Then the verse resumes and each time around the verses get bigger and bigger and the chorus follows suit as the strings get louder and more dramatic.

The end of the song see her going a little wild with the “voilàs” and a little vamping as a wild piano is added into the mix.

I wasn’t that impressed with this at first but after a second watch, it’s got some nice drama and the video is pretty cool too.

UPDATE: This song came in second.

[READ: May 10, 2021]  “Who’s The Chef?”

I found a stash of old David Sedaris pieces and since they’re all pretty old, they’re quite funny.

I read this essay a while ago and I remember it making me laugh then as much as it did now.

Set in Paris, David is telling an anecdote.  His French is good but he can be much more subtle in English.

So when he says “My boss has a rubber hand,” there are obviously some questions.  Especially since boss can also mean chef.

But David is surprised because the first question asked is “When did David get a job?”  Turns out it is a volunteer job, but he does have a boss (chef).  The volunteer work was feeding the blind.

But the point was, his boss had a rubber hand.

Once again, the reaction is wrong.  Hugh said “I’m sure it wasn’t actual rubber…it was probably made of some kind of plastic.”

He is appalled that they think he doesn’t know rubber from plastic.  He insists it was made of heavy rubber (it would have sounded different if it was plastic).  So Hugh asks if it was inflatable.

But even worse is when Hugh says okay so his hand was rubber–what else?

It was one of those times when you really notice the difference between speaking and expressing yourself.  I knew the words–blind people, election year, storage closet–but even when coupled with the verbs and pronouns they didn’t add up the way I needed them to.  In English, my sentences could perform double duty, saying both that I’d reported for volunteer work and that Hugh would be punished for not listening to the single most interesting thing that had happened to me since moving to Paris.

David left the table and returned as Hugh was talking about thier plumber.

“He’s got one arm,” David said.

High disagrees: “he has two.”  But, David argues, one of them doesn’t work.  Hugh’s point, though, is that it is there, it fills the sleeve.

And of course once Hugh had destroyed his credibility with the rubber hand, there was no hope for him with the one arm.

He imagines his gravestone will read “It Was Rubber.”  And Hugh’s will read “No, It was Plastic.”