Au Cochonnet Marin

What I miss most in Marin County are French-style sidewalk cafés.

Places that are a world away from the indistinguishable, characterless holes in the wall called Starbucks.

A café worthy of its name must have a terrace or at least a spot on the sidewalk. Where else could tourists leisurely gawk at other tourists for just a few euros?

Without a place in the sun, the venue is just a plain “bistrot”, a small bar where standing at the counter, you quickly down an “espresso” or a Cognac. It is the poor relative of a reputable café and does not pretend to be anything else.

By the way, the origin of this quintessentially French word is said to be Russian. “Bistrot” (Бистро́) means “quick” in Russian and “it is a legacy of the Russian occupation of Paris after the defeat of Napoleon’s Grande Armée at Waterloo in 1815.” Russian soldiers would sneak away to a drinking place and shout “bistrot, bistrot” for a quick drink. I don’t know if it helped…

Mais revenons à nos moutons !

A terrace is important because it feels like a safe harbor for tired pedestrians and lost tourists. They can enjoy a room with a view of a fancy district while giving their sweaty feet a rest. Contrarily to cheap coffee shops, a café is a place where the customer is king and does not have to wait in line to get some refreshment.

In a real café, you pick your own table and wait for a waiter to take your order. And beverages are not served in paper containers, but in real cups… with handles. Yes, you might pay a little more than at Starbucks, but heck, you only live once… grab it while you can.

Famous sidewalk cafes in Paris like Les Deux Magots, Le Café de Flore, La Closerie des Lilas are not strictly focused on making money. They have a good name to protect, and their first order of business is to please customers. Profit, while important is just secondary to this.

I wish that Elon Musk could be made aware of my predicament and instead of wasting his money on Twitter, spend a portion of his stash on opening a few nice flowery cafés in my neighborhood. What do you think?

Elon, you can call me night or day if you feel that my proposition has some merit.

Toot-a-loo

Alain

« Tous les matins, j’apporte à ma femme le café au lit. Elle n’a plus qu’à le moudre. »  Coluche

I wrote this story in French 10 years ago. Here is the updated English version.

« A quoi ça sert, les parents ? Ah oui, ça sert à ce qu’on leur mente. » Henry de Montherlant

I have not always been a liar.
In the cradle and in kindergarten I did not lie, I am pretty sure of it. It was only in the following years that I started to fib.

I was born shortly before the start of World War II and my mother had been deeply traumatized by this terrible event. She subsequently guarded me like a mother hen, and I was never allowed to venture far from her protective wings.

When my friends went to play soccer, or cavort in the swimming pool, I was ordered to stay home because surely, if I associated with these rascals, something unfortunate would happen to me. It was this diktat that drove me to crime.

-Mom, can I go to soccer practice?
-No, it’s way too dangerous. The ball could injure your eyes.
-Mom, can I go to the swimming pool?
-Don’t even think about it! You could drown…

To survive this misery, and to avoid becoming my friends’ laughingstock, I started to lie… and I gradually perfected various scenarios to cover my tracks.

If I couldn’t go to the swimming pool, I was still allowed to play with my friend André who lived around the corner. And it was from André’s abode that we went to play soccer, swim, or sneak into theaters to watch R-rated flicks.

In those days, people of modest means (we all were) did not have telephones, and it was relatively easy for children to fib without the risk of ever being exposed.

Thanks to steady practice, I became a rather skillful liar. The secret of lying well, by the way, is to be prepared, to turn your tongue seven times before speaking, and to have a good memory.

When I was in high school, only wealthy people owned a (black and white) television set. In my class, there were only three boys issued from these wealthy families. Some mornings, during recess, they took malicious pleasure in (loudly) discussing what they had watched the previous evening on the small screen. We, paupers, could only listen and begrudge their opulent lifestyle.

But one day, to everybody’s surprise, a close friend and I joined their conversation. We offered opinions and comments on what had been broadcast the previous evening on the only television channel of the time.

We thoroughly enjoyed our classmates’ bewilderment.

What they didn’t know was that neither my pal nor I had suddenly come into money and were suddenly able to afford a costly TV set.

My friend, who was an electronic nerd, had simply rigged a gizmo that could pick up the sound of television programs… Not the picture, just the sound. But this was more than enough to allow us to pretend and to gloat.

When I became emancipated, I abandoned (or sparingly used) my talent. But lying is like riding a bicycle, you never totally forget how to use it.

So, if in the future  I ever get the urge to run for office, beware. I might be a little rusty, but I still feel capable of bamboozling voters like a pro thanks to my past practice.

Alain

I am not a fan of flags.
National flags, that is. Especially in peacetime… There are too many of them fluttering around, and their symbolic value has become inversely proportional to their quantity. Flags are like diamonds…Valuable when spare, cheap when plentiful. De Beers has known this for a long time and always tried to restrict its flow.

The same goes for the national anthem. In America, it is squandered everywhere… Do we need to hear it at every football game, any sporting event, or any bar-mitzvah? I say no. It should only be used for solemn occasions, and sparingly… otherwise it becomes common and trite.

 Personally, I don’t care to see national flags or any religious symbol on anybody’s lapel, particularly politicians. It does not prove anything.

“The less a statesman amounts to, the more he loves the flag.” ~ Kin Hubbard

 An intelligent man never proclaims that he is smart, he just proves it. If you want to demonstrate that you are patriotic, do not make flamboyant speeches. If you feel that the country is in danger, do as the Ukrainians did. Grab a rifle and quietly go to the front… without any fanfare. Patriotic speeches are for those who won’t or who can’t.

Flags waving does not really serve any purpose, but to annoy or antagonize your adversaries. Similarly, only an idiot would wave a flag in front of a 2000 pounds bull. It is not more important to stand for nationalism than for what is right.

“Patriotism consists not in waving the flag, but in striving that our country shall be righteous as well as strong.” ~ James Bryce

 Patriotism is only laudable in times of adversity. It is when democracy is threatened that flag-waving is permissible. In Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky did just that, and with aplomb. Like many politicians, he could have run when Russia struck, but he did not do so. “I Don’t Need A Ride, I Need More Ammunition” he famously said.

This man and only people like him are entitled to wave national flags; the rest are probably charlatans and attention-seeking wannabes.

Alain