Archives des Becoming French - FUSAC Paris Classifieds

Ma langue au chat, Tortures et délices d’un anglophone à Paris

Mon petit accent récit extrait de Ma langue au chat, Tortures et délices d'un anglophone à Paris (Seuil/ Points Editions, October 2017) Vous avez un petit accent, me dit-on. Tout le monde a un accent. Mais pas forcément un petit accent. D’ailleurs, s’il était si petit que ça on ne dirait rien du tout. On ne fait pas remarquer à une dame qui se promène avec un chihuahua Vous avez un petit chien, madame. On dit plutôt : Qu’est-ce qu’il est mignon, votre chien. Ou bien : Il me fait les gros yeux, celui-là. Quelque chose comme ça. C’est que le chihuahua a la taille conforme, alors que mon accent est hors norme, il n’a pas grand-chose de mignon, je ne sais pas s’il a des yeux, mais il est assez dur de la feuille. C’est une espèce de créature, de corps étranger enfoui en moi. Normalement, mon accent devrait rapetisser avec le temps à force d’imiter les sonorités françaises, se camoufler comme un phasme contre une branche, complètement disparaître. Mais c’est l’inverse qui s…

English Books Paris: New Arrivals at Bill & Rosa’s Book Room

English Books Paris?

Each week in the Book Room online, we recommend newly published English books we love. We also present some in French or bilingual, for kids or adults, fiction or non. Many are books about France of course, but there are many different subjects.

Discover the Bill & Rosa's Book Room concept. Come visit us - it is a nice spot up and downstairs at FUSAC to Read, Write, Relax and Buy, Donate, Borrow used English books Paris (and some French too, we are in France after all!). There is also the Power-of-the-Postcard desk and unique cards and postcards to write to family and friends, a jigsaw puzzle table, reading chairs. To discover our 4000+ titles visit our Click and Collect List. Near metro Porte de St Cloud. 42 rue du Chemin Vert 92100 Boulogne-Billancourt. Come over (Click for our opening hours) and find out why we call it Bill and Rosa's!

Now for this week's new books:

COURTING DARKNESS First in a duology, th…

French Like Moi: City of Light Bulbs

By Scott Dominic Carpenter author of French Like Moi

Listen to Scott read City of Light Bulbs

Surprise is the highest form of pleasure, and it’s easier to find than people think. You don’t have to invest your 401(k) in Powerball numbers to enjoy the fruits of unpredictability, or even travel by Amtrak. No, it turns out you can simply move to Paris, where the ordinary so often leads to adventure.

It went like this. Shortly before Anne returned from the States, I finished painting the walls and pushing the furniture back in place. During my final check, I discovered the bedroom lamp had burnt out. This led me to hoof it to the local supermarket, which stocks bulbs of various shapes and sizes.

Only after I returned home with my trophy did I realize my error.

In France, the base of a bulb is called a culot, a word derived from cul, which translates as “ass.” Although ungentlemanly in some contexts, cul raises no eyebrows in …

Ma langue au chat, Tortures et délices d’un anglophone à Paris

Mon petit accent récit extrait de Ma langue au chat, Tortures et délices d'un anglophone à Paris (Seuil/ Points Editions, October 2017) Vous avez un petit accent, me dit-on. Tout le monde a un accent. Mais pas forcément un petit accent. D’ailleurs, s’il était si petit que ça on ne dirait rien du tout. On ne fait pas remarquer à une dame qui se promène avec un chihuahua Vous avez un petit chien, madame. On dit plutôt : Qu’est-ce qu’il est mignon, votre chien. Ou bien : Il me fait les gros yeux, celui-là. Quelque chose comme ça. C’est que le chihuahua a la taille conforme, alors que mon accent est hors norme, il n’a pas grand-chose de mignon, je ne sais pas s’il a des yeux, mais il est assez dur de la feuille. C’est une espèce de créature, de corps étranger enfoui en moi. Normalement, mon accent devrait rapetisser avec le temps à force d’imiter les sonorités françaises, se camoufler comme un phasme contre une branche, complètement disparaître. Mais c’est l’i…

New oaks for rebuilding Notre Dame de Paris

Rebuilding Notre Dame Last Fall while riding bikes through the Forest of Marly we saw some freshly cut oak tress of impressive size. We imagined them to be the new elements for rebuilding Notre Dame. We were a bit ahead of the times in our thinking as the selection of trees has started just this March. Oak trees from French forests will be selected for rebuilding Notre Dame's own “Forest” and another roughly 1000 for Violet-le-Duc's wooden steeple. The Forest of the cathedral is the framing that holds up the roof and consolidates the walls. It burned dramatically in 2019. The original medieval beams came from thousands of different oak trees and because of the size of the structure it was a rare architectural work admired by professionals the world over. Beginning 2021 was the time to choose the trees that will be used to rebuild this structure so that they can be harvested by the end of March before the spring growth begins. They will come from all over France from …

We love Le Chat and he is setting up on the Champs-Elysées!

From 26 March to 9 June, the City of Paris hosts a temporary installation of twenty monumental bronze sculptures of the famous "Le Chat" by Philippe Geluck on the Champs Élysées. The exhibiton is called LE CHAT DEMABULE. The famous fat but, highly intelligent, and well dressed tomcat takes up residence on the most beautiful avenue in the world, before undertaking a grand tour of France including Bordeaux, Caen. The sculptures continue on to Luxembourg and Brussels arriving for the inauguration of the Le Chat and cartoon drawing museum in 2023. Don't miss this fun event that will be reminiscent of the Botero sculptures on the Champs in the early 1990s.

If you haven't yet discovered this ironic cat it is time you did. He's the central character in more than 20 cartoon albums and has some pretty funny observations on the quirks of life. In thirty-eight years, Le Chat has entered the hearts of all generations with his good nature, his humor, his humanism and his very…

English Books Paris: New Arrivals at Bill & Rosa’s Book Room

Discover the Bill & Rosa's Book Room concept. Come visit us - it is a nice spot up and downstairs at FUSAC to Read, Write, Relax and Buy, Donate, Borrow used English books Paris (and some French too, we are in France after all!). There is also the Power-of-the-Postcard desk and unique cards and postcards to write to family and friends, a jigsaw puzzle table, reading chairs. To discover our 4000+ titles visit our Click and Collect List. Near metro Porte de St Cloud. 42 rue du Chemin Vert 92100 Boulogne-Billancourt. Come over (Click for our opening hours) and find out why we call it Bill and Rosa's!

English Books Paris? Each week in the Book Room online, we recommend newly published English books we love. We also present some in French or bilingual, for kids or adults, fiction or non. Many are books about France of course, but there are many different subjects. Voir Plus about English Books Paris: New Arrivals at Bill & Rosa’s Book Room

Click and Collect at Bill & Rosa’s Book Room

Follow the links below to view a pdf file of the current inventory of Bill and Rosa's Book Room. More than 4500 titles!

Available for Click and Collect pick up or delivery, just email fusac.office@gmail.com with your selection, we'll send you a link for payment via CB (or take check or cash when you get the books) and arrange for pick up or delivery. For delivery the minimum is 6 books. Depending on where you are we may be able to deliver directly to you (please tell us your postal code). We also have a pick-up point at the Hotel Marignan 75005.

Are you in the Yvelines?: Villepreux, Les Clayes-sous-Bois, Plaisir, Feucherolles, St Nom-la-Bretèche, Rennemoulin, Fontenay-la-Fleury, Noisy-le-Grand, Bailly. Minimum order 25€ for free delivery

Anyone who orders 5+ books will receive a free copy of Elaine Sciolino's La Séduction (A book about France and the French and how seductions of all types, not just sexual, make them tick.)

…

Women Scientists International women and girls in science day

International Women's Day is 8 March. But I didn't know there was a day dedicated to Women Scientists - I should have suspected it though. This year and (every year) it was 11 February. We missed it, but we can still bring forth Women Scientists and doubly honor them for International Women's Day. These three were pioneering women scientists, two American, one French, who surrounded Rosa Bonheur, the namesake of our Book Room.

Natalie Micas was Rosa Bonheur's partner in life. She was a painter, like Bonheur, but also an engineer. She was born in Paris on the 26th of April 1824. Nathalie Micas was represented in the Hall of Science at the World’s Columbian Exhibition in Chica…

Brighten your day. Books are the perfect antidote for the gray and gloomy.

At Bill & Rosa’s Book Room, we have the perfect antidote for the gray and gloomy winter weather: books, a lot of them, to suit all tastes and demands! Iasmina has selected a few to help pass the time and brighten your day. All our books are pre-loved so you'll love the prices too!

Tea Time for the Traditionally Built (4€), The Full Cupboard of Life (3€) The Kalahari Typing School for Men (4€) by Alexander McCall Smith

There’s nothing better to take your mind off the cold and the rain than a plunge into the world of the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, a series of detective novels by Alexander McCall Smith. Travel far away from rainy days with this novel set in Botswana and featuring Precious Ramotswe, the founder of the first and only female-run detective agency in the country. With unique characters, a good dose of kindness and vivid descriptions of Botswanan life, these are detective novels like no other. These thre…

		Book Room
		Paris Mosaïc
		Pratical Paris
		Things FUSAC likes
		Culture vultures
		Made in France
		Get Out Of Town
		The French Language
		The Best Things ever Said about France
		People and Business Profiles