In the village of Thezan the peace is broken every so often, perhaps once or twice in the day, by announcements made by loudspeaker from the Marie’s Office.
This starts as two loud notes played over a loudspeaker system twice.
Then comes a voice, usually a female but sometimes (on her day off I have discovered, because I met her) by a man.
They start each announcement with the unintentionally comic Franglais words;
“Allo Allo !”
Then an announcement is made to say that, for example, there is to be a communal dinner for the hunters in the square on Friday, or M. Poirot’s Peaches are now ripe and he is selling them from his house on Rue X, or will the owner of car no ….. please remove it because it is causing an obstruction.
All useful and relevant stuff, it is obviously a tradition long practiced in all villages.
Let us bear in mind there was a Town Crier fulfilling the same function in Waterford up to the end of the 1890’s.
Just five minutes ago there was an “Allo Allo !” announcement.
They said “ Un Perroquet Gris has been found in the village . Will the owner please collect same in the mayor’s office.
Colm and I looked at one another.
We both simultaneously said; “ Surely a Perroquet is a wig !”
We then went into long conjectures as to how someone could have lost a grey wig in the village and then not even noticed it.
Now there had been a festival of some sorts here for the last few days and a certain amount of drink taken until the early hours, but still, a wig, surely no matter how pissed, you would notice it gone.
My legendary nerdish search for truth drove me to the dictionary.
The true explanation while still a little exotic was rather more mundane than we thought.
The French word for a wig is a Perrouche, Un Perroquet is a parrot.
Comments
Jill
on June 30, 2009We had a town crier in Macroom well into the sixties, maybe into the seventies. He would walk the town ringing his bell, crying things like “the water will be turned off this evening between 6 and 7”. He would sometimes be privately hired, to advertise carnivals (chairoplanes, swingboats and the like) or political meetings (election candidates orating from the back of a lorry). We called him ‘Gampy’, but my mother said we should refer to him as ‘Mister Lucey’. He always had a smile for us children, although I suspect we gave him grief betimes, following him around and mimicing him.
Jill
on June 30, 2009P.S. Gamby hadn’t heard of ‘Allo Allo’, he always started with ‘Hear ye, hear ye!’.
Petra
on July 1, 2009Here’s one for you: Donal and I once visited our friends Gudrun and Oli in Germany. Gudrun had gone shopping and brought home a splendid assortment of cheeses, both soft and firm. She pointed at them and declared proudly: “These are all goose cheeses, even the firm ones. I love goose cheese!” Donal and I must have looked very stricken because Gudrun exlcaimed in dismay: “Oh no – don’t tell me you hate goose cheese!” Eventually Donal, deadpan: “I suppose we could just prentend it’s goat’s cheese, eh…?” Which, of course, it was.
Rita
on July 1, 2009We have these announcements here in St Hilaire (Aude) every morning also. They are usually preceeded by at least one minutes loud music (Spanish fandango generally. On occasions Fiddler on the Roof!) Other than community activities the day’s announcements somtimes consist of telling us that there are tomatoes at such a price in the epicerie or that the man selling the fish/shoes etc has arrived at the piste de petanque.
Tadhg O'Donovan
on July 6, 2009Hi Martin and Sile,
Glad to read that the work is going well, will you be ready for Sept?
I knew about Judy Collins album, particularly the Leonard Cohen contribution but haven’t been able to find it yet on any of sites I buy from, where did you get it?
I presume you are keeping a diary for the “Book of the first year”?
Talk soon
Tadhg
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