Parlez-Vous Francais?

I (along with seven other community members) was invited to the high school the other day as an honored guest and judge of Franco-Phonía, a festival where the kids celebrated “all” of the countries that speak French. Why does Baoba choose to celebrate France and its language?? I have absolutely no idea.

Various groups of students presented a country, telling about its culture and food, native dress, geography and politics. The countries represented were France, Luxembourg, Vietnam, Italy, Switzerland, Canada, and Africa (apparently I’m the only judge who seemed to notice that Africa is not a country). And surprisingly, the one country that I naturally assumed would be represented – Haiti – was not even mentioned.

As a judge, it was my job to choose the country that was best represented in the various presentations. It was hard to choose a winner – mainly because every presentation blurred together. I learned that in France, Africa, Luxembourg, Italy, and Canada, the national food dishes are white rice, fish, and spaghetti (I think because these foods were easy for the kids to bring to class). As a judge I was supposed to try the foods, but by the time I got to the table to get my taste, all of the kids had already eaten everything. Although I did get to drink some wine with the high school students, since every country’s national beverage is a cheap red wine called “La Fuerza,” meaning “the strength” and on the bottle is a picture of a muscle builder flexing his biceps…mmm classy.

The native dress in all of the countries was jeans and sunglasses. Although the group from Switzerland added a jacket because of the cold weather. Most of the countries just did a basic model runway walk to show the clothes, but the group from Vietnam added three reggaeton dances so that the models could show how well the clothes fit when they booty-danced.

And the winner??? France. I actually liked Africa’s presentation best, but I just couldn’t announce them the winner since Africa is in fact a continent full of various countries, each with their own unique culture and geography. Apparently the kids are going to do the same thing in about a month or so, but they’re going to celebrate the countries that speak English, and I’m very much looking forward to those presentations.