January 19, 2005

The Road to Loving France

The New Sisyphus gives a heartwarming story of a very pleasant trip to Paris, topped off by a crepe seller who spoke from his heart:


"Well," he said in heavily-accented basic English,"I thought so. I want to tell you something, but the words I do not know too good, so please excuse if I say it wrong."

"No, it's fine. We understand you well. Go ahead."

"Well, it's just....I want to tell you...." He looked around furtively, quickly.

"What?"

"I want to tell you God bless President Bush and God bless United States of America."

We stared, amazed, not knowing what to say. He went on, with more passion now; now that he had said that he had found his stride with his form of English and the words began to flow.

"When you get home you TELL the Americans God bless George Bush and God bless the United States of America. You tell them not to believe everything they read in the newspapers, and that there are plenty French who think this. He is the best man for the job in the dangerous time we have now. You TELL them."

So we did.


This is how we get past the vile mouthpieces, simple men saying simple things from the heart. We have a great many friends in the world out there and all too often they think themselves incapable of doing much good. That artisan of crepes, manning a crepe cart in Paris did more good for his country in a minute than a week's worth of work in the French embassy in DC.

Posted by TMLutas at January 19, 2005 11:06 PM