Intercultural blog-exchange
I read this in a random blog (Je hais mes voisins - ‘I hate my neighbours’) the other day and it amused me, so I’m going to attempt a translation for my education if not for your edification.
Cat
Bastard cat!
It’s not because he’s handicapped that he can do as he likes.
What could we do if, one day, if he lost his sense of distance jumping onto the window ledge to catch a sparrow?
Too long a jump. The sparrow flew off. The cat too.
We found him four floors down, with a small break in his back leg. Vet, operation, pins inserted, leg just recovered, but always stiff.
Since then, we nicknamed him Verdun. But that’s just at home, when we want to be mean. Besides, he never answers when called Verdun. He doesn’t acknowledge it. On the other hand, he reacts immediately when his official patronym (his vaccination book name) is proclaimed: ‘Cat, dinner time!!!’. Then you’ll see a black thing belting through the kitchen, skidding on the turn, skating on some cushions and recovering at the end of his run in front of his mess tin.
In short, last Monday, anyway, that was Verdun.
Montparnasse Station, 7:06 am, we first smelt the smell.
He doesn’t play this trick on every journey, no. That wouldn’t amuse. He prefers leaving us a little hope. But already, in the taxi, I feared the worst. Rough driving, the fine diesel smell of a Parisian taxi and our irritation at being late. ‘We’re good,’ I told myself.
And in the end, we didn’t miss it.
It must be said, shut up in his bag, carted about at arm’s length, he got rather knocked about, the moggie. And then all these people, the sudden cold, the bright lights, the humidity seeping through the fur and the monstrous howl of the TGV engine…could only cast this proud living room feline into the worst horror film imaginable, one where they shut up cats in bags to reduce them to the state of vulgar luggage.
So, what does the tom do when its cries of despair are deliberately ignored? Well, exactly, it goes! The ultimate weapon which it unsheathes on the station platform, while we race back along the 150 metres of TGV at full tilt to find our carriage.
7:12, we land on carriage No. 1 of the TGV bound for Irun, announced from afar by the incredible mewling of the overwrought cat. From nearby, by the stench emanating from it.
Looks are turned our way. Noses turn the other.
7:15, the train departs. What to do? 259 minutes - the travelling time - in a smell of soiled litter, it’s inhuman. The carriage is on the edge of a riot.
Then, a solution occurs: change the cat. Where? In la nursery of course! A nook sacrificed by the TGV for the changing of babies. It’s in car 9. Who takes responsibility for it? Me, of course! It will require all the experience of a mother to do it! I grab the cat bag in one hand, relinquish my coat with the other and drop all my pride in my numbered seat.
And that’s how we traversed the 9 overcrowded cars of the train, clearing a space between baggage stored in the aisle, stumbling over trailing shoulder straps, toddlers, shoes that have parted with their feet…me and the howling cat, both preceded by its smell!
The only worry for the time being: go quickly. Avoid the looks. Remain deaf to the comments. Skirt around the accusatory fingers. And escape the conductor.
Car 9, the logo of the baby lying down with its legs in the air finally appeared. Phew! The place is unoccupied. A man standing in the hall moves aside to let me through. His eyes settle on the bag, go back up to the logo, return to the bag… Something doesn’t quite fit, but what! ‘I must change him’, I blurted, nimbly closing the door again on what he was preparing to say.
Inside, I liberated the cat from his prison. He comes out, his expression alarmed, eyes bulging, ears back. Pitiable. He has it everywhere! Bedaubed from head to tail. I grab him by the back of the neck to immobilize him, and groom him almost hair by hair. He is so appalled that he allows it without a complaint. Just as well! Because the jolts of the train as it picks up speed put me off balance. I have motion sickness. It’s warm. There isn’t enough air. I start to sweat. My stomach contracts. I suppress a retch. Hold it in, at all costs. Take heart, you’re nearly done.
Damn! Someone tries to open the door from outside. They keep trying.
The conductor, alerted by the man in the corridor? Or worse: a mother! Pessimist by nature, I opt for the latter, knowing to what extent mothers are excessively particular about their offspring’s hygeine. What? A cat full of microbes, crammed full of bacteria, without counting the fleas, on the baby-change table…? How dreadful!
I wash everything, dry, quickly arrange the cat in his bag, take three seconds to gather my thoughts…and eject myself from the place, head down, just avoiding an empty bassinet placed on the floor. A comment, perhaps? Nothing heard! I tear along, taking cars one after another in descending order. The passengers begin drowsing. The cat also, finally exhausted.
I regain my place, wedge the beastie between two suitcases, and fall into my seat.
I look at my watch. I have only 214 minutes in front of me to recover!
‘How was it?’
‘Perfect!’, I say with my last breath of energy and a drawn expression, looking at the countryside to forget my unruly stomach.
‘Poor Pussy. It’s no life for him, really’, declares my offspring to me, before calmly sticking his nose back in his book.
That's right, poor pussycat…
Bastard cat, more like!
Original: Du chat