Mr French

Arrividerci, Italia. Bonjour, Monaco.

We left Italy last night and awoke this morning in Monte Carlo, which is pretty much most of Monaco. A few pictures are here.

Monaco is one of those quirky little places that somehow became and remains an independent country despite having the population of most apartment buildings. According to the information sheet they provide on the ship, France has guaranteed to protect Monaco's sovereignty "in exchange for a pledge that Monaco will exercise its sovereign rights in accordance with French interests." That may seem like an odd definiton of sovereignty to some, but when I think about it, it isn't really all that different from how our last prime minister, John Howard, positioned Australia with the US.

I am glad to be in the land of the French-and-nearly-French. I had proved a pretty dismal failure at learning Italian prior to our trip, despite buying two different sets of lessons for my iPod. Oh, I knew the basics - hello, good-bye, thanks and two beers, please - but I had hoped to be much more fluent with the locals.

Here at least my high school French comes rushing back. I intended to awaken Linda with a hearty "Bonjour, ma cher." I didn't because we were on our third cup of coffee before I remembered. Besides, I was a little shaky on whether the phrase I was thinking of using was asking her how she was doing or what her name was.

I do remember lots of useful phrases from my French classes, though. When we walked around Monaco today, I would have had no trouble asking a perfect stranger where the library or the bowling alley was.

The one phrase that really would have helped which they didn't teach me - or at least I don't recall being taught - was how to ask a stranger to help you get the dog crap off your shoes. "Scrapez le poo, s'il vous plait," just doesn't sound right to me.

Now that we're in the land of France and Friends, this dog poo on the footpath is a serious issue. It's everywhere. Perhaps Linda summed it up best as she was scraping her shoe on the curb: "I don't know how this society can feel superior to everyone else when they can't even get the dog crap off their sidewalks."

But that's also a sign of why we travel. Vive la difference!