Cinquième Jeu de Mots Trivia Quiz

Answer: aile

Battre de l'aile means to flutter one's wings and fly away, if by extension something of yours is doing it, it's flying away. "Leur couple bat de l'aile" is the equivalent of "their marriage is on the rocks". Fear gives wings, fairly obvious. Voler de ses propres ailes is simply to fly with one's own wings. "Il est sous l'aile de son superviseur" means he's being taken care of by the supervisor, under his wings. L'aile du Moulin is the blade of a windmill or for other devices.

Answer: bras

The word bras is invariable for the plural and singular as you undoubtedly know. Le bras droit de quelqu'un is the right hand man or woman, the person who seconds another one and supports him or her. Le bras cassé is simply a broken arm. Manquer de bras is to need manpower, or workers to complete a job. Avoir le bras long is to have connections or influence. Les bras de Morphée is to be asleep. They welcomed us with open arms, les bras ouverts.

Answer: caisse

La caisse enregistreuse is the cash register or till, therefore at the supermarket each caissier or caissière has a caisse. In North America we'd call it a checkout counter. The contents of the cash drawer are your "caisse" too. The French have ten item checkout counters, but, are you really surprised to find out that most people have about fifteen items and the regular ones have older people with one orange and some cat food forcing well brought up people to let them by? No perhaps you're not. La caisse d'épargne is a savings bank. Une caisse de retraite is a retirement or pension scheme to which you contribute.

A caisse is also any sort of container like the champagne example. La grosse caisse is the bass drum in the orchestre. In slang caisse is used from time to time for your car.

Answer: dame

"La Dame aux Camélias" is a novel by Alexandre Dumas, (the son) from 1848 which was made into a play. La dame de pique is the Queen of Spades in a card game, and dame de trèfles =clubs, coeurs is hearts, diamants is diamonds. Le jeu de dames is checkers and the pattern of the checkerboard is called un damier. La dame d'honneur is the lady in waiting. La dame à la licorne is the « Lady and the Unicorn », a famous tapestry depicting the senses in the Musée de Cluny from 1480 to 1500. Madame is the most polite form of address and you may use it, (nay, you must use it) with ladies to whom you speak without the surname after it or if you know the surname, use it. Bonjour Madame Dupin >Bonjour Madame, the former more polite than the latter though neither is impolite.

Answer: eau

Water is pronounced, quite simply OH. That's one of those questions many students ask so that's why I've answered it. "Méfiez vous de l'eau qui dort" is the equivalent of "Still waters run deep". Eau potable means you can drink it, most fountains in villages are labelled one way or the other and despite the fact that so many French people don't trust the water and buy bottled water, it is actually a fairly good quality throughout the country. Eau de source is spring water. Une tempête dans un verre d'eau or..se noyer dans un verre d'eau is to make a big fuss about not much, a mountain out of a molehill or else a tempest in a teapot or cup. (this expression varies widely amongst English speakers but that's the one I mean).

The enormously popular little inspirational book about only sweating the big stuff uses the expression for its French title. Se jeter à l'eau is to get right in and get started. Eau oxygénée is hydrogen peroxide. Eau de Javel is how you say, "clean" in French as it's the word for bleach or Chlorox.

The traditional French housewife uses it liberally and it doesn't seem clean to her without it. Only recently have cleaning products not smelled like it. Marketing strategies made no inroads in this until perhaps the early 2000's when people finally realized that it could be clean without knocking you over with the bleach smell!

Answer: machine

« La machine à explorer le temps » is the French version of H.G. Wells' futuristic novel of 1895 on time travel. Une machine à coudre is a sewing machine, a washing machine is of course, une machine à laver. Une machine à sous is a slot machine, une machine à écrire is a typewriter.

Answer: homme

L'homme is the term used for Man in the sense of humans or mankind of course. L'homme-sandwich is someone wearing a board and walking around advertising something. D'homme à homme is a man to man talk. Un homme d'affaires is a businessman. L'homme de paille is a front, someone whose name is being used, he's a straw man. If someone gives you his "Parole d'homme", it's his word as a gentleman. I'm using the masculine here, as I've never heard it used by a woman. Parole d'honneur might be another equivalent. Un homme-grenouille is a frogman or a scuba diver. L'homme invisible is the Invisible Man, of course.

By the way, most kids would say, "un monsieur" in the third person for a man. "Maman, il y a un monsieur à la porte".

Answer: table

A table is how you call people to come eat. Faire table rase is to begin again, clear out the old and start afresh. Mettre la table is to set the table. Les plaisirs de la table simply means eating and good food. "Chevaliers de la table ronde" are knights of the round table. "Jouer cartes sur table" is to put your cards on the table.

Answer: image

A child who is sage as an image means he or she is basically well-behaved and quiet. Sage means wise and quiet or well-behaved in that sense. This expression is still used frequently when someone looks at a kid who's not kicking up a fuss but is being quiet. Une image d'Epinal comes from the woodcut images made in Epinal that were very simple but effective ways of communicating ideas. When you use this term now, it means breaking something down to a rather simplistic view. The museum is worth a visit if you're in that area. Narcissus looks at his own image in the water of course, a synthetic image is created on a computer.

Answer: paix

Peace.