The elephiphants scramble excitedly to their feet. In the commotion Ellie pulls Zobe aside, looking serious.
She speaks quietly, not wanting to be overheard or cause any embarrassment. “Zobe… there’s something I really need to ask you.” She begins.
#Moi je joue
Moi je joue à joue contre joue…#
Zobe sees the frown on her face and motions for her to carry on. “Well…it’s just that…you know the wig you were wearing when you first got here? Well, it kind of belongs to Al. He loves that wig, and he couldn’t understand where it had gone earlier.”
#…Je veux jouer à joue contre vous
Mais vous, le voulez-vous?…#
She pauses for a second to fend off the crows trying to eat her tail, and continues in a whisper barely audible over the sound of the hippos’ mmbopalining and singing behind them. “What happened to it today? It looked so scraggy! Some people don’t understand, like we elephants do, that wigs need to be cared for properly. I hope you haven’t been maltreating it.”
#…De tout coeur
Je veux gagner ce coeur à Coeur…#
Zobe is shocked to her very core. “I just…I didn’t mean to…I just thought it was a friendly wig!” she sputters, “I had no idea it belonged to Al. But I didn’t mistreat it. Honestly, Ellie, you have to believe me!”
#…Vous connaissez mon jeu par coeur
Alors défendez-vous…#
Ellie looks sympathetic. “OK, she says. I’m sure you didn’t mean any harm. You’re just a bit of an idiot – it’s not your fault.” She sighs. “What did you do to it though?”
Zobe tried to explain, “It helped me to fight a snake. I didn’t force it to, or anything, it just did. And then it came with me the rest of the day as well. There was nothing horrible. I don’t know. Please forgive me.”
Ellie is bored of Zobe’s whining, so she says not to worry about it and goes to join Jean-Luc (the hippo who has been singing frenchily all the while) on the bopaline. All the elephants are stood around it, their tails and trunks held high. There are a few murmurs as Ellie joins them, but the mmbopalining carries on uninterrupted.
She shakes her head and sighs as she wanders towards them. “I’ve never seen so much conformity amongst ollypants,” she mutters…
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4 comments:
I don't understand french!!!!
they're the words to the song in the evian advert where people ae throwing snowballs about. they don't actually mean anything particularly interesting, i just liked the idea of a singing french hippo, and that was the only french song i could think of at the time. so basically, don't worry your pretty little head about it, dear.
but roughly it means
Me I play.
Me I play cheek against plays.
I want to play cheek against you. But you, do you want it?
Of any heart.
I want to gain this heart in heart.
You know my play by heart.
Then you defend.
Thanks for that.....now it all makes sense!!
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