Оригинальный текст
Французский
Перевод
Английский
P'tit kawa
A nice cup of java
Yet another morning like so many others
The day is pretty old already
I try to accept the idea
that I have to get up
That I have to get up.
I'm shuffling my way to the coffee maker.
I'm feeling like crap, looking for the meaning of life
I take a peek at the street below.
People have given up looking at each other.
Nothing changed much since yesterday.
The same junkie stuck begging in front of the café
The same lame tramp clasping a bottle of booze to her crutch.
The same busy drives piling up
and bumping each other down my block.
(chorus x2)
Me, in the mean time,
I'm having a nice cup of java
While I consider all this,
I whisper to myself:
"Why does it go this way ?
Why does it go that way ?
And la la la and bla bla bla"
A moment later, the phone rings.
It's my cousin Bécassine1
who just got kicked out of her factory.
She dumps her problems on me.
I ask her what's up and she goes:
"You're not listening to me!
You taking the piss or what?
I'm so messed up
The IRS is breathing down my neck
I can't even afford a handbag
and my boyfriend is dumping me!
What's this bloody life? A joke or a swindle?"
Feels good to have a family to get things off your chest
(chorus x2)
I hang up and grab my keys
to go and check the mail.
Let's see, what do we have here?
A loving letter from the unemployment insurance
telling me I'm broke.
That's a rather posh start!
Pompous middle-class twats
rehearsing United Nations' waffle
chatting about famine
while fixing makeup on their pretty faces
"We are infested with riffraff!"
I fume against quick viruses,
the economics of these empty skinflints.
These bears2 gambling on stock exchange,
plagued by buying fever3
sprawled on their piles of money.
But these animals are not prowling my street.
They are safe in their zoo,
protected by an army of blockheads.
And I just muse over all this,
still standing at my window.
(chorus x3)
- 1. A wink to this appalling song, which does not bode well for the cousin's IQ
- 2. Probably just there for the ours/bourse alliteration
- 3. A pun on "fièvre aphteuse" (foot-and-mouth disease)
Song details
Translation details
Гость
submitted on 6 Ноя 2016 - 17:04
6
Give a shoutout to Гость
Комментарий:
That's actually quite good. Very true to the feelings of a growing part of the population.
Комментарии 7
Yeah that is cute! I like it a lot and there's some nice colourful language to soak up! :-)
Some thoughts:
La tête dans le fion - So this is literally "My head up my arse"! :-D
isn't "Tu te fous de ma gueule ou quoi" a bit ruder than that? "You taking the piss?" "You fucking with me?"
qui pètent plus haut qu' leur cul - that's a great expression. Don't think we have an equivalent. Maybe something like "Who think their farts smell of roses" or "...don't smell"
Famishment - I didn't even know that was a word! It's very unusual though - I'd have thought just "famine"
I swear I just heard someone (on TV) say "J'ai la tête dans le cul et la chatte dans le Z"
/boggle
:-)
It was in a movie - some 'good time girls' comparing notes after a night's partying. Does seem a bit anatomically unlikely! :-)
..ah, it wasn't "dans le Z" it was "en Z".
I can kind of imagine what that might mean!
Yeah, he think he's the cats whiskers, dog(gies) danglers, bees knees, 'hot shit'... They're all quite good but they don't quite catch the pomposity of the French do they? "Putting on airs" seems quite close but is a bit vanilla...
There's plenty of options for se foutre de ma gueule...
Taking the piss/the Mickey/the Michael
Pulling my leg/plonker (ahem)
Yanking my chain
Having a laugh, messing with me, fucking with me, shitting me
Tu te fous de ma gueule ou quoi - You're punking me or what? - May be an option, I think
Yeah, that's a bit rarer in my neck of the woods put I have heard it. Rather more American I guess! :-)
Dear Pierre, I'm quite impressed! Your attitude to rating is the only thing that keeps me from voting for you not "to fume over it." A bit of nitpicking though (your favourite word). I'm not sure about "ponder" I'd say "Ponder on all this" anyway but we usually ponder before taking some steps. But the girl looks like contemplating, gazing. So I'd say I'm musing on all this, I'm looking on...
Your gift for translating calls for a Russian saying "Мастерство не пропьешь" = If you have an inborn talent you can't squander it even if you wanted to" Good job! Thank you! :)