Idioms from France

Marseille and Provence

in a rushed, slapdash way

Used for anything thrown together fast and a bit carelessly, whether it's a haircut, a meal or a DIY job.

AlsaceLorraine

to go to bed for the night

A cosy, everyday way of announcing it's bedtime, heard around the eastern regions bordering Germany.

Northern FranceBelgiumSwitzerland

to sort out a dispute, acting as go-between

Used in Belgium, Switzerland and just over the French border to the north, this is what a mediator does: step between two sides who won't speak to each other and quietly patch things up. It carries a slightly makeshift, improvised feel, more a bit of string and tape than a formal settlement, which fits a word, bidon, that elsewhere in French slang means fake or cobbled together.

Marseille

to turn up somewhere without bringing anything

Said of someone who turns up at a party or gathering with nothing to offer, hands as empty as the statue's.

AlsaceBelgium

a bus shelter

Abribus is the word everywhere else. In Belgium, and in Alsace too, the same word already used for a small newspaper kiosk covers the bus shelter as well.

MoselleBelgiumSwitzerlandCanada

to be wearing trousers that are too short

Said of someone whose trousers ride up short enough to show their socks, as though they had hitched them up to keep dry from a flood down in the basement. Belgians mostly say dans les caves and the Swiss à la cave; this singular form is the one heard in Moselle and Canada.

Provence

to be stingy

This expression describes someone who is reluctant to spend money. The imagery is that someone with sea urchins in their pocket would avoid reaching in to withdraw money due to the prickly spines.

FranceBelgium

to be insufferably full of yourself

Describes someone whose head has swollen with pride, usually after a bit of success has gone to it.

France

to become full of oneself after a small success

For someone who's let one small win go straight to their head, acting far more important than the moment really calls for.

Franche-Comté and SavoieSwitzerland

to be better off doing something

Used to say someone would be wiser to choose one course of action over another.

Corsica

an outlaw in hiding after avenging his family

A specifically Corsican figure, an outlaw whose crime came from defending family honour rather than greed.

Lyon

telling someone off for a fault you have too

Used when the person pointing out a fault is guilty of the very same thing. The English equivalent is the pot calling the kettle black.

Nord-Pas-de-Calais, PicardieBelgium

a made-up story, told for fun

Standard French would call it une blague. Belgium and the far north of France have a word of their own for the harmless fib, usually heard in the plural.

northern FranceBelgium

chicory, the pale forced salad vegetable

France calls it an endive. In Belgium and the north of France it is a chicon, and chicons au gratin, rolled in ham under a cheese sauce, turn up on a lot of winter tables.

northern and eastern France, NormandyBelgium

a door handle

Most of France reaches for the poignée de porte, or the bec-de-cane. Belgians, and plenty of people in the north and east of France, reach for the clenche.

Franche-ComtéSwitzerland

no matter what happens, regardless of the situation

Heard along the Swiss and Franche-Comté side of the Jura, this is the local way of shrugging off obstacles: whatever gets in the way, the thing still has to happen. Someone might use it about a broken-down car, a stubborn client or a difficult in-law.

northern FranceBelgium

a sweet bake, the catch-all name for pastries

France has no single word to match it. A couque au chocolat is a pain au chocolat and a couque de Dinant is a hard honey biscuit, so viennoiserie is the nearest French catch-all, and even that leaves out the biscuit.

Hauts-de-France, Grand Est, OccitanieBelgiumSwitzerlandCanadaCongo-KinshasaHaiti

to have your midday meal

In standard French you déjeuner at midday and dîner in the evening. Belgium, Switzerland, Canada and parts of France keep dîner for the midday meal, which is the older sense.

Lorraine, northern FranceBelgium

a little money given to a child as a present

France calls it argent de poche, though a dringuelle is less a weekly allowance than the money that turns up in a birthday card. In Belgium it can also mean a tip.

Lyon

to not have been born yet

A very Lyonnais way of saying someone's too young to remember something, as if they were still lost in the river mist before they existed.

SavoieSwitzerland

to be pleasantly surprised

Flips the usual gloom of 'disappointed' on its head: you expected worse and got something better instead.

Provence

to be crazy

This expression describes someone who is crazy, foolish, or simple-minded. It can be used literally or affectionately. In Marseille, football fans are called 'fadas' and Le Corbusier's Cité radieuse is nicknamed 'la maison du fada'.

LorraineSwitzerland

to sulk, pulling a sullen face

Said of a child, or an adult who ought to know better, refusing to speak and jutting out the bottom lip after being told no. Common currency in French-speaking Switzerland and across the border in Lorraine. It looks like it should be about friendship, since pote is mate in ordinary French slang, but a completely different and older word sits underneath.

Marseille

to strut about showing off

Marseille slang for putting on airs and strutting about to impress people, especially in front of the opposite sex.

northern France, SavoieQuebecSwitzerlandBelgium

it is cold and damp out

Standard French spells it out as il fait froid et humide. Quebec, Switzerland, Belgium, the north of France and Savoie say the weather is cru, raw.

northern FranceBelgium

it's pouring rain

This expression describes heavy rainfall or a downpour. 'Drache' is a typical Belgian word that has been added to major French dictionaries like Larousse and Robert.

LorraineBelgium

a ruler

Elsewhere a latte is a lath, a thin strip of wood. In Belgium and Lorraine it is also the ruler in your pencil case, what France calls a règle.

Lyon

to be a bit simple-minded

A Lyonnais put-down for someone who's a bit slow on the uptake or hopelessly naive.

NormandyQuebec

a noncommittal way of avoiding a straight answer

The classic Norman non-answer, hedging your bets rather than committing either way. It plays into the regional stereotype of Normans as famously cagey.

Marseille

to head off to a remote place

Marseille slang for heading off somewhere remote or godforsaken. It also gets used when a conversation goes off the rails and stops making sense.

Marseille

to fall apart completely

Marseille slang for a situation, or a person, coming completely undone.

Corsica

to go into hiding to escape the authorities

Going into hiding, out of reach of the authorities. It took on its most famous sense in WWII, when taking to the maquis meant joining the Resistance.

LorraineBelgium

a dustpan

The French call it a pelle à balai, a broom shovel. In Belgium and Lorraine you sweep the crumbs into a ramassette.

FranceBelgiumSwitzerland

to be completely drunk

One of many French ways of saying someone's had far too much to drink, this one riffs on the rounded end of a garden shovel's handle.

Nord-Pas-de-Calais, PicardieBelgium

here you are, said when handing something over

Standard French keeps s’il vous plaît for please. In Belgium, Nord-Pas-de-Calais and Picardy it is also what you say as you hand something over, where France would say voilà or tenez.

France

to work oneself up over nothing

The spleen is not an organ anyone has strong feelings about, which is what makes poaching it in a fish stock such a good picture of fretting over nothing. French does this a lot, taking it out on the blood in 'se faire du mauvais sang' and on the bile in 'se faire de la bile'.

Lyon

to blow your nose with your fingers

A cheeky Lyonnais dig at Parisians. Despite the name, it describes the rather unrefined trick of using your fingers when there's no handkerchief handy.

Occitanie, Rhône-AlpesBelgiumCanadaSwitzerland

the evening meal

In France the evening meal is le dîner. Where dîner still means lunch, in Belgium, Switzerland, Canada and parts of southern France, the evening meal is le souper.

Alsace, LorraineBelgiumSwitzerland

a zip fastener

In France a zip is a fermeture éclair. In Belgium, Switzerland, Alsace and Lorraine it is a tirette, and a stuck one is just as annoying.

FranceBelgiumSwitzerland

to have had far too much to drink

A line from a comedy sketch that caught on as slang for being thoroughly drunk.