Que la Force soit avec toi.

Two landmarks in my French training recently: First, while in LaBaule I saw my very first "V.F." (version Francaise) film in the movie theater! Pretty much all the films here can be seen in either "V.O." (version originale--e.g. for an American movie the actors all speak in English but there are French subtitles below) or "V.F." (e.g. for an American movie, the actors are dubbed over in French and there's no subtitles, and in the case of a French movie, no additional modifications are needed). I have always gone to see the "V.O." versions but this past week I tried a "V.F." for the first time. It was Audrey Tautou's "Hors de Prix", a romantic comedy which "ne prends pas la tete" (literally, "doesn't take the head," figuratively means that it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the plot), and while I certainly didn't understand every single phrase, I didn't have any trouble following the story and enjoyed watching.

The second landmark in my French education is my first book. Sure, I read newspaper articles and tons of French comic books already...but I think it's time to graduate to books. I know it's not the finest piece of literature or anything, but I'm about 2/3rds of my way through "Revanche de la Sith", the book adaptation of Star Wars Episode III. Interestingly, Darth Vader's name is France is Dark Vader, I'm not sure why. Today's French Vocab of the Day is courtesy of the Star Wars franchise:

"Que la Force soit avec toi!" = May the Force Be With You!

"le cote obscure" = The Dark Side.

And yes, Yoda talks in the same kind of "backwards" style in French as he does in English.