[ti:Beginning French]
[ar:Laurie Anderson]
[al:Live in New York]
[offset:0]
[00:00.17]Beginning French - Laurie Anderson
[00:04.28]I've been doing a lot of concerts in French.
[00:06.99]
[00:09.23]Unfortunately, I don't speak French.
[00:11.86]
[00:13.06]I memorize it.
[00:13.77]
[00:15.07]I mean, my mouth is moving but
[00:17.25]I don't really understand what I'm saying.
[00:19.22]
[00:21.20]It's like sitting at the breakfast table
[00:22.86]And it's early in the morning and you're not quite awake.
[00:26.53]And you're just sitting there eating cereal
[00:28.58]And sort of staring at the writing on the box
[00:30.94]
[00:32.82]And not reading it exactly,
[00:34.76]Just more or less looking at the words.
[00:36.55]
[00:37.12]And suddenly, for some reason, you snap to attention,
[00:41.16]And you realize that what
[00:42.86]You're reading is what you're eating
[00:44.95]
[00:45.94]But by then it's much too late.
[00:48.18]
[00:50.52]After doing these concerts in French,
[00:53.61]I usually had the temporary illusion that
[00:55.67]I could actually speak French,
[00:58.40]But as soon as I walked out on the street,
[01:00.22]And someone asked me simple directions,
[01:01.68]
[01:02.68]I realized I couldn't speak a single word.
[01:04.60]
[01:05.69]So, as a result of this inadequacy,
[01:08.04]
[01:08.80]I found that the people
[01:10.36]I had the most rapport with were the babies.
[01:14.91]And one of the things I noticed about
[01:16.87]These babies was that they were apparently being used
[01:20.16]As some kind of traffic testers.
[01:21.91]
[01:22.89]Their mothers would be
[01:23.98]Pushing them along in their strollers
[01:25.23]And they would come to a busy
[01:26.56]Street with lots of parked cars
[01:27.84]
[01:28.58]And the mother can't see what the traffic
[01:30.33]Is like because of all the parked cars
[01:32.31]So she just sort of edges the stroller out
[01:35.85]Into the street and cranes her head out afterwards.
[01:39.39]
[01:40.07]And the most striking thing about this
[01:43.47]Is the expression on these babies' faces
[01:45.85]
[01:48.54]As they sit there in the middle of traffic, stranded,
[01:51.77]
[01:52.63]Banging those little gavels they've all got
[01:55.83]
[01:57.29]And they can't even speak English.
[01:58.63]
[02:00.95]Do you know what I mean?