Garde De Donc

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi.

Hi, who’s this?

This is Dan Richard.

I’m calling from Jacksonville, Florida.

Hey, Dan, what can we do for you?

Well, I grew up in South Louisiana, and we have this phrase that we say. It goes, and it means to look at something that’s foolish, or to look at something that’s surprising. It kind of translates, can you believe this or something like that. And I was trying to think about, well, what does that come from? And I wasn’t able to get a real good French kind of direct translation. And it seems I was wondering if it was related to going gaga over something. Because we’ll shorten it sometimes and just say, gaga, look at this. And so I didn’t know if that was related to this, like, focus of going gaga over something.

Can you say the expression again?

Yeah.

Gare des dons.

Gare des dons.

And so this is Cajun French or Louisiana French.

That’s right.

I know it’s a little different than in French. It’s a dialect.

Yeah.

But we can still hear the roots of it there. And what we are hearing is the gare is from a verb meaning to look, as in the English regard. And then donk is, D-O-N-T is then. Sometimes you’ll hear it as mes gare donc, or just gare donc, or gare mes donc. And you’re right. It translates as, will you look at that, or get a load of that, or will I never, or will I say? It’s just kind of like an expression of surprise.

That’s exactly how we use it. So if somebody’s just done something ridiculous, us like you got your you got your four-wheeler stuck in the mud and can’t get it out you know. But the but it is not related to gaga although gaga does come from French to be gaga over something is to be kind of enchanted by it or flabbergasted by it or just crazy for it you know. But the French the gaga comes from this French slang imitation of the way someone speaks who it doesn’t have control over their faculties. They make nonsense sounds that kind of sound like ga, ga, ga, ga, ga.

But further back than that, it comes from hospital slang in France, where there’s this word gâteau, which sounds like cake. It sounds like the French word for cakes, but it comes from a verb meaning to spoil or to ruin. So it’s the first part of that word, G-A-T-E-U-X, or gâteau is the female version. And so it’s the gâteau duplicated to make that gâteau sound. But yeah, originally from French hospital slang.

Oh, thank you very much. It’s very interesting.

Yeah, sure. I’d love to talk to you again sometime about the Cajun French. There’s so much that’s still happening there, and it’s so interesting, and it’s always a chance for me to pull out some Cajun music from YouTube and put it on in the background as I’m digging into it. So we’ll let the good times roll, as they say.

Yeah.

C’est bon.

C’est bon.

Okay.

Dan, thanks for calling.

Okay, thanks so much.

Bye-bye.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

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