You’d think that the humour I’d find in someone making errors when speaking a second language would be somewhat tempered by the fact that I’ve barely mastered English and the closest I come to bilingualility is knowing some of the German phrases from Schnappi, Das Kleine Krokodil – and yet, here I am, laughing my ass off.
Something about Malcolm Turnbull‘s face is so perfectly configured for a shit-eating grin that he seems to be in an almost permanent state of discomfort. He always looks like he’s pretending to be polite in a situation that is beneath him, somehow managing to look both condescending and physically pained. This, I believe, is why basically nothing registers on his face in the moment that French president Emmanuel Macron refers to Lucy Turnbull as Malcolm’s “delicious wife“. He’s already there.
The delightfully interesting choice of words came as Macron was thanking the Turnbulls at the end of his brief trip to Australia, saying that, more than food and the wine, he appreciated their hospitality, which seems to indicate that he might have been attempting a play on words that didn’t quite bear out in the cold light of the English language.
You can check it out below:
Only a French President could get away with calling our Prime Minister’s wife “delicious”. #AusPol #9News pic.twitter.com/bWaq59gmo5
— 9News Australia (@9NewsAUS) May 2, 2018
Magnifique.
