My two teens took their Bacs this year. The Bac – Baccalaureat – is the set of exams kids take at the end of their second and third years at lycée. I blogged about it here.

Here are some pearls of wisdom that appeared in students’ answers to this year’s Bac. Benj and Caiti assure me they weren’t responsible for any of these!

 

Président Mitterand died from cancer of the womb.

Physics was discovered by accident in antiquity by Larry Stottle.

The earth would be covered in ice if it weren’t for the volcanoes inside it warming it up.

When a baby is born, it gives a loud cry, like Tarzan in the jungle.

The points of a compass are top, bottom, east and west.

Coca-cola fields run down the water supplies in India.

At the time of the Cold War, it was very cold.

Japan is a big island lost in the middle of the sea.

The surface area of Japan is bigger than France, smaller than New Zealand and about the same as Cuba.

General Aïe Zenhower commanded the disembarkations in 1942 in North Africa. (The French say ‘A__ïe’ for ‘ouch’.)

The armistice is a war which ends every year on 11 November.

A septuagenarian is a shape with seven sides.

Socrates was forced to commit suicide himself.

There are two sorts of gas – natural gas and supernatural gas.

In towns, the problem of security is a problem of insecurity.

When there is trouble in the world, the UN sends in the Blue Baseball Hats. (The student wrote casquettes bleus rather than casques bleus = blue berets.)