When I arrived in Erasmus in Finland, I was exciting to make the others discovering some french music I like. But if those songs are listened without understanding the meaning, it is still beautiful but there is some kind of lack ! So I did some translations of my favourite songs, and here is the most famous song of an important old french singer, Charles Aznavour, born in Armenia. I put my own translation here because I took time to do it, but still my english is far from perfection, so you will surely find a better one on the video *and laught at mine heeem 
* ! Let you discovering !
Je vous parle d’un temps I speak about a time
Que les moins de vingt ans Which those less than 20 years old
Ne peuvent pas connaître Can not know
Montmartre en ce temps-là Montmartre (place in Paris) at that time
Accrochait ses lilas Hung up its lilacs
Jusque sous nos fenêtres Until right under our windows
Et si l’humble garni And if the humble furnished room
Qui nous servait de nid Which serve as our nest
Ne payait pas de mine Did not look like much
C’est là qu’on s’est connu It is here we knew each other
Moi qui criait famine Me who cried out famine
Et toi qui posais nue And you who posed nude
La bohème, la bohème Bohemia, bohemia
Ça voulait dire on est heureux It meant we are happy
La bohème, la bohème Bohemia, bohemia
Nous ne mangions qu’un jour sur deux We ate only one day on two
Dans les cafés voisins In the neighbour cafés
Nous étions quelques-uns We were some
Qui attendions la gloire Who waited for glory
Et bien que miséreux And even down-and-out
Avec le ventre creux With the hollow stomach
Nous ne cessions d’y croire We never cessed to believe in it
Et quand quelques bistros And when some bars
Contre un bon repas chaud For a good hot meal
Nous prenait une toile Took us a canvas
Nous récitions des vers We recited verses
Groupés autour du poêle Grouped around the stove
En oubliant l’hiver Forgetting the winter
La bohème, la bohème Bohemia, bohemia
Ça voulait dire tu es jolie It meant you are pretty
La bohème, la bohème Bohemia, bohemia
Et nous avions tous du génie And we all had genius
Souvent il m’arrivait Often it happened to me
Devant mon chevalet In front my easel
De passer des nuits blanches To spend white nights
Retouchant le dessin Touching up the drawing
De la ligne d’un sein Of a breast’s line
Du galbe d’une hanche Of the curve of a hip
Et ce n’est qu’au matin And it was only on the morning
Qu’on s’asseyait enfin That we sat finally
Devant un café-crème In front of a cream-coffee
Epuisés mais ravis Exhausted but delighted
Fallait-il que l’on s’aime It shows how much we loved each others
Et qu’on aime la vie And that we loved life
La bohème, la bohème Bohemia, bohemia
Ça voulait dire on a vingt ans It meant we are 20 years old
La bohème, la bohème Bohemia, bohemia
Et nous vivions de l’air du temps And we lived with the time’s air
Quand au hasard des jours When at random of the days
Je m’en vais faire un tour I go for a walk
A mon ancienne adresse To my former address
Je ne reconnais plus I do not recognize
Ni les murs, ni les rues Nor the walls, neither the streets
Qui ont vu ma jeunesse Which saw my youth
En haut d’un escalier At the top of a stair
Je cherche l’atelier I look for the studio
Dont plus rien ne subsiste Of which nothing more remains
Dans son nouveau décor In its new decoration
Montmartre semble triste Montmartre seems sad
Et les lilas sont morts And the lilacs are dead
La bohème, la bohème Bohemia, bohemia
On était jeunes, on était fous We were young, we were crazy
La bohème, la bohème Bohemia, bohemia
Ça ne veut plus rien dire du tout Nowadays it means nothing at all
Montmartre in Paris, photo by Arnaud Frich.
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