Word: avion
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Avion!" With its huge exports of cocoa ($30 million a year) and coffee ($60 million), as well as its dense forests, the Ivory Coast is rich by comparison. By sunrise the people of Abidjan are already on their way to work, the men loping along in giant and graceful strides, bantering in a French laced with local slang, e.g., "Avion!" for "Hurry up!", "Japan" for anything shoddy. The symbol of the Coast's progress is the French-financed Felix Houphouet-Boigny Bridge that stretches across the Ebrié Lagoon and supports a four-lane highway and a two-track...
Most of the diners take little heed of their European surroundings, but still add to the atmosphere. These are the section men with beret and moustache; Cliffites with black sweaters, pony-tails, and haggard looks; a grad student who sits in the corner reading a letter that came par avion; the women who drops in to say "Comment allezvous?"; the chef's daughter Monique who philosophizes in the French-English combination of a six-year-old; and the Freshman out to prove he passed the language requirement by ordering a pineapple tart and a hot chocolate "like a native...