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FRENCH WORD OF THE DAY

French phrase of the Day: Cadeau du ciel

A lovely expression which we hope you’ll have plenty of opportunities to use.

Published: 15 September 2021 13:00 CEST

French phrase of the Day: Cadeau du ciel

Photo: Annie Spratt/Unsplash/Nicolas Raymond

Why do I need to know cadeau du ciel ?

Because hopefully you’ll get one soon!

What does it mean?

Literally translated as ‘a gift from the sky’, un cadeau du ciel is an unexpected but very agreeable surprise. This can be anything from a new friendship to a lucky sports goal or a convenient political opportunity. You could even use it to describe a person who is, or has been, particularly important to you.

Ciel means ‘sky’, but it also has the same religious connotations as ‘the heavens’ in English.

Equivalents to the phrase cadeau du ciel in English include ‘heaven-sent’, ‘a gift from the gods’, ‘godsend’ or even ‘a blessing’.

Use it like this

La succession à la Cour suprême est un cadeau du ciel pour Donald Trump – The Supreme Court nomination is a godsend for Donald Trump.

L’amour est un cadeau du ciel – Love is a gift from the gods.

Ce genre de situation peut être un cadeau du ciel si vous savez tirer parti de l’occasion – This kind of situation can be a blessing if you know how to make the most of it.

Synonyms

Un don – a gift

Une bénédiction – a blessing

Tombé du ciel – heavensent (literally translated as ‘fallen from the sky’)

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8 favourite French Words of the Day

Every weekday The Local publishes a French word or phrase of the day. We try to focus on colloquialisms, slang, sayings (and a bit of swearing) – you know, the type of French you won’t learn in the classroom, but will hear all the time in the street.

This daily habit means we have a very extensive back catalogue – find it here – and we’ve picked out eight of our recent favourites.

Taxe lapin

The literal translation of une taxe lapin – oon-tax la-pahn – is exactly what you would expect – ‘rabbit tax’.

However, this is not a tax on rabbits, or even on rabbit owners. It is in fact a ‘no-show fee’ or charge levied on people who make appointments and don’t turn up.

Fortunately, we showed up with an explanation, here.

Banco

Banco – bain-koh – is essentially the French word for “bingo!”. It might be colloquial, but politicians have been known to use it when indicating that something someone else has said is correct.

There’s more, right here.

Radin

Radin – rah-dahn – is a less-than complimentary French term for a penny-pincher, someone who is or ‘miserly’ with their money.

We, however, are not in the least stingy with our definition.

Crevard

Speaking of words that definitely aren’t complimentary… Crevard – creh-varr – is a colloquial term that can be used to describe someone who looks ill or exhausted. It’s roughly equivalent to telling someone that they ‘look like death warmed up’.

Find out more, here.

À peine

À peine – ah pen – means ‘with or to pain’ or ‘with or to effort’, and therefore makes no sense in English. But in French conversation, it acts as an adverb meaning ‘hardly’, ‘barely’ or ‘scarcely’.

We make sense of it all, here.

T’as dead ça

T’as dead ça – tah dead sah – combines the French verb avoir (to have) with the English word ‘dead’. And it’s a good thing, apparently. Because it refers to ‘killing it’ in the positive sense. If you tell someone t’as dead ça, it’s congratulatory, like ‘great job, you killed it!’

Simple comme bonjour

Simple comme bonjour – sahm-pluh com bohn-jor – translates as ‘simple as hello’.

It describes something that is very easy or quick, the French equivalent to ‘easy as ABC’, or ‘a piece of cake’.

Our explainer is just as straightforward, too.

J’en ai marre

J’en ai marre – roughly pronounced Johnny Marr – means ‘I’m fed up’.

We discuss this charming phrase in more depth here.

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