Garoo

Well, no, it wasn’t just vaporware. It wasn’t just one of those myriad ideas that spring in my mind and just vanish silently a few days or weeks later. There it is: the English version of the site is online, as you may, somehow, have noticed by now. Because you’re reading this in English. Yes you are. Really. Probably because you clicked a switch to english button at the top of the page. (By the way, I must think of something to do with that button. I’m just realizing that most people might assume it just links to a Google translation of my blog. Damn. Must find a wording as clear and concise as possible.)

As I was chatting with Xarro, I managed to formulate the exact reason why I wanted so much to launch an English version. It’s not just megalomania—well, there’s some of that, too, it would be hard to deny. It’s mostly a question of community, and belonging.

In the French blogosphere, I’m both actor and spectator. I write a blog, I read blogs, I comment blogs, I blog about blogs (occasionally). In the English-speaking community, I’m only a lurker. I read lots of blogs, but I don’t even dare post comments, because I couldn’t add my URL as a signature. It’s not just a matter of publicity: I would feel like posting an anonymous comment. Hey, I am Garoo, for crying out loud, not some nameless webless John Doe! Uh… what did I say about megalomania again? Forget it.

For… uh, a few days… ah, right, for the last ten days, I’ve experimented with writing everything both in English and in French. Hiding it from the readers, just for me, in order to see if I could make it—seems like I can—and laying out a few rules. They’re simple: first, if at any time I feel too lazy to translate an article, I just won’t, and it won’t be a big deal at all; second, what I write about TV won’t be translated because it’s only interesting to the French audience (it’s either about French TV shows, or about American series that we get with a one-year delay—at the very least). Once this ground has been laid, it seems to work quite alright. For the last couple of days, I’ve been translating the text without really thinking about it (which can be demonstrated by thinking: Oops, I didn’t translate that one, did I? Oops, I did too!), and it can only become easier by force of habit. So all is well, isn’t it?

Now all that’s missing is a few readers. Ok, an awful lot of readers. (Please? Pretty please?) I don’t know if I’ll dare post comments on English blogs right here, right now, right away. I’m shy. I’m self-conscious. If I were just defined by one word, it would be that one. Oh, well, and I haven’t got that much to say, so I’ll wait. But it will come. And then I will either see my readership triple, or the door be slammed onto my face. Oh well. It’s not like it has never happened to me before.