Building vocabulary the French way
We're in a minivan traveling tiny mountain roads in France, and we're late. I see a sign ahead that says something like "3 Cassis." What's a cassis? Nobody in the car knows. We continue to speed along. Several seconds pass. Then the road abruptly drops several feet. Me, my brother, my fiancee, our minivan, all our luggage, and the bikes in the rack on the back of the minivan are now flying and falling. I have a moment to be thankful that my seat belt is keeping me somewhere in the vicinity of my seat. We land, very hard, still going very fast. We have enough time to glance at each other incredulously before the road drops away again. By the third cassis, we've slowed down enough that the minivan stays on the ground. I don't think I'll ever forget that "cassis" is a noun meaning something like "sudden, large drop."
Mad props are due to Renault for their Espace minivan, which came through the cassis situation with no damage. It's not every car that can survive a jump while it's fully loaded. Plus, through all of this mountain driving it got about 30 mpg.