Hey, you're listening to Rough Translation from NPR.

I'm Gregory Worder.

Here's a story about the new normal flying directly in the face of the laws of the old

normal.

The president of France, Emmanuel Macron, issued a decree that the French may not enter

certain public places like schools in the metro without covering their face with a mask.

There's a fine if you don't comply.

But our correspondent in France, Eleanor Beardsley, brought to our attention a different French

law that says, well, the opposite.

The law actually says you cannot dissimulate your face, cover your face, conceal your

face in public.

And I found a little meme on TikTok of a guy talking about the absurdity of having

150-year-old fine if you covered your face.

But now you have 125-year-old fine if you don't cover your face.

And it was joking that Macron was a genius because he's going to fill the French coffers

with fines.

He says, tomorrow, if you're seen by a cop without a mask, you'll get fines, but if you accept

the fine and put on the mask, it would be an endless circuit of people taking off masks

and putting on masks.

See, I'll feed you.

It's infinite.

This is Rough Translation, with far off stories that get close to home.

...