Quote from last night when I was chatting to one of my French friends.  Note that this was said in English: “I was pumping all night and only slept for two hours.”

The context is that when the French students get to Polytechnique as first-years, they have to share a room with the second-years for a short period of time during some initial training before going off to do their three weeks of military training somewhere else in France (Polytechnique is a military school).  So during those first few weeks they go through some initiation stuff including push-ups, which are “les pompes” in French and which is what my friend was referring to.

But I still couldn’t stop giggling.