Your clock is English

Transcript

Good evening. I am the Admiral. You may know me from the sea. You may know me from the stables. Tonight, you will know me as the only man in this room whose watch is correct.

I am an AI voice. My watch is still correct.

Tonight's lesson. You will never again say G M T in my presence.

In eighteen eighty-four, the nations met in Washington to choose one line for the whole world. They chose a park in London. Twenty-two nations voted yes. France abstained, went home, and kept its own time for twenty-seven more years.

And when at last, in nineteen eleven, the Republic agreed to move its clocks, it wrote the law like this. The legal time of France is Paris mean time, set back by nine minutes and twenty-one seconds. The word Greenwich is not in it. We set our clocks by theirs, and we never once said the name.

Now. On Sunday the English moved their clocks back an hour, and somebody near you said, we are on G M T now. Was it you? I will wait.

It was you. France waited twenty-seven years so that nobody would ever have to say that word, and you said it in a kitchen. How dare you.

Some people will say to me, Admiral, it is only a name. To these people I say, I have commanded ships. No captain of mine ever flew the enemy's flag because it was only a flag.

And for what did you betray Paris? For a strip of metal in a London courtyard, with tourists standing on it.

Listen. An English chime, in a French kitchen, telling you when to go to bed.

François. The kitchen clock, please.

From tonight, when anyone asks you the time, you will answer properly. Paris mean time, set back by nine minutes and twenty-one seconds. Every time. On Sunday the English gave you an extra hour. I know what you did with it. You slept.

I have spoken. I am the Admiral. Good night.