France has won this year’s World Cup, and crowds in the streets and victory parades are just not enough: in Paris, the city has (at least for now) gone on a pun-fueled streak of subway station renaming.
Champs Elysées Clemenceau on line 13 has new signs calling it Deschamps Elysées-Clemenceau after French coach Didier Deschamps; he got another shout-out at Notre-Dame des Champs which is now Notre Didier Deschamps. He’s not only this year’s winning coach, he was the captain of France’s last winner in 1998.
At Victor Hugo, the station honors another victor, goalkeeper Hugo Lloris, and Avron has become Nous Avron Gagné (We Have Won), a sentiment reflected at Charles de Gaulle – Etoile, under the Arc de Triomphe, where the station now is named On a 2 Etoiles (We have Two Stars) for the two World Cup victories.
