88 Chic Facts About France You’ll Wish You Had Known Before

A chemist in France unboiled an egg.

77. After winning the Tour de France in 2006 Oscar Pereiro announced his real dream was to play professional soccer. He would quit cycling, join a Spanish team, and score twice in his first season.

78. There are more people speaking French in Africa than in France

79. A woman in France received a rather substantial phone bill of 11,721,000,000,000,000€ (6,000 times the GDP of France itself). The phone company suggested she pay it off in multiple installments and only admitted their error after further pressing.

80. France gives medals to citizens who have successfully raised several children with dignity.

The Man in the Iron Mask existed. He stayed in the mask for 34 years leading to much speculation about his identity and why the king of France would want his face hidden and why he was kept alive instead of executed.

82. The German Empire in its 47 years of existence, won more Nobel Prizes in science than Britain, France, Russia and the USA combined.

83. Over the past 800 years, France fought in 185 military battles and won 132 of them, giving the French military the best record of any country in Europe.

84. France's greatest boxer Marcel Cerdan won 113 fights out of 117, 66 were Knock Outs. He died in a plane crash shortly after becoming world champion. The purpose of the journey was to see his mistress, famous singer Édith Piaf.

85. Nobody knows the exact number of people of African descent living in France because it officially declares itself 'color blind' so the law forbids official surveys accounting for racial or ethnic origin.

A French man named Benoît Lecomte once swam 3,716 miles across the entire Atlantic Ocean, from Massachusetts to France; the feat took him a total of 73 days, 5 of which included him being followed by a great white shark

87. When Louis the XIV of France was shown a new map of his country, which had been freshly surveyed by astronomers using more accurate methods, he saw that France had shrunk by 20 percent. He is said to have exclaimed, "I have just lost more territory to my astronomers than to all my enemies!"

88. When de Gaulle withdrew France from NATO and ordered all US troops out, Secretary of State Dean Rusk asked him for clarification, "Does your order include the bodies of American soldiers in France's cemeteries?"