Le Bonhomme
“Have you ever rubbed your mitts over some REAL snowballs?”
“Snow cones! La Joie de Vivre!”
“Je ne suis pas blanc! Je suis albino!”
Le Bonhomme (literally "good man" in French; short for bonhomme de neige "snowman") is a 7-foot snowman who rules a ruthless reign of festivity over “le Carnaval de Québec” in Québec City, since it began in 1955. Beyond ruthless, he is certainly shameless and belligerent as he strolls through town sporting nothing except a red cap, black buttons and a ceinture fléchée. This may be the result of his only source of nourishment: a peculiar hot French-Canadian alcoholic substance called “Caribou”. Le Bonhomme is also a bona fide pimp as you will often see him with the Queen of the carnival and the six duchesses.
Le Bonhomme lives in a magical ice palace that was originally built in Jacques-Cartier Square in 1955. His palace was later moved opposite of the Québec Parliament in 1973, with the likely motive to influence local politics in his favour. The impressive ice construction even has a dungeon, used to jail Carnival-goers who refused to honour Le Bonhomme's effigy. Le Bonhomme’s territory was divided into dukedom’s many years ago. Now, every region that participates in the carnival is assigned as a Bonhomrie or a 'good natured' county.
The mandate of Le Bonhomme is to rule over festivities and to strictly enforce laughter, dancing and 'la joie de vivre'. He participates in most activities at the festival including the crowning of the Queen of the carnival, le 'defile' and general debauchery. Le Bonhomme dances, chats and extorts cheer from anyone of any age. Le Bonhomme gains political points by visiting the local sick people in hospitals and the elderly to share his 'friendliness' and the spirit of the festival. Sure, ask the people who spent time in his dungeon about his 'friendliness'.
Cabane-à-Sucre[edit | edit source]
Le Bonhomme is credited for starting the sacred Quebec tradition of La Cabane-à-Sucre. One of the last steps of initiation into the “le Carnaval de Québec” involves Le Bonhomme making yellow snow and forcing the newcomers to eat it. Because they enjoyed this so much, this soon became a continued winter tradition. Considering that Le Bonhomme is not capable of producing enough yellow snow to go around, he came up with a unique solution. He picked up a Tim Horton's doughnut and said "This is my body," he then picked up a bottle of Maple Syrup and poured it into the snow and said "and this is my piss." Ever since the tradition of pouring maple syrup into snow and eating it caught on throughout Quebec.
FLQ Connection[edit | edit source]
Le Bonhomme is the evilest terrorist in all of Canada and the leader of the FLQ terrorist group. The FLQ was created based on the teachings of Pierre Vallières in the FLQ Koran "Nègres blancs d'Amérique (1968)", translated into English as "White Niggers of America". In the FLQ Koran, Pierre Vallières confessed that he among many other people in Québec secretly wish they were black. The two main reasons he cited were that A. White People wish they could talk Jive and B. White People wish they could dance.
Le Bonhomme is particularly drawn to these teachings, as he has a hard time dealing with being the whitest person in all of Québec, if not the world. Le Bonhomme is clearly in denial and is famous for his catch phrase "Je ne suis pas blanc! Je suis albino!" which translates to "I am not white! I am albino."