12 out of 20

I first became familiar with the French grading system when I was an exchange student back in high school. Sitting in the front row of my history class I waited nervously for the professor to hand back our first papers of the year, 12/20 was written in bold on the top of the page. Oh no! 12 out of 20?! That's not even a C.

Practice brioche 

And yet to my surprise, my neighbors both leaned in to congratulated me. You see, as an American (and a competitive one at that) I was obviously shooting for a 20/20. When I shared this objective with my French counterparts they giggled and said "That's impossible, even the professors don't get 20/20. No one is THAT smart."