My French is pretty artificial being learned from university (boring required bs lol I should have chosen to learn Japanese) and not native, so croissant could be a double entendre, but I learned it as crescent as in the crescent rolls you can buy from a bakery or donut shop (hence croissants); I say this because ascending and descending make more sense;
However, I know descendre is the verb "to descend" and monter is the verb "to ascend".
