I was skiing at Chamonix years ago, when I met a French-Canadian in
the parking lot. He was horribly depressed at the state of the French
language in the home country. The parking lot was dubbed PARKING
instead of stationment, but even worse in his opinion was LE WEEKEND.

On the other hand, even longer ago I met a Frenchman from Normandy in
the Paris youth hostel. He'd just driven a hitchhiking American girl
to the hostel, where of course she had dumped him, so he was
comforting himself with a bottle of wine at the commons table. He too
was hideously depressed (perhaps it goes with the language?) at the
state of spoken French in Normandy. The worst thing he could say about
it was that it sounded very similar to French as spoken in Quebec.

(Both these conversations, I might point out, were held in English.
Though the French regard it as a predator language, they are pretty
handy with it.)

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: www.danford.net/letters.htm#9

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