Saturday, February 20, 2010

AND MUCH MORE... EST BEAUCOUP PLUS...

If you haven't heard, the Olympics are happening right now in Metro Vancouver and Whistler. There has been some discussion about the French language and whether it's been sufficiently present at events such as the opening ceremonies. On January 29 I was at the Vancouver International Airport to catch a plane, and the bottom sign above caught my eye. All the signs are English on top, French on bottom, and all are correctly written in both languages, except the bottom one. "And much more" does not translate to "est beaucoup plus" - the French est translates to the English is. The word and in English is et in French. The added S is just one little letter that doesn't change the pronunciation, but it does change the meaning significantly.

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