Tool To Remove Headlight & Wiper Knobs

[ArdWrknTrk]

Jeff, I thought you were Canadian, not French?
Aren't you supposed to be apologizing profusely and interjecting "Eh" in every sentence???

[ArdWrknTrk]

Perhaps Quebecoise is a unique subset of the Canadian experience?

[viven44]

Thank you for the explanation! I did not realize the cultural aspect, of course, but the language aspect was already (mostly) clear to me. I was born in one of the French colonies in India (Pondicherry). Even today, Ville Blanche (built by the French) is well preserved as a local-tourist destination, Ville Noire (yes that's what it is really called!) has undergone significant change with the times. French was the official language there until it was anglicized after Independence. Up until my mom's time French was the educational medium but, in my time, was just a part of the school curriculum, so my French is all but mostly gone as I only learned it to fill the graduation transcript.

[BigBrother-84]

Jim - Yep, you’re right! Quebecois is much more accurate that “French Canadian”.
• You have the “French” foreign cousins, living in a far-far country, somewhere over the sea.
• You have the French Canadians, this large group speaking french “from coast to coast”, including all “out-of-Quebec” french speaking friends and the:
• Quebecois, having french as mother language at around 80%.

About the phrasing habits, I would say that (unfortunately imho) our kids tend to use a lot of english words and interjections into their phrases: cool, sick, quick, down, chill, watch, nice, skills, insane, sketch…  I find they are more and more speaking some strange «frenglish».
But I suppose this is the normal languages evolution… there’s not a lot of people speaking Roman empire’s latin these days.  Who knows, maybe in 400-500 years ahead, people in america will speak kind of englispanifrench?


Vivek - It is unknown and misunderstood that the first explorers of american territories where largely french people.
I heard (to be verified) that they had easier relationship with first nations people, was more easy for them to go here and there.
It’s always surprising to go across the USA and find everywhere french names for landmarks, cities, streets, etc.

It’s our story, all of us living here, mixing with each others.  We all share a very similar way of life, our cultures are really really close.


But sometimes there are funny languages misunderstandings.


Like when I wrote in an introduction letter to my future boss «it will be a pleasure to meat you soon».

[ArdWrknTrk]

Do not forget your transient cousins, who wandered down the Appalachians and through the bayou to New Orleans....

There are pockets of French influence in odd places like Alabama ,Tennessee and Arkansas, not just the Creole's.

Americans seem to forget this -little thing- called the Louisiana Purchase, which was IMHO the best land deal we ever got!
Alaska doesn't really compare..
Not that Steward's Folly wasn't a big deal -even before oil was a thing- but the purchase opened up the American West to the white colonists.

[BigBrother-84]

I fully agree with you, there’s still lot of US friends speaking french.

One of their well known ambassador is Zachary Richard, Quebecois love him!

[ArdWrknTrk]

And, I Thank YOU for introducing me to someone who has never been on my radar.

The rich Cajun culture is something I know little about.
That they continue their vernacular and don't seem endangered by the onslaught of media influencer's in 2024 is astonishing to me (but I am not one of them)

[Ifitaintbroke]

Why do you have English in quotes there, Jim? Are we hard to understand?

[Ifitaintbroke]

Much of my family on both sides are originally from Quebec, but I'm not sure what part. How they ended up down here, I'm not sure.

[ArdWrknTrk]

Because what we speak here is not English.

Hell, I have a hard enough time understanding people from my own nation (usually the deep south)
Not a criticism of them or their vernacular, just an observation of how varied "english" is, in a nation divided by distance and culture.

[mat in tn]

easy there fella. yall dont gotta pik on us in da south. at least we dont pahk tha cah in tha yahd

[BigBrother-84]

mat in tn wrote

easy there fella. yall dont gotta pik on us in da south. at least we dont pahk tha cah in tha yahd

Is that Klingon?


During Big Brother’s Big Tour, our biggest “accent” surprise happened while traveling through Tennessee.
A pickup was following us and, since I don’t drive Big Brother really fast (well, let’s say “too slow for US guys”), I stopped on the road side to let them pass us.
They stopped just beside me (they were two men), and began to tell me… something.

I explained (with my strong french accent) that I’m not really fluent in english, so the repeated more slowly to explain me… something.

This time I did catch (maybe) some words like «arin’» and “hurch", and while they were pointing the church parking across the street, I supposed that they were asking me to go there.

So we met there, they were really nice guys and we all made efforts to understand each other.  They just wanted to talk about the truck, we had a cool friendly time with them.

Mat, my wife and I are keeping super memories about Tennessee folks… and their “lovely” accent.

[ArdWrknTrk]

I'm not picking on anyone or any thing

If you can make something intelligible from a Louisiana patois you're doing far better than me..

[viven44]

I have only lived in the South. English was pretty much the educational medium and that's how I learned it, but have always been more fluent in it than my native language. When I moved to the US for education, I could hardly follow "Midtown/Downtown Atlanta" accent. I had to learn differences in spelling. Ex- 'colour vs color'

I met my wife who is a 'Southern Belle' from Arkansas in 2008 and my first interaction with her family was filled with words I have no idea what they were, so I'm sure they thought I was just dumb. "over yonder, fixin' to, bless your heart". I have not had too much trouble with southern dialects. After 15 of being with my wife, my speech is all confused and jacked up  

[ArdWrknTrk]

I use colour, grey and a few others...

Tell me something of the varying dialects in your homeland.
You've said that your state was under French control, and I know Goa was Portuguese.
Then you have Muslim and Buddhist enclaves in the extreme north like Kasmir.

I always love to learn

[viven44]

India is as varied as Europe. If it were not for the British, it wouldn't have been unified into one country. The only reason for unification to make sense today is for economies of scale in military, manufacturing, etc.

Most of the states have their own language, they are not dialects by any stretch. All the surrounding states from over where I grew up have a different language (writing script, vocabulary, grammer, sentence structure). Completely unintelligible. The only unifying language is English. I do not understand Hindi, or any other Indian language except 'Tamil'.

The cultural similarities between states are just about the same as between neighboring countries lets say in Europe and Asia.

About Automobiles, I had no idea automatic transmissions existed until I moved here

[ArdWrknTrk]

India has an astonishing space program.
They just landed on the moon!

How close is Tamil to say, Sri Lanka/Ceylon?

I remember the Tamil Tigers from about the mid '70's

[viven44]

About 25% of Srilankan population is estimated to speak "Srilankan Tamil". Those people are descendants of the original migrants from Tamil Nadu. It is somewhat mutually intelligible (further apart in intelligibility than WASP/Country English ) with the Tamil spoken in Tamil Nadu, although they speak a purer form of Tamil which existed in the homeland.. oh maybe from 1000AD (Wild guess... they sound Ancient !!)

[ArdWrknTrk]

Isolated populations tend to stick with the old ways. (and language, evidently)

Some of the oldest written language is Sanskrit.
I think I'd love to hear that spoken!

[Ifitaintbroke]

Quite true. We speak American, and there are many dialects. On Sunday, I dealt with 2 older gentleman from South Africa. I could barely understand them, but they were speaking English. Now, they were straight from S A, and had not been here long, so their accent is strongly flavored with Afrikaans
 I've met other South Africans who have been here longer, and I could understand them perfectly. Another great example of that process: last year (I think), I dealt with 2 guys from Georgia (the other one), and had a hard time understanding them. A couple of weeks ago, I sold an oil change to a Russian who evidently has been here for a while, his accent is noticeable, but, again, I can understand him perfectly.
This has happened to me, also. Though I have lived my whole life in South Georgia, (yes-we capitalize it) I am not considered to have a Southern accent by those around me. My father grew up in North Dakota, and my mother's family is mostly from the Northeast(Boston/Rhode Island), and part from NC. I grew up in the Savannah area, where people don't have as strong an accent as out here in "the country". When I started at the parts store, I could barely understand many of the people I talked to. There are several dialects in this area, and I have met a few people that even my coworkers from out here couldn't understand. My own speech has als changed greatly since spending so much time around different people, and I'm well aware that I talk differently depending on who I'm around. When talking to rednecks, I talk more like them. When dealing with Hispanics, I try to have as little accent as possible, to help them with the language barrier (though I do speak a smattering of Spanish).