Hum, the Archimeds principle!. A young french lad asked to state the principle came out with this one. "Any body immerse in water will come out... soaked" Freely translate from "La foire aux cancres" a french book, author: Jean Charles, published in early 60'sAs for voila (or voil

<>Not forgetting that a great many English words stem from French, German and Greek amongst other languages.Every time I see viola I get this mental image of Gwyneth Paltrow in Shakespeare in Love and that sets me up for an hour or so. :-jumpy Sad really but at 58 one should not pass up opportunities :-lol

Hi Dave, isn't Chineese the most widely understood langauge followed by Spanish :-) Sorry to say!Anyhow, le Weekend in French is "la fin de semaine" in Quebec :-)the "little fokker" reminds me "meet the parents". I like this movie a lot!!

I think that Mandarin Chinese may be the language with the most number of speakers as a first language, but English is definitely the most spoken if you include Mother Tongue speakers and people who speak it as a second language. Spanish is up there but French is way down I'm afraid (even though I speak it!).

And a Stationnement in Quebec is a Parking in France (Philippe Clay);-) But we also use a weekend over here, though to hear it with a french accent, from France, sounds funny ;-)Hugo

I think it's a question of which Chinese- as I understand it there are several different ones - like Mandarin,Cantonese etc.Anyway - I seriously doubt that (on a world wide basis) any of the Chinese languages are more widely understood than English.I think what you may be referring to is that Chinese is ,I believe,the native language of the largest number of people.I find it hard to believe that Spanish is more widely understood than English- but I wait to be proved wrong........................One thing I must add- In Quebec when we visited there(My wife being a French Canadian)I noticed that ,in spite of the fact that in Europe(even in France) a Stop sign actually says"Stop" using the english word,or "Halt"(also english), the Quebecois insist on putting "Arrette" on the Stop signs.DAve

Well, being 58 too we have to take anything that comes along!!! I can send you 18yo.zip if you wish }( :9 :-eek :-sun1

LOL, in fact it is ARRET in Quebec. The most funny one for me is CUL DE SAC, in plain french, while in France it is depicted with a symbol instead... (litteraly: the but of the bag. ARRETTE is a fish bone!Anyhow, here is what I found:Spanish and English are in a virtual dead heat to be the second most spoken language in the world. As of 1999, Spanish had 332 million speakers, while English had 322 million. They were far behind Chinese, with 885 million. Source: Ethnologue. (If people who speak English as a second language were included, however, English would come out on top.) and Because the birth rate in the Spanish-speaking word is higher than among people whose first language is English, Spanish can be expected to remain firmly in the No. 2 spot for years to come. And if the economies of Latin American countries improve, Spanish could gain importance in worldwide trade and communications as well. from here:http://spanish.about.com/library/weekly/aa070300a.htmalso good source here:http://www.ethnologue.com

Or...guagesdissapointmentwierd:-hah

Isn't there a french word for email that originated in Quebec?

Or for that matter the eternal confusion between plural s and genitive 's and contractions with 's. Also descent vs. decent. Misha

how about people describing their aircraft as a "BOING" versus a "BOEING"?..i've always wondered what Boeing thinks of that ;-)

Okey dokey - moving to Hangar forum....:-)http://saltydogfly2.avsim.net/images/avsim_sig.jpg"I am the keeper of the cheese; you are the lemon merchant"

The viola is a stringed and bowed musical instrument similar to the violin but slightly larger and tuned a perfect fifth lower. It would be the alto ranged instrument of the violin family and generally not often used for solo pieces. It is not a cord instrument (As in a type of rope) nor is it a chord-type instrument even if it is generally playing the harmony parts in the orchestra. A performer on the Viola can however play multiple stops and therefore play chords while sounding more than one string at a time. :)Bilbo

Courriel :-)Hugo