French versus English - Volume 25

Jewish Star of David 'Offensive'

Thanks to Mitchel S. for this story about a Montreal food market that was asked by head office to remove three very prominent Stars of David hanging from the ceiling, over a section of seasonal Kosher food offered before the Jewish holiday of Passover, when Jews celebrate the Exodus from Egypt by eating unleavened bread.
A customer complained that the display was overly religious and the head office immediately ordered the store to take down the offending signs.
After a barrage of counter-complaints, the company reacted quickly to repair the damage and at least one Star of Davis is up once again.
The question remains. What kind of Grinch would complain?  LINK

Dangerous Anglo invasion in Laval

Impératif français, a militant French language group has sounded the alarm over the disturbing development that too many Anglos are moving to Laval. The separatist group has discerned a booby prize to the Mayor of Laval and city councillors for doing nothing to stop this barbarian invasion.
Exactly what steps the city should take to keep the Anglos out, wasn't suggested.
Link{FR}
By the way, if you go to the original article, check out the comments!
Jean-Paul Perreault, the president of the organization, also offered another 'booby prize' to Line Beauchamp, the minister of education for her efforts to teach English starting in Grade one, another dangerous idea! LINK{FR}

Quebec's first Veiled Robbers

You just knew it would happen.

A group of seven people, five women and two men robbed a depaneur. The women were veiled, but it didn't seem to help, the robbers were apprehended a short time later. Rather than coming from Arab countries, the crooks appeared to come from Eastern Europe and were just using the veils as a disguise. Link{FR}

PQ's Marois Wants Ottawa to pay for bridge

PQ leader Pauline thinks its a peachy idea for the federal government to provide a replacement for the Champlain bridge, Canada's busiest bridge, connecting the island of Montreal to the south shore. The Champlain is crumbling and the scheduled patch-up job isn't satisfying anyone including the separatist leader.
 The replacement bridge is estimated to cost in the neighborhood of six billion dollars, too rich for the provincial government and the fact that these bridges, fall under federal jurisdiction didn't seem to bother Madame Marois........Or did it?
Her suggestion is that Ottawa build the bridge and THEN transfer it to provincial jurisdiction, a neat solution! Link{FR}

Ontario to allow vanity plates in French

"Starting Monday, Franco-Ontarians will have a chance to turn their licence plates into showy, self-referential inside jokes in their own language.
The province says it will begin accepting applications for French vanity plates on that date. The new plates will also feature an optional embossed French language provincial slogan - "Tant À Découvrir" instead of "Yours to Discover". Link

If you think about it, the the program offers a great bilingual, English/French dynamic, as in my amateur example to the right.

Quebec cancer registry delayed

 Quebec is the last province to get a provincial cancer registry where data will be collected from 70 centres to give physicians and health care planners a better tool to organize their work.
But Nathalie Rodigue a spokeswoman for the Coalition Priorite Cancer told a Montreal television interviewer that only 22 centres have the necessary software to transmit the information, even though the software is readily available elsewhere, including other Canadian provinces, the US and France. Quebec has decided to write a new home-grown Quebec version of the software, which will delay the implementation. When asked about this, Quebec's Health Minister, Yves Bolduc advised the reporter that;
"We should stop to compare with other provinces. Instead we should work together." Argh!......

Air Transat cancels French lessons.

The Montreal charter airline that flies to the south in the winter and to Europe in the summer, is taking some flak for offering some specialized Quebecois French lessons on its website for European tourists flying to Montreal,  unfamiliar with Quebec's particular version of French.
The examples that the airline provided were actually quite funny, first offering a phrase in Parisian French and then in a Quebecois version.
Of course this displeased many, who demanded that the airline cease these 'insulting lessons' and so, alas, they have disappeared from the website.
You can read the story in French HERE
 If you speak French, you can listen to an audio file of the lessons HERE.

Quebec press council cites Maclean's

On the same day that the massive ongoing corruption scandal at Montreal City Hall escalated even further, with the announcement that the city was spying on a senior politician who was then asked to step aside, the Quebec Press Council announced that it had found Maclean's magazine guilty of bad journalism for the story that called Quebec the most corrupt Canadian province.
Responding to a complaint from radical separatist Gilles Rheame, the watchdog organization claimed that Maclean's had not made its case. LINK

The magazine, fearing that the conclusion was foregone, didn't even bother to defend itself.
Incidentally, it is being reported that the ex-chief of police  of Montreal, Yvan Delorme was also under investigation for his dealing with a local security firm which has since gone bankrupt. Eyebrows were raised when Mr. Delorme resigned abruptly, shortly after signing a new deal with the city to extend his term. LINK 

Quebec the most corrupt province? ...never!

Quebec reducing French Arab immigration

"The new policy of immigration to Quebec will lead to a decrease in the number Africans - especially the citizens of North Africa - admitted in the province.
By 2015, Quebec says it wants to re-balance gradually the proportion that each of the (four) major  geographical basins of immigrant origin.

basins

 Thus, the proportion will be limited to a maximum of 30% for each basin.
In 2010, the proportion of Africans was 36.8% for the total number of immigrants admitted to Quebec. The new government target will therefore reduce the de facto number and proportion.
Moroccans and Algerians formed the two largest contingents of immigrants to Quebec last year."

Link{FR}

Word Cloud highlights differences

 A word cloud representing the most frequently used words in the leaders debates highlights the differences in the English and French debate (translated

English

French

Further reading  French versus English -Volume 24