Posted on 12/05/2022 8:35:59 AM PST by simpson96
Hilarious NYC cab driver explains how the French count to 100.
(Excerpt) Read more at youtube.com ...
This was awesome!
LOL
So I got wondering "is this all made up BS?" So I looked it up and, sure enough, Numbers from 1 to 100 in French confirmed it. What lunacy. That site does have this interesting tidbit:
With the numbers in the 80s, quatre-vingt is used which is like saying 4 twenties (in old English Four score was used instead of eighty thanks to this French influence)And et voilà! We now know why Lincoln used that beautiful turn-of-phrase in the Gettysburg Address. I never knew "four score" was common usage for "eighty" in Ye Olde English because of frog influence.
Pretty much the same reaction that I had when I started learning French. At least numbers in Spanish area heck of a lot easier!
That was funny!
Fondly chuckling because this sounds exactly like something my brother in law would say, in exactly his same intonations.
We tease him (not often) because when he says squirrel, it comes out as skwer-rel instead of skwirl.
I know, I know, he can’t understand a thing I say either. It’s all in good natured teasing, which I had to get used to how New Yawkers do that.
One two tree!
How you told I French you, huh?
It is strange. Credit to the video guy for making it funny.
I do speak a fair amount of French. I remember once many decades ago someone gave me a phone number to write down to call them back. The phone numbers in France are 8 digits (first digit is like an area code I think) so they say them in groups of two. If the number as 37-41-73-98 it gets tricky for a non-native. So when she started to say 73 (which is sixty-thirteen) I started to write the 6 but realized I had to cross it out and and write 73. Same with 98. Quatro-vignt dis-huit (eighty eighteen).
That WAS hilarious!
“French...they fight with their feet and f*** with their faces!”
Voulez vous soixante neuf, madame?
That’s good !
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!
A New Yawker making fun of the French—great combination!
I can see why he drives a cab.
German is eimilarly weird except it goes south at 21
1 = eins
2 = zwei
3 = drei
4 = vier
5 = fünf
6 = sechs
7 = sieben
8 = acht
9 = neun
10 = zehn
11 = elf
12 = zwölf
13 = dreizehn
14 = vierzehn
15 = fünfzehn
16 = sechzehn
17 = siebzehn
18 = achtzehn
19 = neunzehn
20 = zwanzig
21 = einundzwanzig
22 = zweiundzwanzig
23 = dreiundzwanzig
24 = vierundzwanzig
25 = fünfundzwanzig
...
30 = dreißig
31 = einunddreißig
32 = zweiunddreißig
33 = dreiunddreißig
...
and so forth
Sounds like who’s on first routine.
If you think about it for a minute, English is the same way. We have numbers from one to nine, another set of numbers for divisions of 10, 100, 1,000, and so on, and separate set of numbers used only from 11 to 19. everything else is a combination of the one to nine numbers and the 10, 100, 1,000 and so on number names.
That and correct usage of prepositions.
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