[GTALUG] zero [was Re: Favorite desktop manager?]

[D. Hugh Redelmeier]

| From: Evan Leibovitch via talk <talk at gtalug.org>
| 
| I find an interesting-tho-trivial bit of culture shock in going between
| North America and elsewhere (generally, in my experience): floor
| designations in buildings.

I learned this in French class.  The main floor was
rez-de-chaussée.  In those days we were taught Parisian French.
I think Quebec uses both systems of numbering floors.

Quebec French and French in France are a bit different.  One time I
was in a little store Metz and overheard an American asking for
blueberry jam.  She could not communicate this with the shop owner.
So I stepped in and offered "le bluet".  I knew this from having read
labels on items on our breakfast table.

Too bad: I only added to the confusion.  This is a Quebec French word.
In France, it denotes a kind of flower.  The correct word in France
la myrtille.  But that probably denotes a bilberry, a closely related
species.

(I really don't speak French.  Sad.)