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Defiling the Freedom Languge

posted by Jym on August 16 2005 09:54

=v= The bike fora are abuzz about a new high-tech bike rental program in Paris. I was more abuzz about its name: Vélo'V. What the heck does that mean, especially the 'V part?

I asked my French roommate, who pointed me to the original article in her morning online newspaper. An American friend also explained that weird apostrophes and abbreviations often signify English. The 'V is for love. They're sneaking English into French!

Stunned, I looked up the website for Paris' other bike rental program, and I found this oddly reassuring:

English version of our website in construction, please apologize for this.

Okay! Okay! I'm sorry already!

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Comments

=v= By the way, my friends in Vancouver have coined the term "velolove," which is sorta bilingual but sorta not.

Posted by Jym on August 16 2005 10:01

I'm so sorry, too, except that, wait, let's at least meet first.

Posted by Gary Farber on August 22 2005 05:06

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