More blogging en français in Montreal ^[1] is when I started writing des textes en French.

I have been enjoying writing in French. I’ve also been enjoying the interaction that comes out of it. There’s a few ^[2] posts ^[3] I wrote in French ^[4] and the comments are mixed up in two languages which I find very cool. A true testimony of a great cultural side of Montreal. Sure, there are a few exceptions where all the comments turn out to be in English even though the post is in French ^[5]. The one thing that hasn’t happened yet is an English post getting French comments… or maybe I just missed it when it happened.

That’s the online world. Out in the streets, it’s pretty much the same thing. I was at a restaurant last week. We were speaking English to each other, the waitress came and everybody was suddenly speaking French. I was actually observing that and it was… wow. It’s incredible to speak two languages and switch from one to the other as if they were one.

The same thing happens at the office. We’re all bilingual here with a lady that speaks Spanish on the phone all the time. There’s one guy who always speaks French no matter what other people say. The others keep switching languages back and forth. That’s cool.

Et voilà Montréal. Comprendre est plus important que le choix de langue. Personally, I have no preference when talking, mais je préfère tapper en anglais. All the accents in French (é, è, à, ç, ë, ô) are just a pain in the ass to type. Alors pourquoi est-ce que je tappe en français sur Metroblogging Montreal? Le bilinguisme est une caractéristique culturelle importante de Montréal. You take that out and you’ve got no Montreal.

The drawback of this is that these things can get confusing. The graphic design of that sign is so bad that it’s horrible.

^[6]