French is a Numbers Game
I am writing from Geneva, a graceful French-speaking city in Switzerland. But I have a beef with the French language. What is it with these weird numbers? First of all, every number of any worth ends with either a sharp, explosive consonant or a long drawn-out zzzz sound. The other part, the part that actually tells you what the package of cheese costs, is mumbled, as if it is somehow shameful for French-speakers to tell you what you owe. And then there is the nature of the French counting system itself. What kind of crazy person thought up a way to say "94" that translates into English as "Four twenties (and) fourteen"? If your groceries cost you "84.98," then in French, one would say: "Quatre-vingt-quatre quatre vingt dix-huit." I guess. Did I mention that those letters, even when not mumbled, don't actually get sounded out? They are mere representations of some very different sounds indeed. This unknown Frenc