British citizen creates national uproar in Quebec

[HVC]

The Brit complaint about the US is generally that service is too attentive.  I found this to some extent in one place I went to in New York, but I think that's because it wasn't somewhere tourists went very often so the waiter was, I think, just curious.

I do have to say it is rather annoying that it seems everytime you are in the middle of a real important or emotional conversation the waiter just bursts interrupting saying 'is everything ok?'.  Of course when you do actually need them for something it seems they are never around

I'm not sure how it works elsewhere, but i think the NA manner of service is due largly to tips. the waiter wants a tip so they're right up there trying to get you another drink before you're done your first.

I know in portugal everytime i gave a tip the waiters just thought i couldn't count. In france the more traveled areas were fine with tips, but the more out of the way places still found it odd at time. In spain i had no idea what they were saying, but they took my money.

[Sheilbh]

Best story I have of Paris is I was in a cafe with my friend (and having a native with you helps a lot) and the tourists was getting antsy with the slow service. My friend notices I'm getting antsy myself, she tells me to be patient, that is the way it is.

I always feel sorry for the French.  We moan about how slow service is in cafes in Paris but I don't think we realise how slow service can seem in the UK.  The French tend to have table service in cafes and bars, so I've heard that when some first enter an English cafe or bar or pub they don't realise it's counter service and they can get confused at waiting for 40 minutes without anyone asking them what they want.

Wow you would rather visit Philly and Boston over New York?  I guess you have already been there.

I've been to New York.  And I'll return.

Oh and I forgot New Orleans.

Yeah, but you want to visit it BECAUSE they are French!

But of course.  Actually I'm interested in Montreal because they're French in North America.  I'm always intrigued at minority cultural translation that manages to maintain their culture.  I visited a German area of Brazil, I want to go to Welsh Patagonia, I'd even like to visit the white English colonies in Kenya and the public schools in India modeled on Eton (to which English couples are now sending their children because they're stricter and cheaper than English public school).

[Berkut]

The fact that many Americans speak English doesn't seem to be a foolproof antidote to cultural isolationism.

[Malthus]

My anecdotal proof of the sillyness of it all, and the political nature of the opposition to Quebec's language laws, is the fact that bilingualism in commercial packaging suddenly became better as a result of NAFTA. Apparently, the Americans didn't think it was either silly nor such an overwhelming cost to their business to print the packages in three languages and to include a French booklet, usually much better translated than it used to. Likewise, any sort of strict application of the law decreased markedly from that time on.

All of these issues over enormous costs and what not seems a red herring. Large multinationals won't care about packaging; small business usually do not have lots of packaging to do and, by experience, Vermonters are strangely enough more than capable of finding / paying someone to translate their stuff once and for all. Outward commercial signs is a ridiculously tiny issue.

I disagree, based on anecdotal business experiences I have had in the way of my work.

It's an expense and a bother, which piled on top of others, on occasion swings the vote over where to launch. 

Let's not overstate this: it isn't of necessity a  deal-breaker. It's more in the line of a tie-breaker. Where other factors for launching come up even with Ontario or Alberta/BC, Quebec's inane language laws will, quite often, swing the vote.

[Berkut]

I'm not sure how it works elsewhere, but i think the NA manner of service is due largly to tips. the waiter wants a tip so they're right up there trying to get you another drink before you're done your first.

Exactly - and since most servers are largely incompetent, they substitute quantity of service for quality of service, when they can.

What always annoyed me was that the real way to make good money as a server was having nice tits you were willing to show off. That pretty much trumped anything else.

[viper37]

Not the same.  Business that decide not to do business in Israel do so because they either have some ideological opposition to very notion of the state or because they are intimidated by those that do.  What Malthus is talking about is deciding not to business because of costs of complying with bureaucratic or regulatory hassles. 

And I believe that was Malthus is describing is rather the same, but in this day&age it appears rather badly to discriminate against a particular group of people, so you find another justification.

Nearly a century ago it was trendy to be anti-semitic & generally racist.  Now it isn't.
So if I hate Jews and I don't want to do business in Israel with my multinational corporation, I'll invent some lame excuse, like "security risks" in this case, for example.
Here, it's "bureaucratic hassle".  We do have a problem with bureaucracy, but that has not much to do with 'language laws'.  In fact, I'd say it's equally hard to do business in French than in English.

Apparently it is easier to do business in English in Israel (or France or that matter!) than in is in a province of Canada, which should give some pause.

I don't know of any business in France that forbid the use of French or advertise only in english.

Never been to Israel, so I don't really know about the businesses there, and in fact I don't know much about modern Israel at all, but I suspect a business there having signs only in Arabic and having mandatory use of Arabic at the work place would have some problems, legal or otherwise.

[HVC]

I'm not sure how it works elsewhere, but i think the NA manner of service is due largly to tips. the waiter wants a tip so they're right up there trying to get you another drink before you're done your first.

Exactly - and since most servers are largely incompetent, they substitute quantity of service for quality of service, when they can.

What always annoyed me was that the real way to make good money as a server was having nice tits you were willing to show off. That pretty much trumped anything else.

odd, i couldn't see your post until i quoted it.

[Valmy]

What always annoyed me was that the real way to make good money as a server was having nice tits you were willing to show off. That pretty much trumped anything else.

Being attractive is an advantage almost anywhere in life.

[Berkut]

Are you really arguing that large multi-national corporations decide to forgo doing business in Montreal vice Toronto because they are racists, rather than because they don't want to deal with the inane language laws?

That is simply...well, laughable. Your typical large corp would do business with a Jewish Black Worshipper of Satan that spoke pigdin French if they were going to make money doing so.

[Malthus]

Not the same.  Business that decide not to do business in Israel do so because they either have some ideological opposition to very notion of the state or because they are intimidated by those that do.  What Malthus is talking about is deciding not to business because of costs of complying with bureaucratic or regulatory hassles. 

And I believe that was Malthus is describing is rather the same, but in this day&age it appears rather badly to discriminate against a particular group of people, so you find another justification.

Nearly a century ago it was trendy to be anti-semitic & generally racist.  Now it isn't.
So if I hate Jews and I don't want to do business in Israel with my multinational corporation, I'll invent some lame excuse, like "security risks" in this case, for example.
Here, it's "bureaucratic hassle".  We do have a problem with bureaucracy, but that has not much to do with 'language laws'.  In fact, I'd say it's equally hard to do business in French than in English.

If you think that, you are dead wrong.

The businesses I deal with (mainly, multinationals based in either Europe or America) could not care less about petty Canadian concerns about disliking Quebequois.

[Berkut]

I'm not sure how it works elsewhere, but i think the NA manner of service is due largly to tips. the waiter wants a tip so they're right up there trying to get you another drink before you're done your first.

Exactly - and since most servers are largely incompetent, they substitute quantity of service for quality of service, when they can.

What always annoyed me was that the real way to make good money as a server was having nice tits you were willing to show off. That pretty much trumped anything else.

odd, i couldn't see your post until i quoted it.

I messed up the initial post, and then edited it.

[Oexmelin]

My intention is not to give you a lesson in bilingualism.  The math is simple.  If a small percentage of the population of Quebec can speak English then you have a small pool of people from which you can draw from for the talent to deal with the English speaking world.  Those people who cannot speak English must then rely on the bilingual speakers for economic relations with the English speaking world.

Indeed, but by all accounts all of these concerns are grossly unfounded.

According to the latest data, 40,5% of Quebecers declare themselves bilingual. That percentage is 10,3% in Canada. Studies also show that level of bilingualism is systematically underestimated in Quebec and overestimated elsewhere in Canada. In other words, English-second-language speakers in Quebec tend to devaluate the quality of their English (because we have examples of very bilingual persons around us) while French-second-language speakers outside of Quebec tend to overestimate their level of mastery (because the French they possess usually permit them to do simple task in that language).

If you have found a solution to this obvious problem then more power to you.  Not only can you speak more languages then I but you are obviously much more intelligent as well.

I haven't. I was not aiming specifically you, I simply found the cries over the problems of unilingualism to be annoying. It was never my intention to insult your intelligence, which I respect greatly, since I always enjoy our Canadian political debates.

[Valmy]

I messed up the initial post, and then edited it.

I see nothing wrong with editing posts

[Berkut]

I simply found the cries over the problems of unilingualism to be annoying.

That is what all the people who try to push for English language only in the southern US say.

[Malthus]

Are you really arguing that large multi-national corporations decide to forgo doing business in Montreal vice Toronto because they are racists, rather than because they don't want to deal with the inane language laws?

That is simply...well, laughable. Your typical large corp would do business with a Jewish Black Worshipper of Satan that spoke pigdin French if they were going to make money doing so.

This, times two.

Really, the level of paranoia is high.

i respect you a lot Viper, and in this you are only saying what many of your co-provincials think - but I must say it is utterly divorced from reality on this point.