French Girl Reacts to Quebecois Canadian French
- Thread starter canada-man
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Now, I speak French, having studied in Paris and years later working at the International Herald Tribune in the same city. But...but...I recall one sub-zero F January day in Quebec City in the 1980s, when I asked the cab driver taking me into the city to suggest a good restaurant. "Cafe Lapin," I heard. So I bundled up and patrolled the city for Cafe Lapin, as I had wanted to explore the city anyway and, of course, there was no internet except the Yellow Pages, which I purposely hadn't consulted lest it disrupt my adventure. Cafe Lapin sounded like a reasonable name for a restaurant, right! Well, I never found it. Because it didn't exist. And when I asked about this to one of the Nordiques team officials (I was there to cover a Rangers game) he laughed and said, "Well, what that taxi guy told you was Cafe de la Paix, a great place." It's the way the Quebecois clip their words that fooled me. I paid for that with cold feet.
