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  • Montreal bus driver celebrates 40 years of official bilingualism by throwing English-speaking passenger off her bus

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tinkerstewart@gmail.com Sep 13, 2009 9:01 pm

I think the bus driver went overboard to be rude to someone ignorant ofthe language. How can that be friendly? And her colleagues stand up forher? Quelle gaucherie! I'll stay away from that foreign country for sure!Tom Stewart in Beautiful Friendly Oregon USA!

Reply to tinkerstewart@gmail.com at 9:01 pm
dcblair@gmail.com Sep 13, 2009 9:02 pm

This incident, but more strikingly the driver's boss's defense of it, illustrates why tourism in Quebec will be forever limited! Further, the boss's response, vis a vis placement of bilingual drivers on tourist routes, makes one wonder about the racism involved here: the bias was against a Pakistani. Shame on Quebec! dblair

Reply to dcblair@gmail.com at 9:02 pm
ryan.skinnell@asu.edu Sep 14, 2009 11:19 am

I can't help but wonder how this issue might split "English Only" proponents. On one hand, I can imagine people being outraged that all the passengers on a city bus would be expelled and punished because one passenger asked for the time in a "non-official language." It's ludicrous. On the other hand, the bus driver's defense of "French Only" is precisely the kind of action "English Only" proponents would seem to have to support. So, the question seems to be, "Do you support common-sense or an official language?" It doesn't seem like both can win out in this case.

Reply to ryan.skinnell@asu.edu at 11:19 am
sa1157@lycos.com Sep 19, 2009 10:12 am

I work in New York, but we often get wrong-number calls from Quebec. I always thought it was bizarre that when I said "I don't speak French" in my terrible French (I only know a few phrases), the Quebecois would actually ARGUE with me, that yes, I clearly DO speak French! Why, I wondered, would they think I was lying?? Now, I realize, it's because they think it's perfectly normal to lie that you don't speak English. I learned that the solution was to stop trying to pronounce the words correctly and really mangle the accent - SAY NAY PAH ROJERS - to remove any doubts about my linguistic ignorance.

Reply to sa1157@lycos.com at 10:12 am