On 03/12/2010 08:26 PM, Louis Desjardins wrote:
2010/3/12 Boudewijn Rempt> - Europe centrale et orientale : Albanie, Arménie, Bulgarie, Moldavie, > Roumanie ; Weird... Are these countries supposed to be francophone? No. But they are considered "francophile" as large portions of their population speak or undestand French. :)
Well, I live in Romania and from what I know my country *used to be* francophone and francophile, with emphasis on "used to be", however it is still a member of the Organisation internationale de la Francophonie and even hosted the summit in 2006.
Before Word War 2 we were *very close* to France, both in culture, politics and economy. My city, Bucharest, used to be called "the little Paris" and our language (a Latin language) is heavily influenced by French imports in the XIX century.
Then communism happened, and we lost the link with most of the world, still France and French culture remained one of the few rays of light and the French language the most important foreign language taught in schools.
Then the anti-communist revolution and freedom happened about 20 years ago and we are moving fast the English way, French is "uncool" now, everybody is learning and speaking English. you are bombarded with English at every step. I honestly have to acknowledge I forgot almost all the French I used to know (learned in school) from not having a place to use it.
Sorry for the offtopic intervention, but I believe it added useful insight for the curious. The situation in Moldova should be about the same as in my country, since Moldova *is* historically a part of Romania even if its post-WW2 route was a bit different, Albania, Armenia and Bulgaria are probably more different, as they don't use a Latin language.
-- nicu :: http://nicubunu.ro :: http://nicubunu.blogspot.com _______________________________________________ CREATE mailing list [email protected] http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/create
