French language Q&A Forum

Does the use of this phrase (When something has happened, something else will) automatically make the "something else" far enough in the future to use futur simple rather than present tense ? Certainly some of the examples here would likely be fairly soon in the future, but they all use futur simple !

in this sentence from  a roman policier La salle des meurtres by Phyllis Dorothy James 

L’appartement, qui donnait sur Kensington High Street, arborait l’ordre excessif et impersonnel d’un logement préparé pour la visite de nouveaux locataires. L’atmosphère était un peu confinée ; bien qu’occupant un étage élevé, Dupayne avait pris la précaution de fermer ou de verrouiller toutes les fenêtres avant de partir en week-end. 

Here  bien que was not followed by subjonctif ! is that correct ? and would you replace it by bien qu'occupant un étage élevé, Dupayne ait pris la précaution .....

Just checking, the number of minutes are written out in full in all the examples - is there ever a situation in French where numerals are written instead? eg 23 instead of vingt-trois.

Hi, there’s a typo in the hint “HINT: we = Bastien and his granddad”. It should be “grandad”.

For the last question, two alternative answers were given which included "il s’est transformé en un aimable/ agréable jeune homme".

That "en un ai-/ ag-" sounds a little strange to an English ear - is it common?

I got marked wrong for writing "Depuis que Amandine...". This is correct, I believe, given that Amandine is a proper noun. Am I wrong here?

It seems a few of the hints (la peinture, etc.) were one past the audio extract where they were needed.  Also, I find it unnecessary to correct punctuation, as where a comma should be placed is often not apparent from individual phrases unless you have the entire context.

Something strange is going on today - it’s not working properly 

Ok, I should have heard the "la" but I didn't - and I put "le mi-août" because août is masculine. Is it, then, the case that if you use the prefix "mi-" the whole thing ( "mi-qqch") invariably becomes feminine?