French language Q&A Forum

I was a bit shocked, as one of the things that is alway drummed into anglophones is that, while "œuf" is pronounced urf, "œufs" is pronounced without either f or s, "er" - similar sound to deux. Yet, in this dictée four eggs are very clearly described as œufs! 

Is this a mistake, or is the whole "œuf/œufs thing" (that we anglophones are told is so important!) really just a bit of a myth, and all down to personal preference ?

Why not "en Afrique" rather than "pour l'Afrique"?

This is a very academic point. The translation for "Ils redoutent qu'elle ne revienne" is given as "They dread she might come back". In French, they dread that she will return. In the given English translation, even the possibility that she will come back is a cause for dread. I know that, in common speech, the distinction might never be made, but shouldn't the equivalent sentences be as follows?

 "Ils redoutent qu'elle ne revienne." = "They dread she will come back."

 "Ils redoutent qu'elle ne puisse revenir." = "They dread she might come back."

The given translation of « Mes sœurs ne font guère les magasins » is "My sisters hardly go shopping". This is not idiomatic in English; you would say "My sisters hardly ever go shopping". In English, we would use "hardly" on its own to imply some limitation in the action; for example, "He can hardly write (because he is only 4 years old)". But if the limitation is to do with time, then the correct expression is "hardly ever"; for example, "He hardly ever writes (because he's busy doing other things)".

I think in the article on ne ... guère, this distinction should be made. As it stands, "hardly ever" isn't mentioned at all.

How would this distinction be made in French?

Bonjour:)  Would you please review the kwiz answer I missed in the above lesson?  I did not find any of the possible choices for an answer to be particularly applicable.  The actual answer seemed like it was l'imparfait situation in the past so I did not choose that one.  I knew "built" was not a verb used in the choice but it seemed to imply the present tense to me.  Anyway, many thanks for some clarification on this question at your convenience I hope?  Merci.