Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!ubc-cs!eric!handel!durham From: durham@handel.mpr.ca (Paul Durham) Newsgroups: can.general Subject: Re: postings in the French language Summary: So to speak Message-ID: <1820@eric.mpr.ca> Date: 1 Oct 89 18:54:18 GMT References: <1178@mannix.iros1.UUCP> <3837.251eb4d9@uwovax.uwo.ca> <1989Sep26.153200.959@utstat.uucp> <29431@watmath.waterloo.edu> <1989Sep26.181439.28060@jarvis.csri.toronto.edu> <701@vm.ucs.ualberta.ca> Sender: news@eric.mpr.ca Reply-To: durham@handel.UUCP (Paul Durham) Distribution: can Organization: Microtel Pacific Research Ltd., Burnaby, B.C., Canada Lines: 18 In article <701@vm.ucs.ualberta.ca> TMCLELLA@vm.ucs.ualberta.ca writes: > >I dare you to speak to a civil servant in Russian, Japanese, Ukrainian, or >Italian. See how far you get. > Well, if I were in Russia, Japan, the Ukraine, or Italy respectively, thisd would probably get me pretty far ( although there might well be a few unilingual Russians in civil service jobs in the Ukraine ). Civil servants are employees of the state and are supposed to work in the official language of the state. If you want service in one of the above languages, you can lobby to get it adopted as the third official language of the country, or your province. Or, move a to country where it is already an official language. P. Durham