Re: Letf / Right, was Re: Count and mass nouns

Philippe Caquant scripsit:

> For instance, in French,
> when facing a person, we often say ?? gauche ? enfin
> non, ? ta droite?, meaning that we?re trying to adapt
> (correct) our words to match the addressee?s point of
> view.
And in English as well:  "my left, your right".

> OT P.S. I liked the myth about the kangaroo, a little
> further. I heard nearly the same story in Ivory Coast
> about the name of the capital, ?Abidjan?. It?s been
> said that long ago, a French officer once asked a poor
> African guy: ?what?s the name of this place ??, and
> the guy, frightened, answered in his own language
> something meaning ?Well, I just came back from
> gathering branches (or leaves)?, which sounded somehow
> like ?Abidjan?, so the French decided the place was
> definitely Abidjan.
Other examples are "Canada", from the local word for "village";
and (questionably) the city of Nome in Alaska, named after nearby
Cape Nome, which may have gotten its name from "? name" (misread as
"C. Nome") scribbled on a map, showing that the name of the cape

--
John Cowan  jcowan@reutershealth.com  www.ccil.org/~cowan  www.reutershealth.com
"If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on
the shoulders of giants."
        --Isaac Newton