Combien de bises?

Combien de bises
Times Online: French unsure when to turn the other cheek

Ce site web Strange maps ecrit de la mystère de combien de bises devez-vous faire? Oui, c'est une énigme!


Maintenant, quand je vois mes amis français je fais toujours les bises avec eux (pour devenir plus français, bien sûr! :P ) Mais, je n'utilise pas mes lèvres, je touche juste les joues.


La différence entre ces mots n'est pas clair.

(faire) une bise - the cheek kiss thing used as a greeting
un bisou, un baiser to kiss lips to lips, or to hug
baiser (v) - to fuck, to have sex (vulgar slang)
embrasser (v) - to kiss, embrace OR to hug
serrer dans ses bras / (faire) un câlin - to hug
(faire) un câlin - to make love (informal slang between couples)

En savoir plus: Word Reference 1 | 2

Quelle confusion!

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Edited to add :


(10 May 2010): It seems like a lot of people are coming to this page from Google because they want to know the difference between a bise and a bisou. Well, I'm no expert. I've received emails from French friends signed with both 'bise(s)' and 'bisou' so I'm just as confused.. You could see this link for more information. :)


(1 July 2010): A video I found on the topic (all in French though)

Google's new translator phone

Times Online UK: Google translator phone

“Everyone has a different voice, accent and pitch,” said Och. “But recognition should be effective with mobile phones because by nature they are personal to you. The phone should get a feel for your voice from past voice search queries, for example.”

The translation software is likely to become more accurate the more it is used. And while some translation systems use crude rules based on the grammar of languages, Google is exploiting its vast database of websites and translated documents to improve the accuracy of its system.

Looks very promising but I wonder how good is it really?

I know that Babelfish has improved since Yahoo bought it from Altavista (and I have been using Babelfish ever since it existed in the 90s so I can see the difference!) but it's still makes a lot of mistakes for eg: the j' stays as j' and does not get translated into I.

(image) (not of actual phone)

Travel and Study Grants to go and study in France

I accidently stumbled upon this part of the huge website Campus France. You can search for grants that help pay you to go and study in France. How great is that?!

You can sort the list by all sorts of criteria:

• Type of grant (study, research, internship or travel)
• Level (Bachelor (Licence), Master, PhD (Doctorat) or Postdoctoral)
• Subject Area
• Country (ie your country of origin)

Take a peek if you're interested!