Journal entries tagged "Random"
Brussels speaks English
Today, walking through an area around the centre of Brussels, I saw a huge advert for the film “The Day the Earth Stood Still” (a remake of a 1951 film). In English.
I was surprised to see it in English (usually, such ads are in French), so I looked around. Posters and shop signs with a huge “Merry Christmas” were all over the place. A tram went by, and had adverts on it in English. Turning the corner, I saw a huge ad (two full façades of one building) for the new “Toyota iQ” (which does seem very well designed, after looking it up).
All in English.
It’s an interesting observation for me, as an English speaker having lived in Brussels for 16 years. I remember seeing lots of ads in English over time, but it had never made such an impression.
Have recent events and demographic changes meant that English is well on its way to become the true second language of an officially bilingual (Dutch-French) but officiously French-speaking city (only 10-15% of the Brussels population is Flemish)?
A list of films
Another random thing here!
I like lists, sometimes. It makes me feel organised. I have made lists of my favourite bands/artists, songs and albums in the past, but I never used my .numbers list of films to set in writing my favourite films.
According to this spreadsheet (I know, I’m a little mad to have made this monster), we have 548 films, a massive amount of them recorded when they showed on TV in the past 15 years, for a total of 252 videos and 273 DVDs, not counting the two DVDs I burnt recently but have not yet added to the list nor the films still on our HD recorder…