French language Q&A Forum

And while we're on that question, the correctEnglish option, you decorated your flat, is not available. You did decorate your flat is a bizarre emphatic response to a conversation that goes something like ' Who  decorated your flat?' 'We did' 'Oh, I was told it was done for you. So you did decorate your flat.' It's such an odd thing to say it's hard to construct a piece of fiction to illustrate it.

tu as fait decorer  is clearly being done for the subject, but as its not reflexive I assumed they did the decorating themselves?

pourquoi est incroyable devant la vue

Hi, why is “la plus grande partie” feminine? It seems to be “attached to” the male “siècle” more than to the female “devise”. 

faire les magasins and faire le shopping are, without further distinction, both correct.

Come on guys, faire les magasins is as correct as faire le shopping. You admit this and, besides, you haven't made any distinction between the two options.

I don't understand the passe compose "j'ai toujours adore" to translate "I have always loved sending letters."  Seems to me the writer is describing an action from the past continuing into the present.  In that case, we should use the imparfait.  Using the passe compose indicates the writer completed the action in the past.  At one time she enjoyed sending letters but not now.  (Sorry for the missing accents.  I don't know how to type them on this keyboard.)

I am trying to understand the word, cachet, which I found in another exercise where it meant tablet.  I thought it had an additional meaning as a kind of wax seal.  Is it not appropriate in this passage as a synonym for sceau ?