French language Q&A Forum

Hi all,

In the sentence below, I used l'imparfait of pouvoir (pouvait) rather than the passé composé. I would have thought l'imparfait was appropriate as it describes actions that were repeated in the past i.e. they organised meetings that were repeated over a period of time.

Can someone please explain why the passé composé is used here? Choosing when to use l'imparfait or le passé composé does not seem to get any easier!

Du coup, leur petit groupe a pu organiser des rencontres quotidiennes, ce qui les a aidées à garder le moral.

A number of places are have a disputed status; in these cases would the form used vary with the opinion of the speaker? For instance, whilst Kwiziq states «au Québec» (as if it's a country), I can find «dans le Québec» being used.

Could someone manage to accidentally imply a particular opinion by using one form rather than another? (Presumably, this would apply more strongly to a less common form.)

(And in trying to find this out, I've discovered in/to Taiwan is «à Taïwan», following the rule for a city.)

I think I put "au sud de France"... I'm translating directly from English, but is there a reason why "in the south of France" becomes "du sud de la France"

I understand that the preposition here has to be en but I can't really get to the bottom of why. Chris has said in this discussion that the form is 's'inscrire en qqch...' but I don't really see this supported by dictionaries where à and dans seem more commonly cited. Is it that the preposition comes before the word quoi ?

Il est vingt-deux heures = 10 PM

Il est vingt heures deux = 8:02 PM

Just making sure.

The translationof being an actress is je suis une actrice, pas une francaisee

normally nouns need "articles". but   "il" can use without an article for giving an opinion about something mentioned.As you can see There is a noun in the sentence.I am curious about whether it is correct or not?