Smoking is from "smoking jacket", American English
"tuxedo" --I guess in the day you had to dress up for
a date with lung cancer. In Spanish it was adapted to
esmoquin and some Hispanics try to tell me it's from
English smock, but no, it's not.
The most hilarious invented English word I've heard
was when a Russian said "On fakm'en" to mean "He's a
baller/player (playboy)" when referring to Bill
Clinton.
In Cuba I've foquear for "to annoy". And there's a
historic episode c. 1900 referred to "La Guerra de la
Foqui-Foqui" when a group of US Marines started
harrassing women in a Cuban town, yelling "Fucky,
Fucky" and were run out by the local police after a
gun battle.
--- "fournet.arnaud" <
fournet.arnaud@...>
wrote:
. . .
> People who borrow from another language
> tend to create odd things
> like French "smoking" used
> as a supposedly English word for
> "good-looking men's clothes".
> When you have some rudiments about English
> this meaning makes little sense.
> There is still much to study in the art of
> borrowing from another language.
>
> Arnaud
> ================
>
>
>
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