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What is the capital of Tunisia?

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What is the capital of Tunisia?

Comment traduire “Then why the passport?” en français?

“Et le passeport alors???” would be a suitable translation.

Your translation can work. When it is written you will rather say ” alors pourquoi prendre le passeport ?” but at oral We won’t say “prendre”. So, as you have to report a dialogue, it is right.

“I wasn’t going to leave or…”

Je ne voulais pas partir, n’est ce pas

“Then why the passport?” his mother said as she once again held the passport up.

“Dans ce cas, pourquoi le passeport ” sa mere repondit tout en
soulevant encore une fois le passport

This is the answer I gave but some people did not understand and someone down voted my answer. So let me break it down to you. It is NOT right to translate from English to French literally as some do. You have to translate based on Pre-text, Context and Text and expressions.

Otherwise, when you take an expression like

Baby if you give it to me, i give it to you, i know what you want

You will translate it

Bébé si tu me le donnes, je te le donne, je sais ce que tu veux

And that is a BAD translation.

The required translation here was

“I wasn’t going to leave or…

The or… means they are things left, in other words,

I wasn’t going to leave, was I ?

and the one who asked this translation said

Une femme demande à son fils pourquoi il a son passeport dans son sac,
allait-il partir?

In other words, the woman was wondering whether he was willing to leave or not. So you were willing to leave, isn’t it ? That is why i have added the “n’est ce pas “.

“Alors pourquoi le passeport?” sa mère a demandé en tenant le
passeport en haut encore une fois.

I agree that instead of “soulever encore”, “en brandissant à nouveau” should have been a better way of saying it.

So I think a better answer could have been

“I wasn’t going to leave or…”

Je ne voulais pas partir, n’est-ce pas

“Then why the passport?” his mother said as she once again held the passport up.

“Dans ce cas, pourquoi le passeport ” sa mère répondit tout en
brandissant à nouveau le passport

However the person who asked the question did not formulate it well because he said two contradictory things in his questions.

une femme demande à son fils pourquoi il a son passeport dans son sac, allait-il partir?

Mais si c’est la femme qui pose la question a son fils elle ne peut pas dire I wasn’t going to leave elle dirait plutot YOU

« Alors pourquoi ce passeport ??? »

ce …celui-ci que l’on tient, que l’on montre à hauteur d’œil, qui s’intercale physiquement entre les visages des locuteurs.

Même si ce n’est pas la question, une proposition littérale pour la fin de la phrase :

…lui dit sa mère en tenant à nouveau le passeport en l’air. (interrogation insistante)
…lui dit sa mère en brandissant à nouveau le passeport en l’air. (interrogations renouvelée plus agressive)

plus contextuel ou ‘scénographique’ :

…lui dit sa mère en lui remettant le passeport sous les yeux (ou sous le nez).

If I were his mother, I would say « Alors que fais-tu avec ce passeport ? » or « Alors que faisait ton passeport dans ton sac ? » en brandissant le passeport (not “tenir en haut” please 😉 ).

The expression “que fait ce passeport ici” is quite familiar and may sound weird, since a passport doesn’t “do” anything. But it is totally acceptable in an actual conversation in French.

 

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What is the capital of Tunisia?