minhmon0107

[astral vale]

Please be patient

Our volunteers look into many questions every day; sometimes it takes them a little while to answer.

Pro tip: you can rename the thread title with `.tr <thread name>`

Make it descriptive, including relevant context, but also to the point. This way you improve your chances of getting a more relevant and specific answer.

[last adder]

Au + masculine countries (au Vietnam)
En + feminine countries (en France) or masculine countries starting with a vowel (en Ouganda)
Aux + plural form countries (aux États-Unis)

[indigo wasp]

I was going to say that

[last adder]

It's the same with regions, states or provinces.

[indigo wasp]

there are also some countries that don't have an article at all

[last adder]

Towns only take à.

[indigo wasp]

a monaco, a israel

il y en a d'autres

[chilly turtle]

Oh thank you very much!

[last adder]

There are islands that take à too (à Samoa for example).

[indigo wasp]

a Haiti

[chilly turtle]

So this role applies to anything above town?

[indigo wasp]

no

it's just for countries

[chilly turtle]

Ahh I see

[indigo wasp]

i think nameless one means ville

like a paris, a new york, etc.

[chilly turtle]

hmm got it

[indigo wasp]

au quebec

sorry im typing too quickly, it's not just anything bigger than a 'town' which would imply cities

but it's not a hard and fast rule

[last adder]

Moreover, when the town's name includes an article (le Mans, le Caire...), said article combines with à (au Mans, au Caire...) or de (du Mans, du Caire...) whenever possible.

[chilly turtle]

Oh got it thank you very much!

[chilly turtle]

Wait, can I say 'à Québec' instead?

[last adder]

If it's the town, yes.
The province uses au.

[chilly turtle]

Ah got it

[frosty ermine]

À is used for cities and often for city-states or islands

[chilly turtle]

What's about villages, districts, ...?

[frosty ermine]

Do you have an example

[chilly turtle]

Like a district in our city called Hai Chau
How do you say 'in Hai Chau'?

[frosty ermine]

I believe that would be à

[chilly turtle]

Why

[tough hornet]

Prepositions don’t translate between languages

[frosty ermine]

En/au are generally for regions larger than a city

[chilly turtle]

ohh I see, so everything smaller than city will have the same rule as cities?

[frosty ermine]

"dans" sometimes gets thrown around depending on the exact place but it's used kind of randomly and is usually optional

[chilly turtle]

hmm got it

[last adder]

Montmartre is a district in the 18th arrondissement of Paris, and we use à for it. So it should stand to reason that à is used for Hai Chau too.

[chilly turtle]

Alright it makes sense now...

[tough hornet]

As long as it’s a well-defined place, yes; think hamlets, villages, etc. Prepositions of place names play by a different subset of rules.
If it’s just a generic place – think park, cinema, restaurant – the general rules apply.

For example, French differentiates going to somewhere (je vais au marché), going inside of something (j’entre dans la cuisine), or being inside of something (je suis dans le bâtiment). This doesn’t apply to cities, regions, and countries whose preposition for those three things is just « à ».