French language Q&A Forum

Why pendant and durant are used ? there are no clear begin and end in this sentence.

In the last sentence, "Exactement Yvan ! Prenez votre temps et restez détendus !", the adjective détendus is plural; the previous comment was directed at Yvan.  I would expect the singular détendu if the comment is directed at Yvan.  Another interpretation is that the comment is directed at both Yvan and his friend or perhaps others in the group.   It is a bit ambiguous.   Do you agree?

I was surprised to see my use of "cet après-midi" corrected to "cette après-midi". So I looked it up and found that both genders are used for that phrase.

Franchir vs croiser always confuses me. Please explain

I wrote "Oui, on a papoté pendant une heure." instead of "Oui, on a discuté/bavardé pendant une heure." It marked it as incorrect. I think bavardé is closer than discuté for 'chatted', but I feel like 'papoté' suits well for the context. Am I wrong?

How to translate la femme? eg the answer given was this girl? How to know whether it's this or that or the?

Not really a question, but I found the speaker who spoke this text at the end of the session easy to keep up with as I speak the passage aloud myself. Quite often I find the male speakers used speak extremely rapidly for my rather slowly spoken French.

How to describe someone more 

The recommended translation for 'what a powerful voice that man had!' is 'quelle voix puissante avait cet homme !'. I don't actually see this usage of inversion covered in any grammar guides. Is it the norm to invert subject and verb in a sentence beginning with an exclamatory adjective?