How do you say "2009": two thousand (and) nine?
iSamarai,
Why stop there?
If you say the and in a number, as you say you do, how did you speak the year 10 years ago? Did you say "One thousand
and nine hundred
and niney
and nine"? How would you say 1917, "One thousand and nine hundred and seventeen"?
It's a ridiculous exercise.
Who says you speak "British English"? I'm quite sure people in England speak hybrids of English as well as Americans do.
IF you do it in numbers as well, how would you speak a big number like 1,234,567,890? Let's go even further. If you speak "British English, do you know what a billion is? Americans and the rest of the world would say a billion is a thousand millions, but the English might say it's a million millions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billion_(word)
Call it whatever you like!
Gary
PS. By the way, how would old English people say 1 billion one hundred million? (1,100,000,000) "One thousand one hundred million"? Screwy!
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Isamarai said...
As I speak british english, I always say the "and" in e.g. 2009, 234 etc.
(two thousand and nine, two hundred and thirty-four), and I know for a fact that different english regions based on british english also say the "and".