I was watching the CBC coverage of the Nunavut election last night, and listening to the reporters and candidates speaking both English and Inuktitut, sometimes switching back and forth within a sentence.

In particular, they used English numbers when speaking in Inuktitut, and I wondered why. I looked up a tutorial for learning Inuktitut, and I think I found the answer. Here’s the Inuktitut word for “seven”:

?????????? – sitamaujunngigaqtut

If I’m counting right, that’s ten syllables. It takes more syllables to say “seven” in Inuktitut and it does to count to seven in English.