>>>I assume this one should be "billiard"... which would probably translate to "pool" here.
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>>Yea, even though billiard balls have no numbers on them
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>And they play pool without checking whether the water in it is cold or not...
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>And waterpolo is the most expensive sport, because so many horses drown.
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>Kidding aside - my wife has a hunch that the "billion" came to mean 1e9 in the States when they had the first guy who had that much cash, and some reporter (or the guy him/herself) wanted a catchy word. Neither would be a candidate for good knowledge of world standards or literacy.
In Europe we use to say that everything is bigger in USA. This is a good example, not even Bill Gates would be a billionaire in Europe. :-)