Eating and Drinking is not allowed?

[Hong Kong Chinese]

Voice announcement from MTR (tube, underground railway, metro) inside the train compartment in Hong Kong: Eating and drinking is not allowed in the train compartment.

Some said, “It is not grammatically correct because ’and’ is used, and therefore ‘is’ should be changed to ‘are’”.

My question is:

What is the difference of these sentences?

Eating and drinking is not allowed in the train compartment.
Eating and drinking are not allowed in the train compartment.

I know that both sentences are grammatically correct but they have different connotation. Please advise!

 

[Casiopea]

Voice announcement from MTR (tube, underground railway, metro) inside the train compartment in Hong Kong: Eating and drinking is not allowed in the train compartment.

Some said, “It is not grammatically correct because ’and’ is used, and therefore ‘is’ should be changed to ‘are’”.

My question is:

What is the difference between these sentences?

Eating and drinking is not allowed in the train compartment.
This is not allowed.

Eating and drinking are not allowed in the train compartment.
This and that are not allowed.

 

[RonBee]

As Cas noted, eating and drinking is expressed as a unit in that sentence and thus gets a singular verb. Here is another example:

• Cursing and belching is fun.

:wink:

 

[Casiopea]

As Cas noted, eating and drinking is expressed as a unit in that sentence and thus gets a singular verb. Here is another example:

• Cursing and belching is fun.

:wink:

But, is it allowed on the tube?

 

[Tdol]

Cursing is compulsory, while belching is optional. ;-)

 

[RonBee]

LOL! :loling:

 

[Casiopea]

Cursing is compulsory, while belching is optional. ;-)

In Japan, especially where I live--in the sticks with Buddhas, talking on the train is considered a very big no-no. Whispering's OK. Cell phones are damned. :shock: Fondling strangers is ignored. Heck there are bars -or were bars in Tokyo that looked like the inside of trains where fondling is/was the reason patrons frequent/ed the joint.