Many thanks for your responses Anthere.
That even french journalists quote www.wikipedia.org was surprising to me (I know journalists are dumb... but wow!) However if they do that then it is something we need to work with. If this is the case, then I can see practical advantages of a multi-lingual portal. Before I could only seen the symbolism of "Wikipedia is international" my having a multi-lingual and I am not a big fan of symbolism without practical advantages.
Thus if, as you agree is a good idea, we can get a good-looking page, then doubters like me can be won over.
P.s. re the poll, I do realise this has a decent amount of support and a new poll isn't necessary to my mind, my point was supposed to be about something slightly different, but am not quite sure what :)