I have to disagree--the term "pension" is used quite a lot by French hotel/restaurants. In high season pension is often required.

I checked with my best friend Le Petit Robert, and it confirmed what I thought, the original term was at least in French: Pension de Famille, that is a hotel establishment where the conditions ( both of eating and staying there) have a familiar aspect. Of course I guess we all know that one can rent a room in a hotel with demi-pension ( only one meal +breakfast ) or full pension,pension complete all meals. I agree that lately the term is not very much used, except in those establishment that have a tradition, like the beautiful Hotel Pensione La Calcina in Venice.-
In Argentina though the term intermigled with the term conventillo is a little pejorative,
I guess mainly from its use in the lirics of Tango and Milongas ....

In Holland a pension is a small, usually family run, hotel or guest house.
A dierenpension is a boarding kennels.
A pensioen is what you get when you retire.

And a Katzenpension is where my cat stays when I go on vacation. My dog stays at a Hundehotel. Both are full-pension. (I'm not kidding.)

>What is a 'pension'...

Is that pronounced loo-tenant or lef-tenant?

((I))

Rhymes with suspension. In French, of course.

Sounds like pen-see-ohn.

About a week before my 21st birthday, I stayed in a <i>pension</i> in Lausanne. The housemother was right out of The Brothers Grimm, and when she said the doors would be locked at ten o'clock, she didn't mean 10:00:25

I learned a lot about climbing downspouts that summer.

<i>The force that through the green fuse drives the flower
Drives my green age...</i>