This is similar to bug 275101 a duplicate of 256614. However 256614 resolves an issue with gnome cohabitating a kde 4.1 system. It is also resolved, and the bug is obviously still there for people not running kde4.x. My system is still running kde 3.5. I recently emerged gnome and the new install of gnome is missing menus. I need to have gnome menus working even if as a kluge. I don't want to abandon kde3 until I have gnome working.
Please attach ~/.xsession-errors and env |egrep XDG, this stuff should work just fine on kde 3.5.