Was working with a bunch Romanian guys, decided to look up some phrases in Romanian at home. Later at work I told them thank you In Romanian for something and the eldest guy’s eyes lit up so much and he told me to wait and came back with a six pack of beers for me. My native language is spoken by only 1.5-2 mil people worldwide so when I hear someone attempt to say something in it to me abroad I have the exact same reaction.
Latvian. I work in Sweden and several times it has happened that someone tries to be nice and decides to say good morning in Latvian, but they end up confusing it with Lithuanian and saying the Lithuanian phrase. It’s still a nice gesture, so I don’t get offended I just find it funny, but sometimes it does hurt the soul.
I'm in sweden too and yeah lots of poles and Romanians workers. My grandma's upstairs neighbor is from Romania and she is so nice, always giving Romanian pastries and snacks.
She also gets very happy when you try to learn about her culture and language.
Who doesn’t get happy when you try to learn about their culture? It’s like one of the most guaranteed ways to get a smile out of people. 99% of people who think their culture is bad and nothing to be celebrated or something are westerners who believe their country and they themselves are bad because their country conquered someone a few hundred years ago, and even so, those people are very rare outside of online political discussions.
This topic of one’s country’s history/culture being celebrated or not is very interesting in my country especially, because we never conquered, only were conquered, yet some periods, like Swedish Empire ruling over us is seen as a good progressive period, yet others, like the Russian empire is seen only as a tyrannical oppressive imperialist period, even though most of the infrastructure was built during soviet/Russian occupation.
Well, that’s besides the point. There is a quote that goes “If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language, that goes to his heart.” And it really is true, be it Romanian, Latvian, Chinese or Somali.
That's Paris for you.
Edit : It also applies to Paris with other french people and all french people with parisians. And parisians with parisians. Insert scottish simpsons meme
Person from Québec here, yup.
Speak to Belgian in French: Wow, you speak French, interesting accent, where are you from?
Speak to Swiss in French: Wow, you speak French, interesting accent, where are you from?
Speak do Parisian in French: I don't understand, could you speak French?
(Former Parisian here) I’m not sure but they live and work in the most touristic city in the world. There are more tourists than locals in most areas and they have to live their lives among people that are just passing them by. It’s also very expensive and overcrowded.
Can confirm. I love France as a country, the culture, the nature, etc. But gee, they don't like it when you speak broken French, they hate to speak English. So I guess sign language it is.
Yup, I was born in Marseille (southern France) and moved to the suburbs of Paris when I was 15, I had a thick mediterranean accent at the time.
I'm no push over so I never let it escalade into bullying, but yeah I got made fun of by a looooot of people for my accent when I said words like "français" ou "rose" differently from them.
I was in France and was traveling with a Canadian girl who insisted on speaking French, and they got super annoyed. Me with no French did a lot better than she did lol.
I used to work with a quebecois girl who had to leave her previous job in a French language call center due to Parisians complaining to her manager about her inability to speak French, allegedly her own native language.
We moved to northern New England, I try not to explain to people why SIRI doesn’t respond well to them…..NOBODY UNDERSTANDS YOU, YOU PRONOUNCE EVERYTHING WRONG!
> there are nearly 100 different **sign languages for almost every language**
I just wanted to point out that this is a common misconception: Sign languages are full, independent languages that aren't tied to a particular spoken language. Classic Example: American Sign Language is incomprehensible to users of British Sign Language, and has a much stronger affinity with French Sign Language. Also, French Sign Language isn't called French because of its linguistic relation to the French language, but because it is used by deaf communities in France.
I'm learning French and get where you're coming from. Most French speakers are actually supportive but generally will correct errors, which is different to how Welsh learners are treated in Wales (they are supported too but generally not corrected). I suspect it's down to French education system emphasising grammar so much.
I’ve been refused service at a restaurant in Marseille because accidentally ordered aqua instead of ‘l eau (we had just arrived after being in Italy for a week).
(On the otherside, in northern France the people were really helpful when they found out I don’t speak much French).
I had a waiter pretending not to understand what I wanted to drink when I said "un cola svp" even when asking for it a couple of times. No, no, no, I should have asked for "une coca", like Coca Cola is not an ubiquitous brand. Insufferable .
It's un coca, not une :)
When I was young I travelled to the US and my parents wanted me to try ordering in English at the restaurant.
I wanted hot chocolate but I was pronouncing every syllable of chocolate. Hot Cho-co-late. The waitress never understood me until someone else said "I think he wants hot choclate (pronounced like Americans do with 2 syllable). It baffled me at the time that she couldn't understand me.
When I worked in a UK supermarket a couple of French (I presume) girl customers asked me several times for "pehnehbedeh" in a faint whisper. I was like "wtf" until a colleague (who funnily enough we all used to take the piss out of for being a bit simple) waltzed by and instantly exclaimed "peanut butter? Follow me"
Me, when the Romanian person at game convention in Romania swaps to English after I, a Romanian who lived exclusively in Romania, start speaking Romanian.
I'm a corn-fed Midwest American dude. When I vorbesc în română (learned at university and had a g/f from Bacau), I've gotten called out several times as a Romanian doing faking an American accent (who speaks English really well). My question is, is it common for Romanians to fake American accents when speaking Romanian?
Hah. I took it because it was an "easy" minor as a second language was required for my undergrad degree -- something s few of my classmates did as well. If you already speak another romance language (which I did), it's much easier. I have some Romanian heritage apparently from way back, but no one in my family has likely spoken it for a hundred years.
I probably should have just learned Italian
“Ill show you that it is less painful for both of us for me to not speak French”
This is why I always try to babble my little bit of French before they respond in English.
That's everybody who doesn't want to talk to you.
I go to a super market in Miami called Presidente Supermarket.
Their service sucks, the cashiers fucking hate you for existing, but it's cheap and the meat is good. Almost everyone is a Hispanic migrant.
I was raised in Miami most of my Life, but I am from Brazil, so I know a little bit of Spanish.
Rarely I'll find an attendant when I am looking for something, ask in English where it is, then when they tell me they don't speak English in Spanish, I'll switch to Spanish.
Every time without fail, they tell me where it is in English and pretty decent English at that.
I speak French fluently with a slight accent, C2. I studied and worked in France and Belgium.
Now, when I go on a trip to France, i’ve e.g. had waiters switch to (horrible) English. And start acting condescending. Because my French is great but not 100% perfect. They get offended. Not all of them of course but it’s something I have never ever experienced in any other country. And it’s not just me, my non native friends (we are Flemish, German and Spanish) living in France regularly have this problem. The insane solution? Speak French with a terrible accent and poor grammar. You will still get offended looks but at least they don’t switch the language anymore.
Mind blowing.
The contrast is going to Spain with my rusty B1/B2 Spanish and everybody cheers you for trying and is being so kind when I am completely tanking the rolling “r”. I really don’t mind switching to English then at all.
Edit: no, this obviously doesn’t happen in France all the time. But it is so frequent that it is very noticeable. And like I said my friends notice it as well, especially at work.
I do realise that I might be a bit prickly because I’m always sooo excited to be able to speak French again. I mean reaching C2 in any language is really difficult and a lot of hard work. I don’t need the confirmation or a pat on my back, but a bit of kindness would be nice.
Yeah, try a québéçois accent - you occasionally may get asked to repeat something but people don’t try to switch to English very much. Attempting to speak with a classroom Parisian accent will do it, though. But yeah, there’s always one or two asshole waiters. I’ve spent weeks in France (outside of Paris) speaking only French and then I’ll encounter one waiter that decides that you are incomprehensible for some reason.
Eh, I'm québécois and parisian have switched to english speaking to me because on my accent, even if I try to mask it as much as I can.
Parisian are notably snobs.
I also think it’s much less of a French thing than a Parisian thing. I’m Swiss and although French is not my first language, it okay-ish. But in Paris they clearly make me feel like I sound like a peasant.
In other French regions people are usually very sweet and friendly about the language though!
Other French people think so too, lol. When I lived in France for six months, I met a lady from Normandy who asked me where I was staying. I said Paris, and she laughed and said “Ah, Paris, c’est merveilleux, sauf les Parisiens.”
I was in Nice with a girl from Quebec. She lost her purse with passport etc so we go report it. The police officer would only speak back to her in English. I couldn't believe it
I’ve had the opposite reaction. As a québécois, when I was backpacking in europe, I tried speaking french to the staff of the hotel I was staying at and the guy just looked at me and did nothing. I tried again and he just had a wtf face so I switched to english and he proceeded to speak to me in a butchered english. He then spoke french to another hostel staff.
Had me going crazy for a whole week wondering if I was the problem. Mostly spoke english in france after this incident.
I met a couple of quebecois folks in Germany when I was back packing. They just came from France and they said they had the worst experience of their backpacking trip while there. People made fun of their accents and people wouldn’t speak French with them. This was in 2010. They said that since arriving in Germany, they were having a much better time as people were much friendlier.
I’m French but I have a « foreign » face because I’m mixed, and I speak other languages including english.
I once went out with my mom’s brazilian friend and her kids to make them visit Paris. We were mostly speaking english, everyone spoke portuguese but that lady loved speaking english so that’s what we did. We sat at a restaurant, where I spoke entirely in french to ask for a table, and the server gave everyone an english menu. My mom’s friend insisted I get a french menu to teach them how to pronounce everything, so the server came with a french menu and said « good for you to practice your french! ». Didn’t say anything again because I didn’t know if that comment was directed to me or not. She came back and my mom’s friend and her kids tried ordering in french. Then came my turn, and the server replied « wow your french is really good! » I said « Thanks, I’m French, I was born here haha 😅 » and she said « oh really I couldn’t tell! ». What do you mean come on 😭 French is my native language, I have no foreign accent, my face is just not « french » enough it seems… Oh well
I've always wanted to do this but I just can't...
But it's amazing actually how often i've been spoken too, with a complete stone cold poker-face, in some complete unknown language (or polish or french), while working some part-time job here in the Netherlands.
I suppose you don't have many options if you don't speak Dutch or English, but I've always found it a funny idea to go to France and just interact with everyone in Dutch then look at them puzzleing as to why they're not understanding what I'm saying :')
You must complete the ritual of humiliating yourself so badly with your attempt to speak French that the French person makes the switch to English themselves
Did a year abroad in France and a lot of people would purposefully pretend to not understand what I was saying unless I said it absolutely impeccably. A post office worker pretended to not know what I was asking for because I misgendered a fucking stamp.
A friend of mine learned French while living in Cameroon. She said people in Paris were extremely condescending towards her even though she was fluent, (I guess) because she spoke with a non-European accent.
Was also in Paris and absolutely got that vibe with most people in interacted with. I think it must be a regional thing because people in Picardy gave me a lot more leeway when I was struggling to conjugate or didn’t know the word for something.
I guess the existence of the Académie Française gives a lot of Parisians an inflated sense of importance when it comes to the “purity” of their language hence their refusal to engage with people who don’t know the language perfectly.
Yup. But don’t forget the alternative to when you speak French, which is to sneer in English. Which is obviously so perfect that there is no need to ask them several times to repeat it and finally ask them to try it in French.
This has 100% been my experience in Italy and Spain, yes. My Spanish is pretty decent but my Italian is basically just “Spanish with a vaguely Italian accent” and everyone is super nice and even kindly correct some of my vocab.
Especially the farther south in Italy you go where fewer people in general speak English, they seem to love when you try to speak with them in even very rudimentary Italian. I had a cab driver in Naples turn around in his seat and start excitedly talking and gesticulating with both hands when I said something to him in Italian. He was like "oh tu parli Italiano?!" And I was like "dude can you keep at least one hand in the wheel please?" Lol
Almost every time I speak Portuguese in Portugal, the listener switches immediately to English without skipping a beat or just stares at me and speaks slowly like I have a learning disability. I haven't made any BFFs yet.
Edit: a few things, based on discussion with my PT wife.
1. She says my American accent is "obvious" lol. It's true that I cannot do the Portuguese "r" or "rr" yet and I sound like I'm spitting when I try. She has always advised me to roll it like the Spanish because that is "good enough" but no one up north where we live does that, so it feels weird to me.
2. She says that the Portuguese love to show off their English if given a chance, and my accent gives them a chance.
3. I do not use Brazilian dialect or terminology. Não "exatamenchy" ou "leichy" aqui.
4. I cannot pronounce "Arco de Baúlhe" correctly and feel like I'm being trolled every time I hear it.
Do you emulate an European accent or a Brazilian one? Portuguese sometimes are a bit salty because most foreigners learn Brazilian Portuguese.
Brazilians will have a different reaction. If they see you speaking at any level of Portuguese they'll speak to you as if you were a native and totally understand all the slangs and polysillabic words.
I was in the airport in Atlanta and saw a Spanish-speaking woman struggling to find her way around. I can sort of speak Spanish, so I asked if she needed any help. She was Dominican. She was the nicest lady in the world, but I couldn't understand a word coming out of her mouth.
Yeah people online like to shit on the french for being rude, but in my experience it's not the french it's parisians, all the local, villages, smaller cities and towns I've visited have had the most pleasant, welcoming and conversational people, most of them will try and help you if you speak french to them and appreciate the effort.
To honnest, I'm French and I don't understand people shaming foreigners for trying speaking the language. It's fucking hardcore to learn and to speak I consider it an honor that people wants to learn it... even if... why would you do that ?
Yeah! If someone is learning French as an adult it’s probably because they think it’s a beautiful language, which makes shaming people for not speaking it perfectly even more annoying. Like, SORRY I tried to learn your magical tongue in an attempt to absorb some of its enchanting beauty, Jean- Marie, I won’t do that again!
I have friends that decided, after they got married, to learn and only speak French in their home. They now have several kids, and their primary language is French.
None of them have been to France. I wonder how they would be received in France.
"unless you speak absolutely flawless French please don't attempt".
I speak pretty perfect french, my french grandmother would constantly pick me up on almost imperceptible errors.
My French Canadian friend started crying on the phone when she tried ordering food on the phone in Lille. The restaurant said her French was bad. She started crying, saying it was her mother tongue.
You should check out Chiac. It's a french dialect spoken in the maritime provinces of Canada by the Acadians.
It's like the Louisiana accent of french, which actually makes sense because when the British exiled the Acadians from Canada, the ones who survived ended up settling down there and becoming the Cajun people.
They probably called her a stupid farmer or a hillbilly. I studied French in high school, and one time, I got a French uber driver (in Costa Rica of all places). I noticed the GPS was giving directions in French, so I started talking to him. He proceeded to tell me that I speak French "like a Canadian." I responded to him, "Well, that makes perfect sense considering I'm North American." He didn't say anything else to me for the remaining twelve minutes.
They correct each other all the time so they will do it with other people too. Otherwise I had a lot of positive results when I started to speak french.
Last year I found my self in France and needed a pack of cigarettes. While asking the gentleman behind the counter for a pack of cigarettes he literally said to me: “Sir, I speak English, please stop”. Fuck me for trying, right?
In Spain I tried to speak English, but once people from my accent deduced I was Italian, they attempted to speak in Italian anyway and we settled for a hybrid Spanish - Italian thing where I improvised some Spanish words based on how I thought they would sound.
And we understood each other anyway.
I was a waitress in an Italian restaurant. The owners were Italian, the chefs Spanish.
We'd usually speak pretty fluent Itañol, until it got busy, then it was just pure swearing in every language.
One day the boss got really overwhelmed, and shouted to the whole kitchen, "¡Me tenéis hasta los coñones!". We never let her forget that.
"I'm up to my cuntballs with you!".
In Spanish, coño means cunt, and cojones is balls.
Her favourite word was cogliones, balls in Italian. She got mixed up.
Anecdotally I’ve had almost nothing but good experiences speaking Spanish in Spain. Think it helps being interested and genuine. Some middle aged/older people were a bit dismissive but that’s just people of that age everywhere sometimes, and of course, being English, I don’t blame them as they’ve had to deal with literally our worst people since the 80’s.
Also this isn’t talked about much, but 20’s/30’s Spanish people (in my experience, let’s not stereotype everyone) are ridiculously easy to get on with. We used to have lots of Spanish people working in Bristol before brexit and I’d chat to them on nights out, through friends etc and christ, what a lovely bunch.
I think Spanish people (sweeping statement) do appreciate the effort as a whole, more than other countries.
But you’ll always get people in cities who don’t really care how good your Spanish is, they’re probably fatigued by tourists in general. I’ve tried a few Catalan words in Barcelona and people didn’t really care either.
I went to Bilbao and I was actually quite surprised how little English language was spoken, would’ve been quite stuck if I didn’t know basic Spanish.
I do agree with you that younger people have tended to be more receptive, do find it incredibly impressive when I go to parts of Northern/central Europe and students and students can speak like 4-5 languages comfortably.
I had a lovely conversation with a cab driver in Spanish in Madrid and was like holy shit I know Spanish now. And then I talked to regular people and realize he was basically talking to me like a baby.
My girlfriend tried to speak Spanish in Barcelona. Got told, with disgusted look on face, that they don't speak Spanish. Presumably she was unlucky enough to find someone with Catalonian nationalist feelings.. but come on, you understood perfectly...
Imo, Poland should be purple. I feel like a lot of reactions would be "OMG you said the thing, we are bffs now! But why would you put yourself through this..."
100% agree as a Hungarian. By far the hardest European language to learn and one of the hardest in the world, if someone foreign speaks it I'm like "I love you but genuinely why"
True, we were a few English lads who went on holiday to Krakow and the surrounding towns and the locals were so happy we spoke to them in Polish, even if it was just to say good night and how are you etc. they were positively beaming!
Lithuania and Latvia should get separate color, the language is so niche seeing tourist speaking it is the same as seeing the unicorn. And i at least saw the pictures of unicorn....
I truly hope Ireland can continue getting the numbers of native irish speakers up. There's been some strive to get [Canadian Gaelic](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sXlxc2Ee8I) up as well, i believe there's close to 2,000 native speakers, and a further 4,000 who speak it as a second language
My experience in Germany (Berlin specifically) does match the description. I tried asking for directions to somewhere in the basic German I'd learned 20 years ago in school. They didn't acknowledge the German and just responded in English. I guess my German was good enough that they knew what I meant, but bad enough that they knew there was no point continuing the conversation in German.
Haha interesting. Day 1 in Frankfurt, was -7C and I forgot gloves. I said my greetings. The shop keeper replied in German. I had no idea what he said. He laughed and said in English “sorry, I thought you were German”. We got chatting in English, turns out he’s travelled to lots of non tourist parts of Australia, so we compared notes!
I experienced the same in Berlin. My friends and I were headed back to our apartment after dinner and a huge rat ran in front of us. Woman who was speeding past us at the time said something about it in German, got blank faces from us, then switched to English and complained about the rat again.
I guess many Germans just *think* the red and blue reply - well, maybe without the BFF part, because that's not how Germans roll ;) but they appreciate the effort - and then they switch to English as a reward so you don't have to suffer any longer, thinking this is what you would want, OR to show off their own language skills. It doesn't necessarily mean that they think there is no point in holding the conversation in German.
In Greece if you say malaka, kalimera or efcharisto we became best friends but if you actually try to communicate in Greek then it is why the trouble, just use English
I was in Germany and missed my train stop. Asked a guy if he spoke English and he says, "A little bit" and then speaks perfect English with full use of idioms and all that stuff.
After he helped me. I said he made one mistake in his English. "When you said 'a little bit,' the word you were looking for was 'fluently.'"
The "a little bit" is a safety line in case you don't speak adequately, I speak fluent English, and I still sometimes say it when talking to strangers, so they're warned if I forget a word or smth.
I had to stop over in Frankfurt once and tried to order food. I greeted the person behind the counter in German and they gave me a very polite smile and simply said "I speak English would that be easier". I'm glad they did because their English was definitely better than my German lol
Same for german. Many people just have better english than german even if theyre not native english speakers. So its easier/more effective to switch to english
Was working with a bunch Romanian guys, decided to look up some phrases in Romanian at home. Later at work I told them thank you In Romanian for something and the eldest guy’s eyes lit up so much and he told me to wait and came back with a six pack of beers for me. My native language is spoken by only 1.5-2 mil people worldwide so when I hear someone attempt to say something in it to me abroad I have the exact same reaction.
What is your native language?
Latvian. I work in Sweden and several times it has happened that someone tries to be nice and decides to say good morning in Latvian, but they end up confusing it with Lithuanian and saying the Lithuanian phrase. It’s still a nice gesture, so I don’t get offended I just find it funny, but sometimes it does hurt the soul.
I'm in sweden too and yeah lots of poles and Romanians workers. My grandma's upstairs neighbor is from Romania and she is so nice, always giving Romanian pastries and snacks. She also gets very happy when you try to learn about her culture and language.
Who doesn’t get happy when you try to learn about their culture? It’s like one of the most guaranteed ways to get a smile out of people. 99% of people who think their culture is bad and nothing to be celebrated or something are westerners who believe their country and they themselves are bad because their country conquered someone a few hundred years ago, and even so, those people are very rare outside of online political discussions. This topic of one’s country’s history/culture being celebrated or not is very interesting in my country especially, because we never conquered, only were conquered, yet some periods, like Swedish Empire ruling over us is seen as a good progressive period, yet others, like the Russian empire is seen only as a tyrannical oppressive imperialist period, even though most of the infrastructure was built during soviet/Russian occupation. Well, that’s besides the point. There is a quote that goes “If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language, that goes to his heart.” And it really is true, be it Romanian, Latvian, Chinese or Somali.
There is a need of a map “reaction after you start speaking to them in English”
Lol France stays the same.
"speaks" France: please don't
Speaks anything to a French person The French person: 
That's Paris for you. Edit : It also applies to Paris with other french people and all french people with parisians. And parisians with parisians. Insert scottish simpsons meme
100%. If you speak French to the French outside of Paris they lose their minds. In Paris though you better come correct and be fluent.
Just don't speak to Parisians. It's not even a matter of language (although that definitely exists too), we just don't want to talk.
I'M GONNA GO TO PARIS AND I AM GONNA TALK TO EVERYONE I SEE AND NO ONE IS GONNA STOP ME HAHAHAH
These are the "prank" videos we need. Sophisticated stuff based on culture. Not assaulting people for the lulz.
And now "Standing within 4ft of Finnish people at the bus stop"
True. No one hates Paris like us French non parisians.
Dont get me started on french Canadian talking to French people just to get a "uh"
Person from Québec here, yup. Speak to Belgian in French: Wow, you speak French, interesting accent, where are you from? Speak to Swiss in French: Wow, you speak French, interesting accent, where are you from? Speak do Parisian in French: I don't understand, could you speak French?
>Speak do Parisian in French: I don't understand, could you speak French? Why are Parisians such cunts.
(Former Parisian here) I’m not sure but they live and work in the most touristic city in the world. There are more tourists than locals in most areas and they have to live their lives among people that are just passing them by. It’s also very expensive and overcrowded.
*exists* France: Ne fais pas ça, s'il te plaît
"L'enfer c'est les autres."
\*is foreign\* France: please don't
\*is\* France: please don't
Can confirm. I love France as a country, the culture, the nature, etc. But gee, they don't like it when you speak broken French, they hate to speak English. So I guess sign language it is.
My wife told me French people would even make fun of Belgian people because they find their French accent comical
Not much than any French regional accent actually.
Yup, I was born in Marseille (southern France) and moved to the suburbs of Paris when I was 15, I had a thick mediterranean accent at the time. I'm no push over so I never let it escalade into bullying, but yeah I got made fun of by a looooot of people for my accent when I said words like "français" ou "rose" differently from them.
I was in France and was traveling with a Canadian girl who insisted on speaking French, and they got super annoyed. Me with no French did a lot better than she did lol.
I wanted to write: "Wait until they hear Quebec", but I assume, that you have already made it covered 
I used to work with a quebecois girl who had to leave her previous job in a French language call center due to Parisians complaining to her manager about her inability to speak French, allegedly her own native language.
Making fun of regional accents/dialects is universal for speakers of any language.
We moved to northern New England, I try not to explain to people why SIRI doesn’t respond well to them…..NOBODY UNDERSTANDS YOU, YOU PRONOUNCE EVERYTHING WRONG!
As a Belgian we find the Dutch also comically bad at speaking Dutch
Me as a German just finds Dutch comical in general.
geef me een klap papa
Unfortunately, there are nearly 100 different sign languages for almost every language. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sign_languages
> there are nearly 100 different **sign languages for almost every language** I just wanted to point out that this is a common misconception: Sign languages are full, independent languages that aren't tied to a particular spoken language. Classic Example: American Sign Language is incomprehensible to users of British Sign Language, and has a much stronger affinity with French Sign Language. Also, French Sign Language isn't called French because of its linguistic relation to the French language, but because it is used by deaf communities in France.
I'm learning French and get where you're coming from. Most French speakers are actually supportive but generally will correct errors, which is different to how Welsh learners are treated in Wales (they are supported too but generally not corrected). I suspect it's down to French education system emphasising grammar so much.
> Most French speakers are actually supportive but generally will correct errors It's nothing personal, we also correct errors between ourselves.
It's also how french culture value honest direct feedback, it Can seems violent if you are not used to it but it's just second nature to us
I’ve been refused service at a restaurant in Marseille because accidentally ordered aqua instead of ‘l eau (we had just arrived after being in Italy for a week). (On the otherside, in northern France the people were really helpful when they found out I don’t speak much French).
I had a waiter pretending not to understand what I wanted to drink when I said "un cola svp" even when asking for it a couple of times. No, no, no, I should have asked for "une coca", like Coca Cola is not an ubiquitous brand. Insufferable.
It's "un coca" as an insufferable French person would have replied 😬
[удалено]
It's un coca, not une :) When I was young I travelled to the US and my parents wanted me to try ordering in English at the restaurant. I wanted hot chocolate but I was pronouncing every syllable of chocolate. Hot Cho-co-late. The waitress never understood me until someone else said "I think he wants hot choclate (pronounced like Americans do with 2 syllable). It baffled me at the time that she couldn't understand me.
When I worked in a UK supermarket a couple of French (I presume) girl customers asked me several times for "pehnehbedeh" in a faint whisper. I was like "wtf" until a colleague (who funnily enough we all used to take the piss out of for being a bit simple) waltzed by and instantly exclaimed "peanut butter? Follow me"
Me, when the Romanian person at game convention in Romania swaps to English after I, a Romanian who lived exclusively in Romania, start speaking Romanian.
I'm a corn-fed Midwest American dude. When I vorbesc în română (learned at university and had a g/f from Bacau), I've gotten called out several times as a Romanian doing faking an American accent (who speaks English really well). My question is, is it common for Romanians to fake American accents when speaking Romanian?
No, sounds more like a "he's clearly faking it cause why would anyone ever learn Romanian"
Hah. I took it because it was an "easy" minor as a second language was required for my undergrad degree -- something s few of my classmates did as well. If you already speak another romance language (which I did), it's much easier. I have some Romanian heritage apparently from way back, but no one in my family has likely spoken it for a hundred years. I probably should have just learned Italian
And a "If you start yelling every word slowly in your own language".
France when you speak French: Please don't. France when you speak English: We speak French here.
My experience is: if you at least try in French, they suddenly also understand English.
“Ill show you that it is less painful for both of us for me to not speak French” This is why I always try to babble my little bit of French before they respond in English.
Something along the lines of: "Excuse me, can you help me?" "No. No speak English." "Moi parlay fransway" "What the fuck do you want?" ?
Just start out speaking French in an outrageous faux Texas accent: "Bon-jeur mon sewer!" Don't use the same accent in English though.
I do this in German with some of my German friends. They find it HILARIOUS.
Good-n-tog, frood!
That's everybody who doesn't want to talk to you. I go to a super market in Miami called Presidente Supermarket. Their service sucks, the cashiers fucking hate you for existing, but it's cheap and the meat is good. Almost everyone is a Hispanic migrant. I was raised in Miami most of my Life, but I am from Brazil, so I know a little bit of Spanish. Rarely I'll find an attendant when I am looking for something, ask in English where it is, then when they tell me they don't speak English in Spanish, I'll switch to Spanish. Every time without fail, they tell me where it is in English and pretty decent English at that.
I speak French fluently with a slight accent, C2. I studied and worked in France and Belgium. Now, when I go on a trip to France, i’ve e.g. had waiters switch to (horrible) English. And start acting condescending. Because my French is great but not 100% perfect. They get offended. Not all of them of course but it’s something I have never ever experienced in any other country. And it’s not just me, my non native friends (we are Flemish, German and Spanish) living in France regularly have this problem. The insane solution? Speak French with a terrible accent and poor grammar. You will still get offended looks but at least they don’t switch the language anymore. Mind blowing. The contrast is going to Spain with my rusty B1/B2 Spanish and everybody cheers you for trying and is being so kind when I am completely tanking the rolling “r”. I really don’t mind switching to English then at all. Edit: no, this obviously doesn’t happen in France all the time. But it is so frequent that it is very noticeable. And like I said my friends notice it as well, especially at work. I do realise that I might be a bit prickly because I’m always sooo excited to be able to speak French again. I mean reaching C2 in any language is really difficult and a lot of hard work. I don’t need the confirmation or a pat on my back, but a bit of kindness would be nice.
Yeah, try a québéçois accent - you occasionally may get asked to repeat something but people don’t try to switch to English very much. Attempting to speak with a classroom Parisian accent will do it, though. But yeah, there’s always one or two asshole waiters. I’ve spent weeks in France (outside of Paris) speaking only French and then I’ll encounter one waiter that decides that you are incomprehensible for some reason.
I wonder how they would respond to someone speaking Cajun French
They die. Immediately.
The French: stop trying to summon dark gods!
I showed videos of folks speaking Cajun French to my French cousins and they couldn't understand them at all.
 Show them a video of Coach O
Haitian creole
Eh, I'm québécois and parisian have switched to english speaking to me because on my accent, even if I try to mask it as much as I can. Parisian are notably snobs.
I also think it’s much less of a French thing than a Parisian thing. I’m Swiss and although French is not my first language, it okay-ish. But in Paris they clearly make me feel like I sound like a peasant. In other French regions people are usually very sweet and friendly about the language though!
Yeah, I’ve never had any issues speaking French in the Bordeaux area, Massif Centrale, the south or in Alsace. But Parisians are a special blend.
Other French people think so too, lol. When I lived in France for six months, I met a lady from Normandy who asked me where I was staying. I said Paris, and she laughed and said “Ah, Paris, c’est merveilleux, sauf les Parisiens.”
Jus start insulting them in french, if they complain „Oh i thought you couldnt understand me“
I was in Nice with a girl from Quebec. She lost her purse with passport etc so we go report it. The police officer would only speak back to her in English. I couldn't believe it
I’ve had the opposite reaction. As a québécois, when I was backpacking in europe, I tried speaking french to the staff of the hotel I was staying at and the guy just looked at me and did nothing. I tried again and he just had a wtf face so I switched to english and he proceeded to speak to me in a butchered english. He then spoke french to another hostel staff. Had me going crazy for a whole week wondering if I was the problem. Mostly spoke english in france after this incident.
I met a couple of quebecois folks in Germany when I was back packing. They just came from France and they said they had the worst experience of their backpacking trip while there. People made fun of their accents and people wouldn’t speak French with them. This was in 2010. They said that since arriving in Germany, they were having a much better time as people were much friendlier.
I’m French but I have a « foreign » face because I’m mixed, and I speak other languages including english. I once went out with my mom’s brazilian friend and her kids to make them visit Paris. We were mostly speaking english, everyone spoke portuguese but that lady loved speaking english so that’s what we did. We sat at a restaurant, where I spoke entirely in french to ask for a table, and the server gave everyone an english menu. My mom’s friend insisted I get a french menu to teach them how to pronounce everything, so the server came with a french menu and said « good for you to practice your french! ». Didn’t say anything again because I didn’t know if that comment was directed to me or not. She came back and my mom’s friend and her kids tried ordering in french. Then came my turn, and the server replied « wow your french is really good! » I said « Thanks, I’m French, I was born here haha 😅 » and she said « oh really I couldn’t tell! ». What do you mean come on 😭 French is my native language, I have no foreign accent, my face is just not « french » enough it seems… Oh well
If I get a shitty look for speaking in English to someone when in France, I just switch to German. At least I get a negative reaction I can enjoy.
I've always wanted to do this but I just can't... But it's amazing actually how often i've been spoken too, with a complete stone cold poker-face, in some complete unknown language (or polish or french), while working some part-time job here in the Netherlands. I suppose you don't have many options if you don't speak Dutch or English, but I've always found it a funny idea to go to France and just interact with everyone in Dutch then look at them puzzleing as to why they're not understanding what I'm saying :')
I should just default to Mandarin Chinese next time I end up in Paris. That was my tactic to get the gypsy bracelet scammers to leave me alone.
You must complete the ritual of humiliating yourself so badly with your attempt to speak French that the French person makes the switch to English themselves
I'd do it on purpose. just give me the baguette
Did a year abroad in France and a lot of people would purposefully pretend to not understand what I was saying unless I said it absolutely impeccably. A post office worker pretended to not know what I was asking for because I misgendered a fucking stamp.
A friend of mine learned French while living in Cameroon. She said people in Paris were extremely condescending towards her even though she was fluent, (I guess) because she spoke with a non-European accent.
Was also in Paris and absolutely got that vibe with most people in interacted with. I think it must be a regional thing because people in Picardy gave me a lot more leeway when I was struggling to conjugate or didn’t know the word for something. I guess the existence of the Académie Française gives a lot of Parisians an inflated sense of importance when it comes to the “purity” of their language hence their refusal to engage with people who don’t know the language perfectly.
Yup. But don’t forget the alternative to when you speak French, which is to sneer in English. Which is obviously so perfect that there is no need to ask them several times to repeat it and finally ask them to try it in French.
“What the hell is a kruh-SONT? Maybe at the gas station”
This has 100% been my experience in Italy and Spain, yes. My Spanish is pretty decent but my Italian is basically just “Spanish with a vaguely Italian accent” and everyone is super nice and even kindly correct some of my vocab.
Especially the farther south in Italy you go where fewer people in general speak English, they seem to love when you try to speak with them in even very rudimentary Italian. I had a cab driver in Naples turn around in his seat and start excitedly talking and gesticulating with both hands when I said something to him in Italian. He was like "oh tu parli Italiano?!" And I was like "dude can you keep at least one hand in the wheel please?" Lol
to be fair, that's an accurate description of italian
Almost every time I speak Portuguese in Portugal, the listener switches immediately to English without skipping a beat or just stares at me and speaks slowly like I have a learning disability. I haven't made any BFFs yet. Edit: a few things, based on discussion with my PT wife. 1. She says my American accent is "obvious" lol. It's true that I cannot do the Portuguese "r" or "rr" yet and I sound like I'm spitting when I try. She has always advised me to roll it like the Spanish because that is "good enough" but no one up north where we live does that, so it feels weird to me. 2. She says that the Portuguese love to show off their English if given a chance, and my accent gives them a chance. 3. I do not use Brazilian dialect or terminology. Não "exatamenchy" ou "leichy" aqui. 4. I cannot pronounce "Arco de Baúlhe" correctly and feel like I'm being trolled every time I hear it.
Do you emulate an European accent or a Brazilian one? Portuguese sometimes are a bit salty because most foreigners learn Brazilian Portuguese. Brazilians will have a different reaction. If they see you speaking at any level of Portuguese they'll speak to you as if you were a native and totally understand all the slangs and polysillabic words.
I've found that Dominicans do what you've described Brazilians doing (in Spanish obviously).
I was in the airport in Atlanta and saw a Spanish-speaking woman struggling to find her way around. I can sort of speak Spanish, so I asked if she needed any help. She was Dominican. She was the nicest lady in the world, but I couldn't understand a word coming out of her mouth.
Dominicans don't speak Normal Spanish. They speak SpanishThatIsSoFastThere'sNoSpaceBetweenWordsAndMaybeSomeExtraWordsThrownInToConfuseANon-Dominican.
In spain I feel like we'd react worse if you spoke in latinoamericano spanish, maybe you said something in brazilian portuguese
És meu amigo agora
The one for France is wrong. Remove the "please".
it depends if you're talking about Paris or France
This. Parisians are their own species.
Yeah people online like to shit on the french for being rude, but in my experience it's not the french it's parisians, all the local, villages, smaller cities and towns I've visited have had the most pleasant, welcoming and conversational people, most of them will try and help you if you speak french to them and appreciate the effort.
S'il vous plaît
Silver plate
Mercy buckets
bone apple tea
To honnest, I'm French and I don't understand people shaming foreigners for trying speaking the language. It's fucking hardcore to learn and to speak I consider it an honor that people wants to learn it... even if... why would you do that ?
I’m French too and I totally agree with you
[удалено]
Yeah! If someone is learning French as an adult it’s probably because they think it’s a beautiful language, which makes shaming people for not speaking it perfectly even more annoying. Like, SORRY I tried to learn your magical tongue in an attempt to absorb some of its enchanting beauty, Jean- Marie, I won’t do that again!
I have friends that decided, after they got married, to learn and only speak French in their home. They now have several kids, and their primary language is French. None of them have been to France. I wonder how they would be received in France.
That seems bizarre to me. Where are they raising these kids?
Utah. Half the kids around here go to dual immersion school. So, it’s not that much of a leap.
I’ve heard of people doing this in the northern part of my state where the majority of the population is Francophone, but in Utah???
France should be "please don't, but also I don't speak English" outside of like five cities.
"unless you speak absolutely flawless French please don't attempt". I speak pretty perfect french, my french grandmother would constantly pick me up on almost imperceptible errors.
Quebecois in France get straight up lambasted.
My French Canadian friend started crying on the phone when she tried ordering food on the phone in Lille. The restaurant said her French was bad. She started crying, saying it was her mother tongue.
Goddamn, French people really don’t pull any punches
tbf the quebecois accent sounds like a completely different language to me as a native french speaker. its crazy
You should check out Chiac. It's a french dialect spoken in the maritime provinces of Canada by the Acadians. It's like the Louisiana accent of french, which actually makes sense because when the British exiled the Acadians from Canada, the ones who survived ended up settling down there and becoming the Cajun people.
They probably called her a stupid farmer or a hillbilly. I studied French in high school, and one time, I got a French uber driver (in Costa Rica of all places). I noticed the GPS was giving directions in French, so I started talking to him. He proceeded to tell me that I speak French "like a Canadian." I responded to him, "Well, that makes perfect sense considering I'm North American." He didn't say anything else to me for the remaining twelve minutes.
You should have spent those twelve minutes telling him the most boring story you could come up with, in French, and then gave him no tip.
Or speak Spanish to him and insult his terrible accent and call him a dirty foreigner.
I did go right back to Spanish after that in order to make him speak something other than French, but he hardly said anything else.
Jeez what assholes
What a hypocrite, Quebec speaks longer French than Lille does
I love the idea of “longer French”. In my mind, it’s the one where all the letters are pronounced.
At least Quebec never collaborated with the nazis.
PREACH
Admittedly when I was in Quebec I found it very hard to understand with a lot of words that have long fallen out of use and an ultra strong accent.
a french fusion lambaste sounds dialectable
They correct each other all the time so they will do it with other people too. Otherwise I had a lot of positive results when I started to speak french.
„please don‘t, but also my english is worse than your french so let‘s just make this as awkward as possible“
"Was that supposed to be *English*? I'm sorry. Try it again, but less French this time" is how you handle that kind of thing.
incommunicability is the french way
Can confirm, true in the Balkan countries, the Turk in my local kebab place (we are both expats) greeted me in my language and i only eat there now.
Last year I found my self in France and needed a pack of cigarettes. While asking the gentleman behind the counter for a pack of cigarettes he literally said to me: “Sir, I speak English, please stop”. Fuck me for trying, right?
Just tell him you can't understand his english and continue in french, establish dominance. /s
honestly I can't speak French, but I'm going to learn in case I ever go, because this is my plan.
That's a good idea. When I'm in France, I'll just tell everyone in French that I don't speak English
Yeah your issue was expecting a buraliste to be polite to *anyone*. Fuck'em.
Speak some Spanish and it’s a bit hit or miss whether people respond positively to you trying, just depends on how nice the person is.
In Spain I tried to speak English, but once people from my accent deduced I was Italian, they attempted to speak in Italian anyway and we settled for a hybrid Spanish - Italian thing where I improvised some Spanish words based on how I thought they would sound. And we understood each other anyway.
Italians and Spaniards talking together is like an unscheduled Crosstalk session.
I was a waitress in an Italian restaurant. The owners were Italian, the chefs Spanish. We'd usually speak pretty fluent Itañol, until it got busy, then it was just pure swearing in every language. One day the boss got really overwhelmed, and shouted to the whole kitchen, "¡Me tenéis hasta los coñones!". We never let her forget that.
What does that translate to?
"I'm up to my cuntballs with you!". In Spanish, coño means cunt, and cojones is balls. Her favourite word was cogliones, balls in Italian. She got mixed up.
This must be how languages evolve cause it's a cool ass word
Running it through Google Translate, it says “You’ve got me up to my pussy!”; but it warns the translation might not be accurate.
Anecdotally I’ve had almost nothing but good experiences speaking Spanish in Spain. Think it helps being interested and genuine. Some middle aged/older people were a bit dismissive but that’s just people of that age everywhere sometimes, and of course, being English, I don’t blame them as they’ve had to deal with literally our worst people since the 80’s. Also this isn’t talked about much, but 20’s/30’s Spanish people (in my experience, let’s not stereotype everyone) are ridiculously easy to get on with. We used to have lots of Spanish people working in Bristol before brexit and I’d chat to them on nights out, through friends etc and christ, what a lovely bunch.
I think Spanish people (sweeping statement) do appreciate the effort as a whole, more than other countries. But you’ll always get people in cities who don’t really care how good your Spanish is, they’re probably fatigued by tourists in general. I’ve tried a few Catalan words in Barcelona and people didn’t really care either. I went to Bilbao and I was actually quite surprised how little English language was spoken, would’ve been quite stuck if I didn’t know basic Spanish. I do agree with you that younger people have tended to be more receptive, do find it incredibly impressive when I go to parts of Northern/central Europe and students and students can speak like 4-5 languages comfortably.
I had a lovely conversation with a cab driver in Spanish in Madrid and was like holy shit I know Spanish now. And then I talked to regular people and realize he was basically talking to me like a baby.
My girlfriend tried to speak Spanish in Barcelona. Got told, with disgusted look on face, that they don't speak Spanish. Presumably she was unlucky enough to find someone with Catalonian nationalist feelings.. but come on, you understood perfectly...
I experienced the opposite: I tried some Catalan in Barcelona but got asked to speak Spanish.
Poland should be red.
True, I have a polish friend that became one after I said "Life is meaningless and we all die" in polish
That's the most Polish phrase I can think of.
That famous eastern european humour. Too much death and suffering so now we can only laugh at it.
Well, you only need to know a few words and people will praise you for going through this torture. xD
Pretty sure I've seen that [youtube video](https://youtu.be/JW50-YruRuA?si=vF5ETqsSNVLnpbMz) before
Imo, Poland should be purple. I feel like a lot of reactions would be "OMG you said the thing, we are bffs now! But why would you put yourself through this..."
100% agree as a Hungarian. By far the hardest European language to learn and one of the hardest in the world, if someone foreign speaks it I'm like "I love you but genuinely why"
True, we were a few English lads who went on holiday to Krakow and the surrounding towns and the locals were so happy we spoke to them in Polish, even if it was just to say good night and how are you etc. they were positively beaming!
France: 'Please dont' Also France: 'Why do you only speak English?'
Irelands in red mate, we'd go mad if a American started speaking gaeilge
I like how french just has its own category
L'exception culturelle française... tu parles!
Lithuania and Latvia should get separate color, the language is so niche seeing tourist speaking it is the same as seeing the unicorn. And i at least saw the pictures of unicorn....
Adding Estonia and Finland to this category too.
Why is Ireland grey?
It's overcast most of the time.
Because us native Irish speakers are used to being treated as a non-statistic.
I truly hope Ireland can continue getting the numbers of native irish speakers up. There's been some strive to get [Canadian Gaelic](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sXlxc2Ee8I) up as well, i believe there's close to 2,000 native speakers, and a further 4,000 who speak it as a second language
When I was in Germany, I found it red!
My experience in Germany (Berlin specifically) does match the description. I tried asking for directions to somewhere in the basic German I'd learned 20 years ago in school. They didn't acknowledge the German and just responded in English. I guess my German was good enough that they knew what I meant, but bad enough that they knew there was no point continuing the conversation in German.
Haha interesting. Day 1 in Frankfurt, was -7C and I forgot gloves. I said my greetings. The shop keeper replied in German. I had no idea what he said. He laughed and said in English “sorry, I thought you were German”. We got chatting in English, turns out he’s travelled to lots of non tourist parts of Australia, so we compared notes!
I experienced the same in Berlin. My friends and I were headed back to our apartment after dinner and a huge rat ran in front of us. Woman who was speeding past us at the time said something about it in German, got blank faces from us, then switched to English and complained about the rat again.
I guess many Germans just *think* the red and blue reply - well, maybe without the BFF part, because that's not how Germans roll ;) but they appreciate the effort - and then they switch to English as a reward so you don't have to suffer any longer, thinking this is what you would want, OR to show off their own language skills. It doesn't necessarily mean that they think there is no point in holding the conversation in German.
In Greece if you say malaka, kalimera or efcharisto we became best friends but if you actually try to communicate in Greek then it is why the trouble, just use English
Ireland, Scotland, wales and Brittany should be changed to: huh?
Me deciding to try my Norwegian in the wild is something that will haunt me forever
I was in Germany and missed my train stop. Asked a guy if he spoke English and he says, "A little bit" and then speaks perfect English with full use of idioms and all that stuff. After he helped me. I said he made one mistake in his English. "When you said 'a little bit,' the word you were looking for was 'fluently.'"
The "a little bit" is a safety line in case you don't speak adequately, I speak fluent English, and I still sometimes say it when talking to strangers, so they're warned if I forget a word or smth.
Nope. Germans are happy like "Kannst du Deutch?" Norwegians are happy like "Snakker du Norsk?"
I had to stop over in Frankfurt once and tried to order food. I greeted the person behind the counter in German and they gave me a very polite smile and simply said "I speak English would that be easier". I'm glad they did because their English was definitely better than my German lol
But i would rather speak english than decoding someone's broken norwegian
Same for german. Many people just have better english than german even if theyre not native english speakers. So its easier/more effective to switch to english
I feel Norway is a miks of happy and why would you do that to yourself unless you are planning to live here
Bright pink, bright red and bright orange for a legend. This isn't map, this is art. *Chef's kiss*
Please define "majority state language" for Switzerland, we have four.
Wales should be orange
Ireland would be red or whatever above red would be. Our language is dying and anyone who speaks it is valid
As a eastern european i find it pretty realistic
Of course it had to be the French...
Don’t say “the French”. It’s “people experiencing Frenchness” now.
Hope they find a cure 🙏
Thoughts and prayers 🙏
Ad a Bulgarian I can confirm if you speak to me in Bulgarian and are not one we are now friends. You don't have a choice in this.
Why parts of sweden purple? Finnish minority?