Yes and it is kinda annoying if there's only one country which doesn't want to adopt English, forcing everyone to learn their language ;-)
So it is just a matter of perspective. I wonder how the chinese see that picture.
So it is just a matter of perspective. I wonder how the chinese see that picture.
I critizied that the people in France are known for their hostility against English. So I just wish they would embrace the international nature of English a bit more.
“What do you call someone who speaks 3 languages? Trilingual
What do you call someone who speaks 2 languages? Bilingual
What do you call someone who’s speaks one language? American”
I’d be willing to bet that a greater percentage of French population have basic communication skills in a foreign language than Americans.
FYI until relatively recently, French was the Lingua Franca of the world, not English. In fact that was one reason I wanted to learn French, to help me in travels around the world. Yes English is more prevalent now, yet I’ve found French to be more helpful than English in some non native French speaking countries.
One thing I'll tell you is that in my experience, every culture has its own way of expressing annoyance. When those ways clash, it can make people seem way more hostile than they mean.
As an example, if I start a sentence with "Sorry, but..." I'm pretty annoyed, but in some parts of the world, that would be endearing. In other parts, it would be so polite as to be annoying.
One thing I'll tell you is that my country isn't particularly patient with people who don't try to learn English, or with people whose English is poor. We have a reputation for being very polite and welcoming, but I think that's more a function of people just not picking up on cues that we're annoyed.
What? You've never been to Europe have you? Try travelling here and speaking English in any country other than the obvious champions like Norway / Sweden / Danemark and you'll come to the crazy realization that people like speaking their own language.
But hey, on the positive side of things I have a feeling that the younger generations depend less on their own language and have better English skills.
There's not that many Spanish, Chinese or even French speaking countries you'd want to move to, as someone from a developed country.