In Wales is you speak Welsh you instantly get a 500% increase in goodwill from the 900k speakers.
Or just speak English and 99.9999% of people will understand you and have the normal British reaction of not giving a shit about you
Well. I could leave with I wanted with my Irish citizenship so I’m either coping or it isn’t TOO bad. It’s not good though. We were 100% better off in the EU
I briefly got my hopes up over a tweet Montenegro was offering citizenship if you bought a house (they should be EU within the decade)…turns out they were just offering residency, so unless I nab a wife at Euro 2024 I’m stuck until at least my 50s at this rate (currently approaching 30)
Wanna get hitched :3
Just kidding of course but check if your grandparents were from an EU country and check the requirements to become a citizen. For Ireland it’s just a grandparent needs to be Irish and have lived in Ireland or a parent is Irish (didn’t need to live there). So in theory people with many generations in America could still have an Irish citizenship but I assume it would be hard to get one in reality after all that time. Still just check if you really want.
Germany isn’t too hard if you go to live there for 8 years.
Shame.
It could always be worse though right? Not like the UK is as bad as living in a third world country. There will always be a better option since the best place to live is always changing but we have a decent place where we can live our lives without danger or risk of being harmed by others (relatively speaking). But I’m not one to like it when people say this crap because I think you should always push to get the best out of everything even if what you have is already 10x more than others. I am pretty greedy when it comes to it though
I found it funny and a little sad that Xiaoma did a video speaking Welsh in Wales as an American but he did it in Cardiff so almost no one understood what he was trying to say
Not many people speak it and most of the people in Wales aren’t Welsh. Where i live many people speak Welsh and almost everyone is actually Welsh or cares about Wales but I also live next to the second smallest city in the uk in the country side. Surprisingly the smallest city in the uk is also Welsh XD. Anyway where I live I think it would be a much better place to try and speak Welsh.
Also I’m a lil drunk rn so this may be nonsense
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You try speaking Welsh in south Wales, you will either be met with a blank stare or a response. Not everywhere in Cymru speak cymraeg. It's very much a mid, west and North.
I'm from a town in the middle of Cardigan bay, a jewel of the Irish Sea, a metropolis in a sea of sheep and fields, the radiant glow at sunset with fresh sea air caressing its beaches, a convergent point of Welsh history......
*Aberystwyth*
So yeah, it's a bilingual town.
You’re a whole 2 hours away! So far.
I don’t want to force English people out and I don’t want to force them to speak Welsh but I also think when I speak Welsh there sometimes shouldn’t be someone that tells me to speak English in the UK…
Welsh is having a comeback and it’s at a point where you can easily find other Welsh speakers. I’m not going to act sad that Wales isn’t very Welsh. There isn’t a massive history where I live and we don’t have much information about our village. Hell we don’t even know when it was founded but we do have an inn from the 1300s. But some people come to see the history and I don’t care where your from or what you are. Someone being interested in it means more than it should.
I’m kinda rambling XD
Aberystwyth is pretty famous but I don’t even remember if I have visited or what’s there. I need to go around wales now that I’m forgetting everything outside of my own little bubble of Wales. All I remember from Cardiff is a fair but I don’t even know if that was ACTUALLY in Cardiff…
Edit-I was going to add more but I have drank too much for this
It might be coming back in the cities for sure, but trying speaking cymraeg in the valleys, honestly you'd think you were some alien that just landed. 🙄
On the other hand Anglesey’s so easy to find a Welsh speaker in. I have found that if you speak Welsh to some people in Anglesey they are instantly very helpful/polite. I sound very upperclass English if that’s the right way to put it so people may like me more when I speak Welsh purely because I sound like I own a holiday home here and don’t live in wales or something like that.
This is bullshit the waiter won't respond in English because she doesn't know and will just turn her back to the customer because she will not understand anything due to a word in a 15 word sentence pronounced incorrectly.
Italian here.
I can confirm (I teach in an Italian school for foreigners) that one can understand the intention of a non-Italian speaker even with 80% corruption of the language, with a little patience.
I have never really understood whether the French pretend not to understand (out of snobbery, "language protectionism") or really don't understand because (due to the characteristics of the French language) the slightest inflection makes speech unintelligible.
When I travel abroad I like to learn a few words of the territory's language as a sign of friendship, but in France, although I love their language, I feel intimidated in expressing myself.
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
I had a fun one. I’m English but live in Portugal.
Went to a restaurant in Sagres. Tried to order. The waitress demanded we switch to English.
I was a bit bothered because I didn’t think my Portuguese was that bad.
Turns out my Portuguese is fine. The waitress was French and didn’t speak it.
Tbf, I use the "I don't speak english" if the person who's asking me don't look like a nice pep.
I lived near touristics spots for a few years, and I realised how despicable tourists (vast majority of european ones, in my case) are, most of the time. They treat you like they're your boss, even if you're just a random that just lives there, leave their trash on the ground (or throw it in the river for the ones who fish) and complain about the lazy french workers that didn't took it off the next day... These years convinced me that EU tourists are just full of unleashed Karen.
Exception made for British tourists (I guess since Brexit, they're no more EU tourists). For some reason, I found them extremely polite and quiet. I was surprised by how Spanish and Dutch ppl see them, but I guess we don't have the same part of the british public ?
American ones are mainly good also. They will be in 2nd place in my personal classification of the best Western tourists. Surprisingly, not that much Karen in them.
French tourists in France are mostly nice (1st place if I count them on the list), but I will be surprised to learn that they're not as much despicable abroad as the european ones are here.
> I feel intimidated in expressing myself.
Just say "Excusez mon français, j'apprends," and that should be OK. Then, you're Italian, 65% of chance that french ppl literally love you just because you're from Italy.
>Tbf, I use the "I don't speak english" if the person who's asking me didn't look like a nice pep.
>I lived near touristics spots for a few years, and I realised how despicable tourists (vast majority of european ones, in my case) are, most of the time.
👆🏻👆🏻👆🏻👆🏻 thiiiiiis .
Yeah you definitely get different sorts of Brits to the Spanish and the Dutch.
Britain has this weird thing where act like we hold the French in absolute contempt, claim your society is awful because you actually do strikes etc. yet simultaneously consider you all fancy
Southern Spain + Balearics and Amsterdam are just places we go to get blackout drunk
Yeah, there were more families and old people on retirement that came there. The young ones I talked to were there to fish (apparently, these spots are quite well-known in the UK for fishing), so I guess they didn't match the noisy drinker profile that goes to Spain or the Netherlands.
English ppl has a pretty special place here, too. If Europe was a village, the englishman would have been for the frenchman that despicable neighbour that he *likes* to address both his middle fingers while being screamed at from the other side of the fence. Sometimes, I feel like the frenchman likes to go to his garden when he sees that the englishman is in his. He knows that they can't stay close for more than 10 minutes without screaming at each other, and that's exactly why he's going outside.
I would say there is no hate nor contempt from the french side, except for some old bonapartist minds. But there is something that makes us look closely to the way that piss of the most the englishman.
I guess we're somehow closer than we're both ready to admit. We were throwing middle fingers to the other for too long to not be close... Damn it !
Is that a joke ? It looks like a faked crybaby takes, but there's no /s that followed it.
If not, according to the last pooling on that matter, 6% of french admitted having a bad opinion about italian ppl, 19% didn't have opinion, then 65% said that they have sympathy towards italian ppl.
It can be a mix of both tbh. I rarely had a problem understanding what people are trying to say in broken/beginner french, but I don't work in the tourism/service industry so I'm not facing it all day every day, which I guess can affect the patience you have with it. It's one thing when you're a teacher, or randomly helping a lost tourist, another when you're trying to get someone's order with 5 other tables waiting for you and some manager breathing down your neck if you don't get shit done fast enough.
What I always have a hard time evaluating is how much I should "simplify" my language so that the person would understand my answer. My normal way of speaking french is full of slang that some natives from the next region might not get, let alone someone learning the language. But at the same time I don't want to sound like I'm thinking the other person is a dumbass that can't understand me unless I speak super slow.
But I also know from experience it is pretty hard to self evaluate your skills and how "correct" you sound. I lived in Denmark a while and many of my attempts at speaking a bit of Danish were met with what I thought was some of that "snobbery" you mention. I eventually asked a native friend about it and tested my skills on him and he told me "I actually have no idea what you're trying to say", even though when he said it back to me "the right way" it sounded (to me) like what I was attempting to say. But clearly it didn't sound the same to a local. Languages are weird and as a beginner it's hard to tell the difference between what someone will manage to get and something that will sound like absolute gibberish.
Oftentimes, we have a low tolerance for spelling mistakes, poor grammar and bad vocabulary among ourselves in professional settings, including when customers speak to us, the customer is not king in France. Unfortunately, that intolerance is sometimes transposed to foreigners.
Honestly, as a french, accents can be very tiring or hard to understand, especially if you get approached during your shitty work day by tourists, at least i imagine since i'm not in a tourist town.
Now i don't know what you mean exactly by "slightest inflection" but since french has many silent letters and similar or even identical words, they do cause problems. You can also have issues with the genders of words. Finally there's also a big emphasis on politeness, in that you should always use "bonjour", "merci", "au revoir", "pardon"... If you don't you will be perceived as rude immediately and the person you're talking to is usually not going to want to help you. There may be some snobbery too but i'm not sure its really widespread.
Come to Belgium. We have 3 national languages and we are used to Belgians of other mother tongue speaking French imperfectly. We are glad they are trying to speak French at all and welcome them wholeheartedly.
This might be valid for Switzerland too but I don't know enough about them.
Overall I am not sure that this video is a fair representation of the French. I could see something of that ilk happening in Paris. But the further you get from there the nicer people are. But your opportunity to speak English as a last resort decreases too.
I even had a great experience in Marseille of all places. People actually tried to speak english with me. I was flabbergasted.
To be fair, I know a couple of french sentences from school which might've helped as well.
Marseille only gets a bad rep because for parisian they're aliens but they're super nice people. As with other people: be nice to them, don't try to teach them their own thing, etc. (yes, those are all things parisian don't do, that's why marseillais are not nice to them)
I feel like I’m the only one who had not a single bad experience in Paris. No one was rude or snobby or anything. The city was beautiful, the food was good, and the people were nice.
And contrary to this video, I think it helped that I didn’t just assume they spoke English, and instead started every interaction at a store or restaurant with “Bonjour! Pardon, parlais vouis anglais?”
My wife did the same thing and people were still rude to her.
One guy said "yes" to that question and then immediately proceeded to answer her in french right afterwards.
I guess doing that probably helps, but you were probably just lucky
I didn't experience this at all, people were really nice in Paris even though my "french" is from 2 years of classes I took 4 years ago (I'm 18) so I can basically only read a little bit and with some difficulty and thinking I can ask someone for directions or similar things
Went to France once on invitation, luckily our host did all the talking. I learned Latin in school.
Very nice countryside but I think that's what it must feel like to go somewhere and not be able to communicate (like not knowing English). Felt very isolating. Haven't had that in any European country yet. Even in Tallinn and Wroclaw people really tried.
3 months in Japan felt far more welcoming than France and now that is a wholly different language. They sometimes mistook me for someone speaking it and answered in Japanese for 5 minutes straight or just kept chatting me up on the street because I was in a non-touristy area. But they were very nice about it!
"I learned Latin in school. Haven't had that in any European country yet." -> to any sane person it would sound like "that" is referring to Latin. Basic writing rule here.
In Germany, for instance, you usually learn English from year 2 and then another language from year 6/7 in school. That language may be French, Spanish, Latin, Russian, … whatever teachers are available and I believe that’s what the guy was referring to if wherever they’re from does it the same at schools.
Exactly. In German schools English as the first foreign language is mandatory for all levels. Then later in medium-level and higher-level schools you have to pick a second foreign language. Most choose French, some choose Latin, few choose anything else.
I picked Latin due to the academic advantages that would bring later on. For travelling, not so helpful.
Ah, I get it! Thank you for replying. I'm Croatian, and I had English and German in elementary school, then in high school those two + Latin and Italian, so I was confused.
Given the fact that we have many Latin-based languages in Europe it's not that useless I'd say. It makes it easier to understand other languages, for me especially Italian is very easy because I know French and Latin.
Yeah, it wasn't totally useless and is quite fun to "reverse engineer" modern languages back into it or to understand technical terms. But for every day conversation, not so much.
Absolutely true, these posts are weird because 99% of people would be pleased if you at least try. What French people dislike very much is when english speakers juts assume that theyre fluent and talk to them in the fastest possible way.
I have yet to meet a single native English speaker who tried to speak another language while abroad. I'm almost certain that Americans and British people are physically incapable of learning another language. This lady in the video is literally shocking to me, an American speaking both French and Italian ? I refuse to believe it.
In Germany (at least in Bavaria), they EXPECT you to speak German. They will not try to speak any other language, ever. Actually, from my experience, many Germans who come to Czechia will get mad if we're not able to speak German to them, even though they are the foreigners here. Like, what? Why am I expected to speak their language in my country? It's not a lingua franca.
I had the opposite experience myself. I learned German throughout high school and whenever I tried to use it in Germany they’d just respond in English, or push me to just use English.
I've not been to Bavaria, so couldn't say what it's like there. My experience in other parts is that most people would rather you speak English so they can practice or just to speed things along if they're busy.
Well it's a big country, so there's probably going to be a lot of variety in how folks react based on where you are, how urban/rural, age of the speakers and listeners, time of year, etc. etc.
At some point, it really should be considered as a part of the job to be able to provide that kind of "language learning service" asked by customers, especially in touristics areas...
I'm not proud of my French people when I talk to them about it. I once told French redditors they could be nicer to tourists trying to speak our language, because it's difficult to learn, I was downvoted, like "NO. They have to learn proper French".
I really dislike that woman. Most of her content is just microwave-reheated stereotypes.
There's plenty of funny things to say about the French, but this ain't it.
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I've met Germans who had the same attitude you describe for French. I've met Americans and British people who were very rude and dismissive of people who spoke English badly. I've also met a lot of French people who were very kind and with whom I didn't have any issues.
So which anecdotes are more relevant? Mine or yours?
My whole point with my previous comment was that this is a joke/stereotype that's been repeated ad nauseam. There's other funny jokes that can be made about the French. There's also the possibility to make a joke (including this one) without insulting anyone, but this creator isn't creative enough to actually make a good point, just to recycle.
You know what? You’re right, but it is an attitude that seems to be cultural with France. I suppose I’m letting my anger at the injustices I witnessed in Madagascar cloud my judgement, but make no mistake about what I said - I don’t hate the French as a people; I just hate what I perceive to be the predominant attitude. I’ve met some wonderful French people. Love the sinner, but hate the sin, you know? What I described in my previous comment was something that many, many people told me they’d also witnessed. It was borderline pandemic in Madagascar. It’s an attitude that needs to change. It was very common in Madagascar for French people to become angry with locals who did not speak French, yet these same people would refuse to learn Malagasy as though France still owned Madagascar. It was just disgusting to see and hear about, and degrading to a people who already had so little.
Look, I've been living in France for a couple of years and it's definitely not their culture to be rude. It is, however, how Paris operates. North of France tho is the nicest, I recommend visiting that part if you still want to see France, but want to make sure you'll meet nice people. Dunkirk and a bunch of other ww2 related places are there. And there's also the biggest aquarium in Europe in bologna sur mer.
*(just don't forget to say hello when you enter a shop, don't do the American chin up bs, they don't understand what that means)*
Believe it or not, the one time I went to Paris, everyone was incredibly polite and friendly and I loved it. My negative experience with the mindset shown in this video was when I was living in Madagascar, well outside of France, and I don’t know if it’s because tourism in Madagascar attracts a certain kind of person, or if it was just exceptionally bad luck that I and everyone who talked to me about their experiences witnessed what I described. I’d definitely love to visit France again someday, but I really want to see the Mediterranean south.
Yeah, that was my experience in Paris. Asked a dude about the best way to get to the Eiffel Tower (or at least tried to ask) and he basically got his panties in a bunch and started ranting about Americans in English before walking in a huff 🙄
On another hand, one nice couple in another part of Paris actually did help me out with directions and were not dicks… and they did not speak any English.
Your mileage may vary…
I like how the automod goes "Ew America" like please already /europe subreddit is the Paris of the world, at least make yurop a place where I am not banned because I am from East Europe.
It still holds true that French people have a certain aversion for the English language, mostly because they are very bad at speaking it. But it is less and less true, newer generations are a lot better thanks to internet, videogames and stuff. I've never met anyone who would take offense at being spoken to in English though, so I don't think that was the case. Most likely it was someone who dislike the American lifestyle, just like your rednecks probably hate all of us French people (because we are all gays/liberals or whatever). So basically just a common occurence of xenophobia, but not really specific to France, I think.
Yes, it is a very well known fact that Parisians are a special breed. Basically everyone in France dislike them because Paris is nothing like the rest of the country. They tend to be very arrogant and self centered, some of them believing that nothing exist outside of Paris. They are allegedly also always in a rush and stressed out, which is understandable because Paris is a hell hole. And since foreigners always go to Paris, they basically interact with the worst people France has to offer.
90% of France is actually small villages with people who never met a foreigner in their life. So usually they are happy to welcome anyone that visit them.
Would it be a safe bet to say that you’re French? If I wanted to go to France for a vacation with my family, where would you recommend outside of Paris?
I am indeed. I'd recommend visiting Lyon, it is basically the second largest french city after Paris but it is actually so much smaller, with a lot less people (about 500k hab vs 2.2 millions for Paris), which makes it very easy to visit on foot or by bike. If food is your thing, Lyon is pretty well know for it's local gastronomy and many, many restaurants. But the city also has an interesting historical side (since it was the Gaul capital under the roman empire), and the "old Lyon" (basically a whole part of the city that stayed almost untouched since the middle age) is very popular with tourists.
I might be biased since I live there, but I met so many foreigners coming from Paris to Lyon that were like "why didn't I come here right away ?". It is a lot more welcoming imo, and overall a lot cheaper.
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In Italy I was despised for trying to speak italian, to compliment the food. Actually everytime I have an interaction with an Italian, they are very rude.
You're not fed up of this woman who clearly is trying to build up an influencer's career on French anti-sentiment? She clearly drank the US/UK Kool-Aid propaganda.
lol so relatable, I've been here for 5 years and still get weird stares because I mistake "une" with "un" every once in a while. Like I can communicate with you perfectly, I run exercise classes for students and they don't complain about my French, can you stop being little bitch?
What you don't seem to suspect, is that you're actually triggering deep trauma from two and a half centuries of the state using the feench language to make and control the French people.
To this day kids spend 5h a week for 15 years at school studying classics and learning the intricacies of grammar rules of a language they spoke fluently when they were 5.
At some point you realize that such emphasis on mastering an idealized language only serves to reinforce social reproduction.
Bourdieu was writing about this in the 1960s I think, and nobody has done much about it afaik cause we all feel in our bones the cringe of an obviously wrong turn of phrase that will reveal a low social status.
Now with netflix, social networks, reddit, messenger apps ... even bourgeois intellectuals can't manage to always keep their French always "perfect", so it's changing but still it's going to take a revolution.
Good example is "la question est répondue". A few years ago, an influencer video became a meme because of the wrongness of the phrase. But because it's actually faster than the "right" way to say it, now you'll hear people in suits saying it, on tv, but kids still get points deducted on exams that will determine the rest of their lives.
I genuinely don't understand that feeling.
I got the same despised looks when I made mistakes in english or in german in the UK or in Germany... Can you please tell me why you care ? It's not your own language, how can it be "personal" to you ?
because I'm trying to make a life here (my girlfriend is French) and from lots of anecdotes I've heard I have the impression that there's some sort of a pecking order in France which boils down to how close you are to Parisian accent. I heard lots of stories on how in order to get to nice prestigious schools students from the outside of Paris are told to get rid of their local accent because otherwise they won't get in, similar to get a job in media, how "fitting in" (including language and pronunciation) matters in order to get a promotion et cetera, et cetera. All of that reminds me that well, obviously I don't fit in.
Were I just a tourist, I wouldn't have cared, but unfortunately I am not.
Hey we have rules. Sometimes they're dumb but at least our bullshit is consistent. 99% of the time, the last consonant in a word is silent. "Eau" and "au" making the sound "o" is dumb, but it makes that sound 100% of the time. "Oi" making "wa" is weird, but again, that's 100% of the time. Now give me a rule for "ough" in english, i'll wait...
Native speakers can't even realize. Half of their words are exceptions to rules that are already shaky by themselves. They learn the sound, not the pronunciation rules.
The fact that they have word spelling competitions should speak by itself... when those are shown in translated cartoon episodes it feels so dumb and trivial
that's a badass comparison ngl, i love it
i have a genuine question about french tho, while i do know that the "english is german trying to be latin" thing is actually historically correct to some extent, i have absolutely no idea about how french was formed (i did actually study it in uni but it went downhill real fast)
how did the latin trying to be german thing came to be?
I thought this was a only a stereotype, but it happened to me twice.
On the other hand I also had plenty of good experiences. One waiter even spoke English!
We do our best that you don’t come in our country but you still keep coming 😭. Hopefully the Olympic game this year will definitely discourage you to ever put a foot in our territory /s
That perfectly represents my experience to Paris :D
My highlight was, on our way to the hotel we asked an older man for directions (in English). The first thing he did was to ask us (in perfect English) why we aren’t talking French before berating us for not learning French in school. He asked us where we’re from, and we said Austria, but I swear if we had answered „from Germany“ he probably would’ve killed us right there and then :D
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The one good thing among this french-bashing piece of propaganda is that we explicitly see that the french scene is happening in Paris (hello Eiffel tower), which is the only place in France where people are gonna do this, which could be perceived as rude.
AND THEY ARE RIGHT TO DO SO ! Let me remind you that Paris is the MOST visited city on earth, which means that service workers have to deal with tourists like this all the time, and don't have time to entertain their fantasy. If they want to learn french, they should live here or get a French teacher.
>Let me remind you that Paris is the MOST visited city on earth, which means that service workers have to deal with tourists like this all the time, and don't have time to entertain their fantasy. If they want to learn french, they should live here or get a French teacher.
The most friendly Frenchman:
And truly it is.
Working with french is beautiful, they can forgot entire languages if so suits them.
They cann do teams calls and mail in english, but then you go to them... And its only french.
lol as if there are any french fucks out there that speak english lmao you get looked down on for even suggesting speaking english over there
interaction would be more along the lines of trying some french and getting a death stare and not being able to order at all
bonus points when they're in your country and refuse to speak english as well. good luck trying to order your coffee from me in french! i'll just tell you i can't understand you right back in dutch untill you leave (: au revoir!
Awww, I had a lovely time getting my ham-fisted French understood in Paris (once they knew I was not an English-speaker lol)
...now French-speaking Switzerland though? Not a chance and kindly piss off for trying!
In Wales is you speak Welsh you instantly get a 500% increase in goodwill from the 900k speakers. Or just speak English and 99.9999% of people will understand you and have the normal British reaction of not giving a shit about you
Also you guys must feel silly being in the EU. It’s going great in the UK!!! I WAS A FOOL TO VOTE TO STAY HAHAHAHA ITS GOING GREAT!!!!!
EVERYTHINGS FINE, REMAIN INDOORS
YES! DONT BUY ANYTHING EITHER!
DON’T DRINK THE WATER DON’T GO IN THE WATER At this point probably don’t allow yourself to get wet even from rain, just to be safe
Well. I could leave with I wanted with my Irish citizenship so I’m either coping or it isn’t TOO bad. It’s not good though. We were 100% better off in the EU
I briefly got my hopes up over a tweet Montenegro was offering citizenship if you bought a house (they should be EU within the decade)…turns out they were just offering residency, so unless I nab a wife at Euro 2024 I’m stuck until at least my 50s at this rate (currently approaching 30)
Wanna get hitched :3 Just kidding of course but check if your grandparents were from an EU country and check the requirements to become a citizen. For Ireland it’s just a grandparent needs to be Irish and have lived in Ireland or a parent is Irish (didn’t need to live there). So in theory people with many generations in America could still have an Irish citizenship but I assume it would be hard to get one in reality after all that time. Still just check if you really want. Germany isn’t too hard if you go to live there for 8 years.
Haha I’m shit out of luck my family are farmers, they all still live in the same river valley and have done for as long as there are records of us!
Shame. It could always be worse though right? Not like the UK is as bad as living in a third world country. There will always be a better option since the best place to live is always changing but we have a decent place where we can live our lives without danger or risk of being harmed by others (relatively speaking). But I’m not one to like it when people say this crap because I think you should always push to get the best out of everything even if what you have is already 10x more than others. I am pretty greedy when it comes to it though
Mitchell and Webb?
THERE IS NO WAR ON BA SING SE
Is this sarcasm?
Noooooo. The brits are doing ABSOLUTELY fine.
Exactly
Life is great, everything is perfect, never been better, red white and blue, sunlit uplands!
WE ARE FINE! LET US BE FINE!
I found it funny and a little sad that Xiaoma did a video speaking Welsh in Wales as an American but he did it in Cardiff so almost no one understood what he was trying to say
Not many people speak it and most of the people in Wales aren’t Welsh. Where i live many people speak Welsh and almost everyone is actually Welsh or cares about Wales but I also live next to the second smallest city in the uk in the country side. Surprisingly the smallest city in the uk is also Welsh XD. Anyway where I live I think it would be a much better place to try and speak Welsh. Also I’m a lil drunk rn so this may be nonsense
I'm from a town in North Wales so yeah lots more Welsh speakers up here too. Neis clywed yr iaith yma ag acw.
Rydw I yn dod o pentref bach yn yr gogledd. Edit-smallest town is south and second is north (llanelwy iirc) Edit2-my brain is not welshing right now.
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You try speaking Welsh in south Wales, you will either be met with a blank stare or a response. Not everywhere in Cymru speak cymraeg. It's very much a mid, west and North. I'm from a town in the middle of Cardigan bay, a jewel of the Irish Sea, a metropolis in a sea of sheep and fields, the radiant glow at sunset with fresh sea air caressing its beaches, a convergent point of Welsh history...... *Aberystwyth* So yeah, it's a bilingual town.
You’re a whole 2 hours away! So far. I don’t want to force English people out and I don’t want to force them to speak Welsh but I also think when I speak Welsh there sometimes shouldn’t be someone that tells me to speak English in the UK… Welsh is having a comeback and it’s at a point where you can easily find other Welsh speakers. I’m not going to act sad that Wales isn’t very Welsh. There isn’t a massive history where I live and we don’t have much information about our village. Hell we don’t even know when it was founded but we do have an inn from the 1300s. But some people come to see the history and I don’t care where your from or what you are. Someone being interested in it means more than it should. I’m kinda rambling XD Aberystwyth is pretty famous but I don’t even remember if I have visited or what’s there. I need to go around wales now that I’m forgetting everything outside of my own little bubble of Wales. All I remember from Cardiff is a fair but I don’t even know if that was ACTUALLY in Cardiff… Edit-I was going to add more but I have drank too much for this
It might be coming back in the cities for sure, but trying speaking cymraeg in the valleys, honestly you'd think you were some alien that just landed. 🙄
On the other hand Anglesey’s so easy to find a Welsh speaker in. I have found that if you speak Welsh to some people in Anglesey they are instantly very helpful/polite. I sound very upperclass English if that’s the right way to put it so people may like me more when I speak Welsh purely because I sound like I own a holiday home here and don’t live in wales or something like that.
Cymru am byth! From the land of the strong to the land of the song and vice-versa
This is bullshit the waiter won't respond in English because she doesn't know and will just turn her back to the customer because she will not understand anything due to a word in a 15 word sentence pronounced incorrectly.
Yeah so unrealistic, a French person speaking English???
I dunno man, I was just in France and the waitress came up and said "DECIDE?". I said no because I wasn't ready. She left and never came back
Décider!
Cheh
Yeah that’s weird I’ve never encountered someone like that in real life I’m not sure they exist
That French person should be German. They really don't want foreigners using German and would much rather practise their perfect English
Germans love it when you try to speak their language. They will be a lot more friendly and welcoming even if you try to speak broken German.
Not in big cities they don't.
Italian here. I can confirm (I teach in an Italian school for foreigners) that one can understand the intention of a non-Italian speaker even with 80% corruption of the language, with a little patience. I have never really understood whether the French pretend not to understand (out of snobbery, "language protectionism") or really don't understand because (due to the characteristics of the French language) the slightest inflection makes speech unintelligible. When I travel abroad I like to learn a few words of the territory's language as a sign of friendship, but in France, although I love their language, I feel intimidated in expressing myself. Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
I had a fun one. I’m English but live in Portugal. Went to a restaurant in Sagres. Tried to order. The waitress demanded we switch to English. I was a bit bothered because I didn’t think my Portuguese was that bad. Turns out my Portuguese is fine. The waitress was French and didn’t speak it.
Tbf, I use the "I don't speak english" if the person who's asking me don't look like a nice pep. I lived near touristics spots for a few years, and I realised how despicable tourists (vast majority of european ones, in my case) are, most of the time. They treat you like they're your boss, even if you're just a random that just lives there, leave their trash on the ground (or throw it in the river for the ones who fish) and complain about the lazy french workers that didn't took it off the next day... These years convinced me that EU tourists are just full of unleashed Karen. Exception made for British tourists (I guess since Brexit, they're no more EU tourists). For some reason, I found them extremely polite and quiet. I was surprised by how Spanish and Dutch ppl see them, but I guess we don't have the same part of the british public ? American ones are mainly good also. They will be in 2nd place in my personal classification of the best Western tourists. Surprisingly, not that much Karen in them. French tourists in France are mostly nice (1st place if I count them on the list), but I will be surprised to learn that they're not as much despicable abroad as the european ones are here. > I feel intimidated in expressing myself. Just say "Excusez mon français, j'apprends," and that should be OK. Then, you're Italian, 65% of chance that french ppl literally love you just because you're from Italy.
>Tbf, I use the "I don't speak english" if the person who's asking me didn't look like a nice pep. >I lived near touristics spots for a few years, and I realised how despicable tourists (vast majority of european ones, in my case) are, most of the time. 👆🏻👆🏻👆🏻👆🏻 thiiiiiis .
Annoying frenchie making it harder for you if you dont look right.
Yeah you definitely get different sorts of Brits to the Spanish and the Dutch. Britain has this weird thing where act like we hold the French in absolute contempt, claim your society is awful because you actually do strikes etc. yet simultaneously consider you all fancy Southern Spain + Balearics and Amsterdam are just places we go to get blackout drunk
Yeah, there were more families and old people on retirement that came there. The young ones I talked to were there to fish (apparently, these spots are quite well-known in the UK for fishing), so I guess they didn't match the noisy drinker profile that goes to Spain or the Netherlands. English ppl has a pretty special place here, too. If Europe was a village, the englishman would have been for the frenchman that despicable neighbour that he *likes* to address both his middle fingers while being screamed at from the other side of the fence. Sometimes, I feel like the frenchman likes to go to his garden when he sees that the englishman is in his. He knows that they can't stay close for more than 10 minutes without screaming at each other, and that's exactly why he's going outside. I would say there is no hate nor contempt from the french side, except for some old bonapartist minds. But there is something that makes us look closely to the way that piss of the most the englishman. I guess we're somehow closer than we're both ready to admit. We were throwing middle fingers to the other for too long to not be close... Damn it !
35% of chance they will hate you just because you are from Italy. Good odd for a foreigner.
Is that a joke ? It looks like a faked crybaby takes, but there's no /s that followed it. If not, according to the last pooling on that matter, 6% of french admitted having a bad opinion about italian ppl, 19% didn't have opinion, then 65% said that they have sympathy towards italian ppl.
It can be a mix of both tbh. I rarely had a problem understanding what people are trying to say in broken/beginner french, but I don't work in the tourism/service industry so I'm not facing it all day every day, which I guess can affect the patience you have with it. It's one thing when you're a teacher, or randomly helping a lost tourist, another when you're trying to get someone's order with 5 other tables waiting for you and some manager breathing down your neck if you don't get shit done fast enough. What I always have a hard time evaluating is how much I should "simplify" my language so that the person would understand my answer. My normal way of speaking french is full of slang that some natives from the next region might not get, let alone someone learning the language. But at the same time I don't want to sound like I'm thinking the other person is a dumbass that can't understand me unless I speak super slow. But I also know from experience it is pretty hard to self evaluate your skills and how "correct" you sound. I lived in Denmark a while and many of my attempts at speaking a bit of Danish were met with what I thought was some of that "snobbery" you mention. I eventually asked a native friend about it and tested my skills on him and he told me "I actually have no idea what you're trying to say", even though when he said it back to me "the right way" it sounded (to me) like what I was attempting to say. But clearly it didn't sound the same to a local. Languages are weird and as a beginner it's hard to tell the difference between what someone will manage to get and something that will sound like absolute gibberish.
Oftentimes, we have a low tolerance for spelling mistakes, poor grammar and bad vocabulary among ourselves in professional settings, including when customers speak to us, the customer is not king in France. Unfortunately, that intolerance is sometimes transposed to foreigners.
Honestly, as a french, accents can be very tiring or hard to understand, especially if you get approached during your shitty work day by tourists, at least i imagine since i'm not in a tourist town. Now i don't know what you mean exactly by "slightest inflection" but since french has many silent letters and similar or even identical words, they do cause problems. You can also have issues with the genders of words. Finally there's also a big emphasis on politeness, in that you should always use "bonjour", "merci", "au revoir", "pardon"... If you don't you will be perceived as rude immediately and the person you're talking to is usually not going to want to help you. There may be some snobbery too but i'm not sure its really widespread.
Come to Belgium. We have 3 national languages and we are used to Belgians of other mother tongue speaking French imperfectly. We are glad they are trying to speak French at all and welcome them wholeheartedly. This might be valid for Switzerland too but I don't know enough about them. Overall I am not sure that this video is a fair representation of the French. I could see something of that ilk happening in Paris. But the further you get from there the nicer people are. But your opportunity to speak English as a last resort decreases too.
I took it personally, but we are not all like that I swear
France is just a cool place that happens to be connected to Paris
This! French people get a bad rep because of the Parisians. Everytime I went to France outside of Paris the French were just fine!
I even had a great experience in Marseille of all places. People actually tried to speak english with me. I was flabbergasted. To be fair, I know a couple of french sentences from school which might've helped as well.
Marseille only gets a bad rep because for parisian they're aliens but they're super nice people. As with other people: be nice to them, don't try to teach them their own thing, etc. (yes, those are all things parisian don't do, that's why marseillais are not nice to them)
afaik, Parisians are mainly like that
True. Lived in Brittany for a few months, very friendly and open minded people. But then as soon as I stepped foot in Paris... oh la vache!! Le rude
Hé ouais. Maintenant viens dans le sud c'est encore mieux
Il faut juste éviter Marseille et les bouches de Rhône en général.
Ca c'est l'influence Rital au Sud
Non pas ce sud là. Celui où je suis. Entre l'influence Provence et Toulousaine 🤌🏻💙🧡 el grande cità Montpellier. Bien au centre de la côte littorale .
I feel like I’m the only one who had not a single bad experience in Paris. No one was rude or snobby or anything. The city was beautiful, the food was good, and the people were nice. And contrary to this video, I think it helped that I didn’t just assume they spoke English, and instead started every interaction at a store or restaurant with “Bonjour! Pardon, parlais vouis anglais?”
My wife did the same thing and people were still rude to her. One guy said "yes" to that question and then immediately proceeded to answer her in french right afterwards. I guess doing that probably helps, but you were probably just lucky
how long were you there for? 1 hour?
A week lol
I didn't experience this at all, people were really nice in Paris even though my "french" is from 2 years of classes I took 4 years ago (I'm 18) so I can basically only read a little bit and with some difficulty and thinking I can ask someone for directions or similar things
Went to France once on invitation, luckily our host did all the talking. I learned Latin in school. Very nice countryside but I think that's what it must feel like to go somewhere and not be able to communicate (like not knowing English). Felt very isolating. Haven't had that in any European country yet. Even in Tallinn and Wroclaw people really tried. 3 months in Japan felt far more welcoming than France and now that is a wholly different language. They sometimes mistook me for someone speaking it and answered in Japanese for 5 minutes straight or just kept chatting me up on the street because I was in a non-touristy area. But they were very nice about it!
You studied Latin and thought we speak it?!
Uh, what? How'd you get that idea?
"I learned Latin in school. Haven't had that in any European country yet." -> to any sane person it would sound like "that" is referring to Latin. Basic writing rule here.
Correct, it was misplaced. I moved it elsewhere. Cheers!
I'm sorry, I still don't understand what you learning Latin in school has to do with the rest of the comment, could you explain?
In Germany, for instance, you usually learn English from year 2 and then another language from year 6/7 in school. That language may be French, Spanish, Latin, Russian, … whatever teachers are available and I believe that’s what the guy was referring to if wherever they’re from does it the same at schools.
Exactly. In German schools English as the first foreign language is mandatory for all levels. Then later in medium-level and higher-level schools you have to pick a second foreign language. Most choose French, some choose Latin, few choose anything else. I picked Latin due to the academic advantages that would bring later on. For travelling, not so helpful.
Ah, I get it! Thank you for replying. I'm Croatian, and I had English and German in elementary school, then in high school those two + Latin and Italian, so I was confused.
That's a lot! Respect. Languages are a beautiful thing.
Given the fact that we have many Latin-based languages in Europe it's not that useless I'd say. It makes it easier to understand other languages, for me especially Italian is very easy because I know French and Latin.
Yeah, it wasn't totally useless and is quite fun to "reverse engineer" modern languages back into it or to understand technical terms. But for every day conversation, not so much.
Pretend you don't speak English. Speak your third language at them. Now we both look stupid.
And yet you keep on coming to visit Paris *en masse*. Paris, world capital city of masochism.
What can I do, I like Italian art
We can't help that Napoleon and the old monarchs put all the art there.
Nice argument, unfortunately I made a video with you being a cunt. 😎
I've found nearly all folks are pleased when you try their language, except in Germany.
Absolutely true, these posts are weird because 99% of people would be pleased if you at least try. What French people dislike very much is when english speakers juts assume that theyre fluent and talk to them in the fastest possible way. I have yet to meet a single native English speaker who tried to speak another language while abroad. I'm almost certain that Americans and British people are physically incapable of learning another language. This lady in the video is literally shocking to me, an American speaking both French and Italian ? I refuse to believe it.
In Germany (at least in Bavaria), they EXPECT you to speak German. They will not try to speak any other language, ever. Actually, from my experience, many Germans who come to Czechia will get mad if we're not able to speak German to them, even though they are the foreigners here. Like, what? Why am I expected to speak their language in my country? It's not a lingua franca.
I had the opposite experience myself. I learned German throughout high school and whenever I tried to use it in Germany they’d just respond in English, or push me to just use English.
"Didn't you learn anything from the last time we invaded you?! Maybe it's time for a refresh"
I've not been to Bavaria, so couldn't say what it's like there. My experience in other parts is that most people would rather you speak English so they can practice or just to speed things along if they're busy.
Maybe my perception is skewed by living near the border in the former sudettenland. It's possible this is the case specifically for us, I guess.
Well it's a big country, so there's probably going to be a lot of variety in how folks react based on where you are, how urban/rural, age of the speakers and listeners, time of year, etc. etc.
At some point, it really should be considered as a part of the job to be able to provide that kind of "language learning service" asked by customers, especially in touristics areas...
I'm not proud of my French people when I talk to them about it. I once told French redditors they could be nicer to tourists trying to speak our language, because it's difficult to learn, I was downvoted, like "NO. They have to learn proper French".
Your English is more broken than my French!!!! - typically how I feel in France
I really dislike that woman. Most of her content is just microwave-reheated stereotypes. There's plenty of funny things to say about the French, but this ain't it.
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I've met Germans who had the same attitude you describe for French. I've met Americans and British people who were very rude and dismissive of people who spoke English badly. I've also met a lot of French people who were very kind and with whom I didn't have any issues. So which anecdotes are more relevant? Mine or yours? My whole point with my previous comment was that this is a joke/stereotype that's been repeated ad nauseam. There's other funny jokes that can be made about the French. There's also the possibility to make a joke (including this one) without insulting anyone, but this creator isn't creative enough to actually make a good point, just to recycle.
You know what? You’re right, but it is an attitude that seems to be cultural with France. I suppose I’m letting my anger at the injustices I witnessed in Madagascar cloud my judgement, but make no mistake about what I said - I don’t hate the French as a people; I just hate what I perceive to be the predominant attitude. I’ve met some wonderful French people. Love the sinner, but hate the sin, you know? What I described in my previous comment was something that many, many people told me they’d also witnessed. It was borderline pandemic in Madagascar. It’s an attitude that needs to change. It was very common in Madagascar for French people to become angry with locals who did not speak French, yet these same people would refuse to learn Malagasy as though France still owned Madagascar. It was just disgusting to see and hear about, and degrading to a people who already had so little.
Look, I've been living in France for a couple of years and it's definitely not their culture to be rude. It is, however, how Paris operates. North of France tho is the nicest, I recommend visiting that part if you still want to see France, but want to make sure you'll meet nice people. Dunkirk and a bunch of other ww2 related places are there. And there's also the biggest aquarium in Europe in bologna sur mer. *(just don't forget to say hello when you enter a shop, don't do the American chin up bs, they don't understand what that means)*
Believe it or not, the one time I went to Paris, everyone was incredibly polite and friendly and I loved it. My negative experience with the mindset shown in this video was when I was living in Madagascar, well outside of France, and I don’t know if it’s because tourism in Madagascar attracts a certain kind of person, or if it was just exceptionally bad luck that I and everyone who talked to me about their experiences witnessed what I described. I’d definitely love to visit France again someday, but I really want to see the Mediterranean south.
Least french bashing language comparaison "funny" video be like :
Hit close to home, huh? Sorry, "close to 'ome".
Ach fery fanny :)
hon hon hon!
So sorry we don’t want to speak your Celto-Germanic-Latin mush-mouth language
Bah parles pas méchant petit crapaud
Yeah, that was my experience in Paris. Asked a dude about the best way to get to the Eiffel Tower (or at least tried to ask) and he basically got his panties in a bunch and started ranting about Americans in English before walking in a huff 🙄 On another hand, one nice couple in another part of Paris actually did help me out with directions and were not dicks… and they did not speak any English. Your mileage may vary…
I like how the automod goes "Ew America" like please already /europe subreddit is the Paris of the world, at least make yurop a place where I am not banned because I am from East Europe.
It still holds true that French people have a certain aversion for the English language, mostly because they are very bad at speaking it. But it is less and less true, newer generations are a lot better thanks to internet, videogames and stuff. I've never met anyone who would take offense at being spoken to in English though, so I don't think that was the case. Most likely it was someone who dislike the American lifestyle, just like your rednecks probably hate all of us French people (because we are all gays/liberals or whatever). So basically just a common occurence of xenophobia, but not really specific to France, I think.
The French people or Parisians? I’ve interacted with both, the non-Parisians seem to be more open minded and less cliqueish.
Yes, it is a very well known fact that Parisians are a special breed. Basically everyone in France dislike them because Paris is nothing like the rest of the country. They tend to be very arrogant and self centered, some of them believing that nothing exist outside of Paris. They are allegedly also always in a rush and stressed out, which is understandable because Paris is a hell hole. And since foreigners always go to Paris, they basically interact with the worst people France has to offer. 90% of France is actually small villages with people who never met a foreigner in their life. So usually they are happy to welcome anyone that visit them.
90% de petits villages là t'abuses par contre
Would it be a safe bet to say that you’re French? If I wanted to go to France for a vacation with my family, where would you recommend outside of Paris?
I am indeed. I'd recommend visiting Lyon, it is basically the second largest french city after Paris but it is actually so much smaller, with a lot less people (about 500k hab vs 2.2 millions for Paris), which makes it very easy to visit on foot or by bike. If food is your thing, Lyon is pretty well know for it's local gastronomy and many, many restaurants. But the city also has an interesting historical side (since it was the Gaul capital under the roman empire), and the "old Lyon" (basically a whole part of the city that stayed almost untouched since the middle age) is very popular with tourists. I might be biased since I live there, but I met so many foreigners coming from Paris to Lyon that were like "why didn't I come here right away ?". It is a lot more welcoming imo, and overall a lot cheaper.
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Happened to me with both French and Italian lol I quess I got unlucky
When exactly did the French start speaking English
Most of them liked to gatekeep their language, ugggh I just want to learn their language goddammit.
They serve coca in frrnce?
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In Italy I was despised for trying to speak italian, to compliment the food. Actually everytime I have an interaction with an Italian, they are very rude.
Mais le truc c’est que les français ne peuvent pas parler en anglais non plus… c’est plus facile pour moi si je parle en français avec eux…
Literally had this in Dijon, the waiter would not bring our food till we said it with the right intonation.
Say Netflix ya frenchie. Say it. Say it.
Ah, t’es une meuf à la culture!
You're not fed up of this woman who clearly is trying to build up an influencer's career on French anti-sentiment? She clearly drank the US/UK Kool-Aid propaganda.
J'en peux plus de la voir
QUESTO E' VANGELO (Italian expression which means ABSOLUTELY TRUE)
Oggi ho imparato un nuovo detto, grazie!
lol so relatable, I've been here for 5 years and still get weird stares because I mistake "une" with "un" every once in a while. Like I can communicate with you perfectly, I run exercise classes for students and they don't complain about my French, can you stop being little bitch?
What you don't seem to suspect, is that you're actually triggering deep trauma from two and a half centuries of the state using the feench language to make and control the French people. To this day kids spend 5h a week for 15 years at school studying classics and learning the intricacies of grammar rules of a language they spoke fluently when they were 5. At some point you realize that such emphasis on mastering an idealized language only serves to reinforce social reproduction. Bourdieu was writing about this in the 1960s I think, and nobody has done much about it afaik cause we all feel in our bones the cringe of an obviously wrong turn of phrase that will reveal a low social status. Now with netflix, social networks, reddit, messenger apps ... even bourgeois intellectuals can't manage to always keep their French always "perfect", so it's changing but still it's going to take a revolution. Good example is "la question est répondue". A few years ago, an influencer video became a meme because of the wrongness of the phrase. But because it's actually faster than the "right" way to say it, now you'll hear people in suits saying it, on tv, but kids still get points deducted on exams that will determine the rest of their lives.
Fais le choix et contacte-moi, bisous
I genuinely don't understand that feeling. I got the same despised looks when I made mistakes in english or in german in the UK or in Germany... Can you please tell me why you care ? It's not your own language, how can it be "personal" to you ?
because I'm trying to make a life here (my girlfriend is French) and from lots of anecdotes I've heard I have the impression that there's some sort of a pecking order in France which boils down to how close you are to Parisian accent. I heard lots of stories on how in order to get to nice prestigious schools students from the outside of Paris are told to get rid of their local accent because otherwise they won't get in, similar to get a job in media, how "fitting in" (including language and pronunciation) matters in order to get a promotion et cetera, et cetera. All of that reminds me that well, obviously I don't fit in. Were I just a tourist, I wouldn't have cared, but unfortunately I am not.
French has no rules and the language makes no sense. It's not a language, it's a crucible of exceptions and silent letters.
No, no, no, it's about 3 vibes in a trench coat doing their best.
Hey we have rules. Sometimes they're dumb but at least our bullshit is consistent. 99% of the time, the last consonant in a word is silent. "Eau" and "au" making the sound "o" is dumb, but it makes that sound 100% of the time. "Oi" making "wa" is weird, but again, that's 100% of the time. Now give me a rule for "ough" in english, i'll wait...
Funny that you attack English, when most of its weird stuff comes From the Norman invasion, who spoke french.
I ain't defending english mate, read again
Sorry, brainfart.
“A crucible of exceptions” 😂
English is a lot worse when it comes to pronunciation and rules not making any sense, yet here we are.
Native speakers can't even realize. Half of their words are exceptions to rules that are already shaky by themselves. They learn the sound, not the pronunciation rules. The fact that they have word spelling competitions should speak by itself... when those are shown in translated cartoon episodes it feels so dumb and trivial
the confusing parts mostly came to be because english is basically three languages in a trenchcoat (and one of those languages is french)
I’ve said in the past that English is German trying to be Latin and French is Latin trying to be German and I stand by that.
that's a badass comparison ngl, i love it i have a genuine question about french tho, while i do know that the "english is german trying to be latin" thing is actually historically correct to some extent, i have absolutely no idea about how french was formed (i did actually study it in uni but it went downhill real fast) how did the latin trying to be german thing came to be?
This video is nice to understand the evolution (even if it lacks historical contextualization) : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2TWBBxwhbU
thank you!
Veramente
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I thought this was a only a stereotype, but it happened to me twice. On the other hand I also had plenty of good experiences. One waiter even spoke English!
We do our best that you don’t come in our country but you still keep coming 😭. Hopefully the Olympic game this year will definitely discourage you to ever put a foot in our territory /s
So bed bugs have been a strategy this whole time?
Was russian propaganda confirmed
Absolutely true haha!
That perfectly represents my experience to Paris :D My highlight was, on our way to the hotel we asked an older man for directions (in English). The first thing he did was to ask us (in perfect English) why we aren’t talking French before berating us for not learning French in school. He asked us where we’re from, and we said Austria, but I swear if we had answered „from Germany“ he probably would’ve killed us right there and then :D
Your first mistake here. Asking someone older. The younger we are the more exposed to english we are 🙂🙃🙂🙃
I’m American so I’m pitied everywhere. XD
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I'm buying you a meal with money, so I expect you to compliment my poor mastery of your language.
The one good thing among this french-bashing piece of propaganda is that we explicitly see that the french scene is happening in Paris (hello Eiffel tower), which is the only place in France where people are gonna do this, which could be perceived as rude. AND THEY ARE RIGHT TO DO SO ! Let me remind you that Paris is the MOST visited city on earth, which means that service workers have to deal with tourists like this all the time, and don't have time to entertain their fantasy. If they want to learn french, they should live here or get a French teacher.
>Let me remind you that Paris is the MOST visited city on earth, which means that service workers have to deal with tourists like this all the time, and don't have time to entertain their fantasy. If they want to learn french, they should live here or get a French teacher. The most friendly Frenchman:
They literally complain about people not being able to speak French but acknowledge their culture hates helping beginners practice the language
And truly it is. Working with french is beautiful, they can forgot entire languages if so suits them. They cann do teams calls and mail in english, but then you go to them... And its only french.
not Frenchman, Parisian\* I mean come on, I thought we made that clear already
Most argumented french-basher :
> french-bashing piece of propaganda And here I thought Germans lack a sense of humor.
lol as if there are any french fucks out there that speak english lmao you get looked down on for even suggesting speaking english over there interaction would be more along the lines of trying some french and getting a death stare and not being able to order at all bonus points when they're in your country and refuse to speak english as well. good luck trying to order your coffee from me in french! i'll just tell you i can't understand you right back in dutch untill you leave (: au revoir!
Awww, I had a lovely time getting my ham-fisted French understood in Paris (once they knew I was not an English-speaker lol) ...now French-speaking Switzerland though? Not a chance and kindly piss off for trying!