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Getting people not to speak English | ||
Tags: Language Banditry | Convincing native speakers | Immersion | Swedish | Learning Technique/Method | Accent | English | German | French | Spanish | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Raistlin Majere Trilingual Hexaglot Senior Member Spain uciprotour-cycling.c Joined 7152 days ago 455 posts - 424 votes  7 sounds Speaks: English*, Spanish*, Catalan*, FrenchA1, Italian, German Studies: Swedish | Message 41 of 169 25 July 2005 at 5:34am | IP Logged | ||
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I insisted on speaking French even when they spoke English, but nevertheless that did not deter them.
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| jradetzky Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom geocities.com/jradet Joined 7207 days ago 521 posts - 485 votes 1 sounds Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2, GermanB1 | Message 42 of 169 25 July 2005 at 1:32pm | IP Logged | ||
That happened to me in Germany. Once they realized I did not look German they talked to me in English even though I talked to them in German. I was able to talk in German only to an old man in Munich and to a lady and her children in Zurich. When in was in France, since I did not speak much French at the time, I tried to use English, but people would not understand. At the ticket counter for example, people preferred to talk in Spanish to me instead of English! Fun indeed. Edited by jradetzky on 25 July 2005 at 1:40pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Martien Heptaglot Senior Member Netherlands martienvanwanrooij.n Joined 7105 days ago 134 posts - 148 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, German, Spanish, Turkish, Italian, French Studies: Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, Latin, Swedish, Arabic (Written) | Message 43 of 169 25 July 2005 at 1:51pm | IP Logged | ||
As the administrator already suggested: why didn't you pretend not to understand any English at all or even not to know what language they were speaking? So if they say in English "ten euros please" you say "comment???" , if they repeat "ten euros please" (maybe with a bad pronunciation) you just say "je suis désolé Monsieur mais je ne comprend pas l'Allemand" (This trick worked for me in Spain a couple of times :) ) Edited by Martien on 25 July 2005 at 1:52pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Raistlin Majere Trilingual Hexaglot Senior Member Spain uciprotour-cycling.c Joined 7152 days ago 455 posts - 424 votes 7 sounds Speaks: English*, Spanish*, Catalan*, FrenchA1, Italian, German Studies: Swedish | Message 44 of 169 25 July 2005 at 4:29pm | IP Logged | ||
Enough to shatter the poor man's morale to pieces :). That reminds me, next to me in the Champs Élysées there were a couple of French men. In front of them was an Australian couple, who the Frenchmen mistook for Germans. And the French kept talking to the visibly bothered Australians in German trying to show off when in fact they were looking stupid because they mistook English for German :) Edited by Raistlin Majere on 26 July 2005 at 4:37am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| maxb Diglot Senior Member Sweden Joined 7183 days ago 536 posts - 589 votes 7 sounds Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: Mandarin | Message 45 of 169 26 July 2005 at 8:45am | IP Logged | ||
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Before going to China in June of this year I was a little worried that I wouldn't get many oppurtunitites to practice chinese, having read on some internet forums that many Chinese are not willing to speak chinese to foreigners. However what I experienced while there was completely different. Whenever I addressed people in Chinese they answered in Chinese (expect for one guy in a department store). Moreover they seemed genuinely happy that I could speak chinese so they didn't have to speak English!
I think you have to choose the right oppurtunity to speak chinese. Many people working in stores and in markets in China aren't very good at English so they will happily switch to chinese, however if you encounter someone who speaks English really well it would be futile to speak chinese with them (unless your chinese is better then their english of course. ). For instance in Shanghai a man came up and started talking to my parents and me. He spoke English very well, and had a large vocabulary so I never even tried to speak chinese with him. Edited by maxb on 26 July 2005 at 8:48am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| KingM Triglot Senior Member michaelwallaceauthor Joined 7191 days ago 275 posts - 300 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French Studies: Russian | Message 46 of 169 28 July 2005 at 1:17pm | IP Logged | ||
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My French is pretty weak, but I've never had that problem either in Quebec or France. They will generally switch to English only when I get to the head-shaking stage.
I suspect the reason is that in whatever language I'm learning I work overtime to get my accent as close to native as possible. Even if I can only say one or two things I want it to sound right. This does tend to make me sound like I speak more of the language than I really do. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| epingchris Triglot Senior Member Taiwan shih-chuan.blog.ntu. Joined 7028 days ago 273 posts - 284 votes 5 sounds Studies: Taiwanese, Mandarin*, English, FrenchB2 Studies: Japanese, German, Turkish | Message 47 of 169 30 August 2005 at 9:26am | IP Logged | ||
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Hmm, is that also the case now even in France? I've heard a lot of people saying that Frenchmen are reluctant to speak English, and if you talk to them in English they will respond in FRENCH! Maybe that was the case before but not now?
When I went to the US for a year, a Taiwanese family, which is a friend of my family, invited us to their home. The younger boy of the family (a bit older than me) can understand Mandarin, but he only speaks in English. I wanted to practice my English and he wanted to practice his Mandarin (did he? Maybe he just didn't see why there's need of it) and we ended up speaking in......English! Of course it's that way because he is very poor in Mandarin while at least I was able to make conversation in English. I think he's successfully integrated into America. Edited by epingchris on 02 September 2005 at 6:31am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| victor Tetraglot Moderator United States Joined 7318 days ago 1098 posts - 1056 votes 6 sounds Speaks: Cantonese*, English, FrenchC1, Mandarin Studies: Spanish Personal Language Map | Message 48 of 169 30 August 2005 at 5:45pm | IP Logged | ||
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France and Quebec are a bit different. At least 1/3 of Québécois are fully bilingual, and the other 2/3 can usually speak English at least to an intermediate level.
They usually choose if they want to speak English or not, but they are not incapable of doing so. Edited by victor on 30 August 2005 at 7:07pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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