You have to deal with that foreign language if you’ve decided to travel abroad.  This is true no matter what your native language is.  It’s handy to know English.

English is widely spoken around the world.  When someone from Greece or Poland meets someone from Italy or Germany, they speak English.

Since English seems to be the lingua franca around the world, we’ll look at it from that perspective.  If you’re a native English speaker, that’s good for you, but to be a real traveler, you should learn a few words of that foreign language… hello, good-bye, please and thank you at the very least.  It’s just polite to do that. (more…)