2 language conversations

Man of Honour
Man of Honour
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3 May 2004
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Kapitalist Republik of Surrey
I've been trying to think how to make this into an interesting thread but I've failed so I'm just going to post it anyway otherwise I'll forget. I was camping at Lemans 24hrs race and got talking to some French girls in the campsite and although it's happened before this was the first time I really noticed. Probably because I really wanted to practice my French but everything I said was in French and everything they said was in English, so the conversation was being held in two languages.

Anyone else experienced this?

Maybe not so strange afterall, but it's odd that they want to speak to someone in a different language in their own country?

Edit: the girls were CUTE by the way, as most French girls usually are ;)
 
Yes I had this when skiing in Chamonix earlier this year.

Met some people there and spoke French to them, but who spoke English back to me.

I didn't really think about it at the time, only afterwards.
 
pics of you're lying. :D

also it's not difficult to want to talk in another language etc. the english are very naive as the czech/polish/slovakian people i know all prefer practising english whereas we just talk louder as they 'must' know how to talk english lol.

i talk in czech/german, they reply in english. we correct each other as they want to learn. :)
 
Quite common when I used to go to France on holiday. The only problem was, that after the 3rd week, my accent was so good and my tan was great, they all thought I was french and wanted to know which district I was from :D
 
Pics or GTFO. :D
If my camera came back with pictures of other girls I'd be dead. SWMBO would kill me, even if they are French. And if/when she finds out I gave one of them my cowboy hat I'm even more dead :D

I didn't really think about it at the time, only afterwards.
It seems to work though, bizarrely. I wanted to hear them speak French more than anything else, sooo sexy ;)
 
I sometimes have conversations in 3 languages.

Me, sister, parents.

Parents speaks to us in Haka and Cantonese
Me and Sis speak Cantonese to Parents (rarely in Haka)
Sister and I speak English to each other

Me and my sister are the only ones who know every word being said, my parents can only speak Cantonese and Haka Fluently, and a little English.

Sounds complicated, but it's just click, no translation needed.
 
When I was on holiday last year we went to a restaurant and I asked for a table for five in Spanish and the waiter replied "what's that mate?". Was plain sailing from there, well it was the Costa Del Sol :o

I'm sure it's only a matter of time until technology allows us to talk to each other in languages we don't even know.
 
yes this has happened to me with but i later was told by said persons that it was because my french was crap but they didnt want to upset me while i was trying so hard :p there english was probably better than mine too :o
 
yes this has happened to me with but i later was told by said persons that it was because my french was crap but they didnt want to upset me while i was trying so hard :p there english was probably better than mine too :o

Their English probably were. :p
 
Yep, happened to me before. I am fluent French speaker and was glad to have the opportunity to speak some French to this French girl whilst on a conference. She spoke to me in English. I didn't notice until someone pointed out what we were doing.
 
Same thing. Have spoken to foreign friends in French and they reply in English.

Generally prefer it if they would stick to French though, so I can get used to the accent, but I guess they are thinking the same thing.
 
Another regular here. It's mainly at work these days, when my colleagues manage to remember that they don't need to switch to English. In the past I've had such conversations with friends too, though, including one massive blazing row which would probably have sounded quite bizarre to anyone listening, especially as neither language involved was native to the country we were in!
 
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