I admit that I'm extraordinarily fortunate that I speak English, meaning that most museums and cultural sites I've visited worldwide -- even where English isn't the native language -- have signs and guides who speak English.

I speak some Spanish and a smattering of Arabic, my Mom speaks English, French, Spanish and can get by in Italian, my fiance speaks French, etc.

Asking -- and being willing to pay -- for help is essential. I don't hesitate to use guides, when necessary, in countries where English is not a common second-language and neither me nor my travel companion speak common languages in the country. The concierge in nicer Japanese hotels will bend over backward to help you -- at the Shangri-La Tokyo, they made all of our restaurant and train reservations for us, provided translated menus in anticipation of meals at restaurants where English wasn't spoken, and gave us maps with directions in English and Japanese (including photos of the door at our destination so we'd recognize it).

Google Translate gets better and better -- heck, I use it to communicate with my cleaning people, who do not speak much English (and I speak even less Polish).

If you don't have an easy reference to help you translate, sign language is great! I remember going to China in the 1980s and there was a guy in our group who went out for a stroll and couldn't find his way back to the White Swan Hotel in Guangzhou. Eventually he managed to imitate a bird while pointing to a white shirt and someone figured out where he was trying to go.

I've been to about 50 countries, and I can't think of one where we weren't able to overcome the language barrier in one way or another.