lhrsfo

My grandfather worked for Shell Oil at the start of the 20th Century and had to attend meetings in Europe with clients and colleagues from various European nations. The only language they all had in common was Latin, so Latin was used in the meetings.

pinniped

That's awesome. Any photographs or other memorabilia from those trips? Was he working long enough to ever fly one of the early transatlantic airline services?

BuildingMyBento

I can't speak for Spain, but I'll always be a non-local in China, even though I speak some Chinese. (and never mind the few times I was called a Uyghur.)

For instance, I wandered into a sandwich shop in Zhuzhou, Hunan. The owner invited me upstairs for tea, and after chatting for a while, he whipped up a "bacon" sandwich for me. I don't see that whole encounter occurring either for a local or a non-Chinese speaking person, but yes it is one of those (fortunately numerous) moments that I'll think about for years.

superangrypenguin

How do you speak Chinese? Mandarin, Cantonese perhaps, but not much information is given when someone speaks Chinese

Ok I may be a bit pedantic here

ksandness

It really depends on where you will be doing most of your traveling.

If most of your traveling will be in one region, learn one of the languages commonly spoken in that region.

I'm a special case, in that I make a living as a Japanese-English translator, but the great advantage of speaking Japanese is that I can talk to literally anyone in the country. I've had some great encounters with children and old people and others who have never studied or have forgotten English.

Even in a region where most people speak English (e.g. Scandinavia), knowing a bit of the local language or a related language can help with reading signs. The written forms of Norwegian, Danish, and Swedish are easy to figure out if you know just one of those languages, although the spoken forms are quite different, and I was able to read a lot of signs in Amsterdam due to my knowledge of German. Of course, Dutch is a separate language, but looks almost like a halfway point between English and German.

BuildingMyBento

Last I checked, Chinese NEVER referred to Cantonese.