Paris vs London vs New York City (house, cheap, citizen)

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by Davy-040

I'm talking about a West-European metropole / WORLD city not rural China.
If the French in Paris don't want to talk English to tourists they should stop calling themselves a WORLD city.

Bull. A world city does not have to have English be common to be a world city. Given that you're capitalizing the word WORLD, then I think some consideration should be given to the actual demographics of the world.

France has as its top main import and export trade partners non-English speaking nations. Its immigrant population are mainly not English speaking. You're pretty far off base.

[Davy-040]

I agree when you gonna live in a country longer than a couple months you have to know the language (basic level) but you can't expect that from a tourist.

I don't expect people who visit the Netherlands to speak Dutch.

[ErikJohnsson]

If the US economy wasn't crap, I'd say a few smaller US cities are better than NYC overall (Portland, San Francisco). NYC is way too into itself, too much is happening at once, too noisy, too crowded, too many tourists. Manhattan is for the super-wealthy, ie finance types, bankers, senior-whatevers, rich kids. Mega-chain stores have taken over. The other burroughs are in pretty rough poverty. Young artists go there hoping for the best, but just scrape by if they're lucky, or they're subsidized by rich parents. San Francisco has similar problems with gentrification as a result of the US' massive and growing income gap.

[corcorangirl]

The French have their problems with foreign languages. I taught German at a language school in Paris, and people were way too shy to say anything because they were so afraid to make mistakes or to be laughed at. The french school system concentrates on punishing mistakes, which is not a good thing when learning a language, and after 12 years of losing points for using a wrong tense and never getting a bonus for trying something new, people just start to hate foreign languages and never want to talk them again.

A big part of french people not speaking english to foreigners is in my opinion that they are ashamed of how bad their level is. Most americans have learned some foreign language in school, how would you feel if you had to give directions in it to a stranger on the street?

And by the way, in my experience Parisians more often than not do make an effort to talk english to strangers, and if they hear that you have great troubles with french they will often switch to english to make things easier for you. And as minatu ku said Paris is a horribly stressful town, most people live in the suburbs and have long commutes, work long hours under a lot of pressure and when they finally can go home or are on their lunch break the last thing they want is to talk english to a tourist who is lost. I think especially americans, who have the luck to speak the lingua franca of the western world, and often make no effort at all to learn another language have no right in criticising the french for their lack of language skills.

[BigCityDreamer]

Originally Posted by ErikJohnsson

If the US economy wasn't crap, I'd say a few smaller US cities are better than NYC overall (Portland, San Francisco). NYC is way too into itself, too much is happening at once, too noisy, too crowded, too many tourists. Manhattan is for the super-wealthy, ie finance types, bankers, senior-whatevers, rich kids. Mega-chain stores have taken over. The other burroughs are in pretty rough poverty. Young artists go there hoping for the best, but just scrape by if they're lucky, or they're subsidized by rich parents. San Francisco has similar problems with gentrification as a result of the US' massive and growing income gap.

I've been to San Francisco a number of times, and I know it is nothing like New York City. San Francisco is a lot smaller.

[ErikJohnsson]

Originally Posted by BigCityDreamer

I've been to San Francisco a number of times, and I know it is nothing like New York City. San Francisco is a lot smaller.

Uh, that's exactly what I said in the first sentence:

If the US economy wasn't crap, I'd say a few smaller US cities are better than NYC overall (Portland, San Francisco).

[ErikJohnsson]

Originally Posted by corcorangirl

And by the way, in my experience Parisians more often than not do make an effort to talk english to strangers, and if they hear that you have great troubles with french they will often switch to english to make things easier for you. And as minatu ku said Paris is a horribly stressful town, most people live in the suburbs and have long commutes, work long hours under a lot of pressure and when they finally can go home or are on their lunch break the last thing they want is to talk english to a tourist who is lost. I think especially americans, who have the luck to speak the lingua franca of the western world, and often make no effort at all to learn another language have no right in criticising the french for their lack of language skills.

Have to agree. The difference you'll get in response is based on your effort.

How would an American react if a French person walked up to them and spoke French, then appeared frustrated when the American didn't respond in French? People come to the US and try to speak English even if it's difficult for them (or Spanish if they're in a heavily Hispanic area).

English is the dominant language of international business and politics, but people actually living in the countries use their own language almost entirely, from speaking to reading and writing to watching films and TV. In some countries they have very little exposure to English, some have more.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by ErikJohnsson

Have to agree. The difference you'll get in response is based on your effort.

How would an American react if a French person walked up to them and spoke French, then appeared frustrated when the American didn't respond in French? People come to the US and try to speak English even if it's difficult for them (or Spanish if they're in a heavily Hispanic area).

English is the dominant language of international business and politics, but people actually living in the countries use their own language almost entirely, from speaking to reading and writing to watching films and TV. In some countries they have very little exposure to English, some have more.

Your post and the one you quoted are very true. People are confusing the fact that "English is the *best* language to know for travelling around the world these days" with "English is the *only* language you have to know for travelling around the world these days".

So yeah, if you pick a random supermarket stockboy or taxi driver or traffic cop somewhere in the world the best chance you have with a language (other than that person's native language) is English. But that doesn't mean that every single person you run into will speak English or should speak English and that you are justified in flipping out if they don't.

Plus, in many regions of the world there is a regional lingua franca other than English that people tend to learn as a second language and prefer it over English. Languages like Russian, French or Spanish for example depending on where you are in the world.

[Acajack]

One of my absolute favourite "anglo-triumphalist" post-travel comments is:

"I went to city/country X, and the locals were so rude - they refused to speak me in English even though I know they could!"

[lucas9]

Will Page, you obviously have a deep inferiority complex re: New York.

In any case, I've lived in all three and place London at the bottom. I love New York and Paris equally, but I give the edge to New York because I living in the United States. I find life in America easier than life in Europe.