Yes Alberta public schools, and all over the city, not in any one section. When I travel overseas I try to take whatever free time I have, travel on public transportation, and see stuff, get down in the alleys, check out the places the locals eat.
In Italy after my first day I had basically picked up a guide, and a ton of information in broken French and English. In France I had a hard time even getting people to acknowledge I was there. -----Original Message----- From: Dana Tierney [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, March 31, 2007 10:15 PM To: CF-Community Subject: Re: French Protest um, these would have been Alberta public schools? Still. I am sure you could ask for directions. What part of Paris are we talking about, out of curiosity? If you were in the tourist areas people may simply have been Americaned out. That woman shouting across a room about how cute something was was real, and probably singlehandedly set perceptions of American back city-wide. FWIW, I was fluent, but my mother was routinely treated as subintelligent because she was not. As are most non-English speakers in the US, to be fair. It's hard to escape the stereotypes others have of your country when you are in a foreign country. I can't tell you how many times I had to explain that no, I had never seen an igloo, not a real one anyway. I think this is where Joachim was going. My experience in Denmark was that younger people tended to speak English and older people spoke German. And did not want to. As a complicating factor, my German was just barely good enough to buy food and ask for directions, so I doubt anyone thought I was German. So he may well be saying something else, as I suspect he speaks German the way he does everything..... >God I hated Paris, and the exact opposite experience. > >I learned French in school, not in the 2 years in US high school manner, >but over 6 years in schools in Canada. I can more than get by. I know >soccer, and pay attention to the politics. Then again I was there as a >US Gov't rep. > >-----Original Message----- >From: Gruss Gott [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2007 7:53 PM >To: CF-Community >Subject: Re: French Protest > >> Sam wrote: >> You're from Minnesota? Aren't you always the tourist when you leave >home :) >> > >Well there are tourists and there are visitors; I'm a visitor since I >rarely tour. > >Visitors learn a language at least enough to say "hello", "i'm sorry I >don't speak <language>", "please", "thank you", "I'm sorry", and "can >I buy you a beer?". They learn the general culture and what's >acceptable and what's not. They learn about the place they're >visiting and stay where they can learn the most about their hosts; >that's not a tourist motel. > >They address their hosts first in their host's language, ask >permission to do things, act with care and forethought, and try to >learn a thing or two about local sports teams, politics, etc. >Visitors feel gracious to have been allowed to visit and ensure their >hosts know that. > >I've been to probably 20 foreign countries throughout Europe and Asia >and NEVER had a problem with that methodology. EVERY country I've >been in, I have a great story about someone who went above and beyond >to help me. > >No two places have delivered more on that more than Tokyo and Paris. >Both AWESOME cities. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Deploy Web Applications Quickly across the enterprise with ColdFusion MX7 & Flex 2 Free Trial http://www.adobe.com/products/coldfusion/flex2/?sdid=RVJU Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:231740 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
