Why do people who don't speak English go on vacations to countries whose language they don't know?

[Barnabas]

A few hours ago I tried to help an old french woman (she uses a cane)
she doesn't speak English or Spanish. She didn't know German either. I had to connect the internet and use the babelfish translator English to French in order to give her some indications.

It is like the second time something like this happens to me with an old french lady.

How can you enjoy the vacations if you can't communicate at all? Just watching people and the views?

[The Mad Monk]

She's French.

[Zoetstofzoetje]

the french, like the english, assume that everyone should speak their language as a lingua franca.

[Fake Boris]

It's more difficult, but you can still enjoy it.

[rah]

I would have missed many things if I had limited myself to that.

[MikeH]

MANY Americans come on holiday over here without bothering to learn any English first.

[onodera]

Because they don't want to limit themselves to countries that share their language and are unable/unwilling to learn English? They pick a hotel with French-speaking receptionist and use him/her to deal with bookings/taxis etc.

[loinburger]

I was able to enjoy myself in France and Italy without knowing any Italian and only knowing a bit of French. The biggest problem I ran into is that my accent was so horrible that I'd have to point to the menu item I was ordering to avoid any confusion. (A lot of people in France and Italy spoke English, but some regions of Italy that I visited had few if any English-speaking residents and that wasn't a problem. In France I only went to Paris, but quite a few people either didn't speak English or pretended that they didn't speak English.)

I've also been to Quebec a few times, which had fewer English speakers per capita than France or Italy (at least, far more people pretended not to speak English in Quebec)

[Lorizael]

MANY Americans come on holiday over here without bothering to learn any English first.

[Barnabas]

the french, like the english, assume that everyone should speak their language as a lingua franca.

English is the lingua franca nowadays, French used to be the lingua Franca here, but since the 1970s educated people are expected to know English, not French.

[Main_Brain]

RE: English

So you surely would have no Problem understanding this?

[MOBIUS]

MANY Americans come on holiday over here without bothering to learn any English first.

I still remember the Americans in Venice berating the poor Italian stallholder: "Dammit, why can't y'all speak English in this country?"

Dumb tourists

Dumb American tourists

[The Mad Monk]

Our tourists are still more popular than yours.

[Dauphin]

I still remember the Americans in Venice berating the poor Italian stallholder: "Dammit, why can't y'all speak English in this country?"

Dumb tourists

Dumb American tourists

My favourite was "If it's good enough for Jesus, it's good enough for everyone."

[Dauphin]

When I was in Berlin, I remember being 'complimented' by American tourists after giving them directions - one said to the other "All these Germans speak such good English!"