The British and Foreign languages

[English assassin]

In a few weeks time I shall be off to Francophone Switzerland for my holidays, and have been booking mountain huts etc. Although the Swiss (in marked contrast to another french speaking nation we could mention) seem to be very tolerant of my french (which is very much of the "Je voudrais une chambre" and "ou se trouve la plage" variety) I have once again been forced to confront my lack of foreign languages.

Which is notoriously a national failing.

But, I was thinking as I looked for my old French text books (Le Francais de aujourd'hui, which should of course now be Le Francais de il y a vingt ans) maybe one trouible is which language to learn? Last year I was in Norway, the year before in Spain (digressing, I remember just enough spanish from school to confuse my french) and so on. Once I was in Poland and lets face it Polish isn't going to be top of anyones list.

What I am saying is, if you speak English, and live in Europe, there isn't a very obvious second choice. In Uk schools people tend to get taught french but i don't know if there is any very good reason for it, as opposed to, say, Italian or Spanish or German.

So, I was wondering, what do people think is the most useful second language to learn in Europe and why? Personally if we were starting from scratch I would not bother with French (which the French will always pretend you can't speak anyway) and, provided its not too difficult, put everyone onto German.

[Dutch_guy]

well German is good, but It's hard to learn from scratch.
however if you have experience with latin then german grammer would be a little easier.
But Spanish is also a good language to learn, since a lot of countries use that language, good for backpakking trips ;)
And a lot of people in the world use the language, that's not true with German.

[InsaneApache]

I agree, I'd go for Spanish....closely followed by Portuguese. After all they are also an 'international' language, much like English.

[Marcellus]

So, I was wondering, what do people think is the most useful second language to learn in Europe and why?

English

But for native English speakers (i.e. the British), I would say any of French, German, Spanish and Italian, because these are the languages of the places Britons seem most likely to visit. They are also quite 'international' languages, so are useful in that respect too.

[el_slapper]

Remember that Blair won the olympics for London.....speaking in French . Now you know what the ultimate choice is .

[edyzmedieval]

As a second language, it's hard to tell.....

I study French, but I hate it...
I studied German, I liked it but I went to another school....
I studied Japanese, the teacher got a job and I left Japanese( I liked the Japanese language )

I wanna study German and Italian. And possibly Spanish or Portuguese....

[The Stranger]

portuguese is cool but the native speakers speak it so fast i cant keep up with it. same for french and italian. prolly leftovers from rome cuz the had no spaces i think.

[King Henry V]

Latin is useful in the Western countries of Europe, as it is the root of Portuguese, Spanish, French and Italian. HOwever, unless you go to the Vatican, you won't find it very useful in talking to people.
P.S Where are you going in Switzerland, EA?