Comment by wasmitnetzen
1 day ago
Cheap strawman. Travelling Swedes, Danes, Finns and Poles will be fine with English, Dutch with either/both English or German.
1 day ago
Cheap strawman. Travelling Swedes, Danes, Finns and Poles will be fine with English, Dutch with either/both English or German.
Mostly fair, I really appreciate the grasp that almost all Scandinavians have on English.
Don't forget French though! I wouldn't make the assumption that travelling French people would have enough grasp of English or German to understand the announcements.
My comment is mostly a poke at the two assumptions: that non-English speaking countries should universally support English-speaking travellers, and that English is the predominant (and only other) language which should be supported.
I’m baffled that any other language would be considered - the only language that comes close to English in number of speakers is Mandarin, and Mandarin has nearly half a billion fewer speakers than English.
We should be happy there is a language that has emerged for people to communicate globally without borders, and support it’s role as the worlds second language rather than work to re-fracture how people communicate
There are direct trains between French and German cities, where additional announcements in French may be appropriate (and perhaps also English).
For local/regional trains, I wouldn't expect any language other than German.
3 replies →