Comment by TFNA
3 days ago
Lots of ordinary people in Europe know what B1 and B2 mean, because these are the codes used in standard European CVs, and many countries have language tests for citizenship (or, for non-EU citizens, permanent residency) requiring skills at one of these levels.
Not sure why you think B2 is useless for ordering food. B2 is the level at which one can work in an office environment in the local language, it is already beyond ordering food.
I meant "uselessly high". Expecting yourself to be able to have office job entirely in foreign language before you brave to order beer and steak is absurd.
Also, I had to explain those labels to Europeans enough times to think the labels are not known by random people.