Should German count as only one language?

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

Ah well, when I was in trouble in Ober Bayern with my German, I spoke English.

Well, ok, I was in a family in which the Herr was lawyer in München, and the Frau was...hmm...a kind of crazy-slightly Peter Pan-kind of jewel or clothes creator who was about 10-20 years younger than him, she was nice though. Not really the kind of 'Grüss Got' people hidden in the mountains then. They once took me to some of those totally hidden though, to which you can only access by a road that seems to have 20% of inclination and which seems to be about 1m large, and on which you wonder how the f**k it would happen if an other car comes in the other sens, especially when you're in a big Mercedes that might be twice larger than the road (still didn't found out how it could happen, especially since it's like that on about several kilometers). And then you can find nice 'Grüss Got' farmers at the top of it, don't remember for which kind of food it was, but I'm not sure those speak exactly the same language, they seemed to understand each other though.

Ah France has a lot of dialects too (I don't mean regional languages, but patois), but I think most French speakers in France, Belgium, Switzerland, or African countries can understand each other without much problems. Hmm, for Québequois, once you pass the obstacle of the over big accent ^^, it would be quite accessible too, but as I said in the other thread, sometimes they can be quite different.

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

Ah well, you can't pay 20€ to do 1.000 km and land on the roof of the building to which you go...

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

I can't look into development histories, but I'd wager a bet most of them weren't laid out to be... at least not any laid out before the airport itself was built.

Such as train stations in European cities, which at 1st were out if the cities, and then they have been fully integrated to those so that now they are part of the center or close of it. Also, at least in France, train stations areas always had a bad reputation, and ironically it didn't change much since then, districts around stations use to be kinda rough, even if the station is now in the center or close, which also at least in France, use to be the part of cities with the less problems.

And the suburb thing is what is currently happening to Toulouse-Blagnac. Crazy how suburbs (that is lots of houses and residences but also all what goes with it, big supermarkets, big movie theaters and so on) grew there around the airport in the very last years, this going along the important development of this airport (which became the 4th French one), and well, to be precise it also went along with the last big developments of Airbus there, it seems to match with the A380 facilities coming.

[Bunwahaha [still dunno why, but well, so be it]]

In Western Europe outside of Latin countries, at least, most people would have attained a certain level of command of English, yeah. English really is crucial to fully participate in popular culture and to further one's career.

...fixed. That is France, Italy, Spain, Portugal.

Of course, English is the lingua franca.

Essentially this (though there are some stubborn holdouts - like French in the Western Maghreb and all over 'former' French African colonies).

...fixed too. I've always been amazed how some apparently classical citizens in DCR speak a so good French, including a very fluent accent, this is not the case to this point in other colonies from all what I've heard, ironically it is the former Belgian colony.

What is the status of foreign language education in Europe? Is it normal for so many Europeans as we have on this forum to be fluent in English? In the US you are not expected to begin learning foreign language until age 11 or 12 and then it is only required for two to four years, and as a result most Americans do not speak a foreign language unless they have made a special effort or are in a peculiar circumstance.

When I was a kid, it was also mostly the case, you officially start a foreign language at the 1st year of collège (middle-school), which uses to be 11. But for example the public elementary school in which I was had organized an initiation to English the year before middle-school. Then I was familiarized before some others, but still, it didn't prevent some pals who were with me in this initiation to be some of the worse at collège. The point was, you cared about it or not.

That being said, it kinda changed since then, for example my youngest bro had an initiation circa 6-8, I don't remind exactly, and this till collège, and not necessarily to English, he picked German iirc. And seems those kind of initiation are being more and more generalized nationally here.

2nd foreign language begins at the 3rd year of collège for everybody here, that is 14. And, classically, you can begin a 3rd one since the 1st year of lycée (high-school), but not all lycées provide it.