The large scale learning of foreign
languages is a relatively recent phenomenon. Our grandparents’ generation
didn’t speak foreign languages. He is a story to show what that could lead to:
We are in Denmark. Two old men are
sitting on a bench at the side of a small road. It is a nice sunny day. It is years ago, before gps and Google Maps. Man uses his brain, or asks others to put him
right.
The two men are sitting there
talking. Suddenly a big shiny car pulls up. A man comes out of the car and asks
in English for directions to Hirtshals. He has to catch the ferry for Norway. The
two men do not understand English. They do not get a word of it. He then asks
in German - same result. At last he asks in French, but gets no reaction.
He leaves, and the two men sit and
watch the big shiny car disappear in the direction of Copenhagen.
After a while one of them sighs.
“Maybe we should have learnt a foreign language.”
The other one looks at him. “Why”,
he says, “look at this guy in his shiny car. He spoke three different
languages, and where did that get him?”
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