Last year I was all around Belgium.
Posted by Peter. Anyway, when you go into a very local bakery and meet that rare, older person who doesn't know a word of English, you're reduced to pointing at the food anyway.
Located in a Germanic dialectal area as attested by all historical toponyms, Brussels has known over the centuries an increasing influence of French that culminated in the 19th century when French became de facto the language of the newly funded Belgian state. You will truly enjoy the Belgians.Hi Miranda, I'm Brugian (Bruges), so from the north part of Belgium. Most people in Flanders will speak English. Usually when traveling, I make sure to know a few phrases in the local language and greet people in it, and ask "do you speak English" in the local language. You don't have to even bother with:"Do you speak English?" In Flemish area (I stayed in Antwerp) everybody speaks English. Just look around at signs on stores, offices, etc. You'll also find tourist families that you overhear speaking to each other in French or German or Norwegian will speak to merchants in English. About Bruges: "H-a-llo" (not "h-E-llo) is ok to say ... "hello" . I know the basic French phrases plus a bit more, and I'm sure I could learn the bare minimum at least in Flemish.
However, how do I know which one to use?
If you want, you can throw out a little "Neemt me niet kwalijk, speekt u engels? The so called 'war' between Frenchspeaking and Dutchspeaking inhabitants in Belgian is only a political thing, not a problem in the streets.
EVERBODY speaks english in Belgium. Let's try this method: It's best not to speak French to people in Flanders.
The Brussels Capital Region is officially and legally mandated to be bilingual (Dutch and French) as in most official signs will have both languages on them. : 51 In 2006, 28% of those living in Brussels had a good to excellent knowledge of Dutch, while 96% had a good to excellent knowledge of French, and 35% of English. At our B&B in Brugge, we said "merci" to our hostess, who replied curtly in English, "You know, we are not French." My wife was born and raised in Hasselt in the northeastern province of Limburg, and I can assure you, the local language is most definitively Dutch. Since Brussels is right in the middle, officially it's bilingual. She said she always spoke English (even though she knew French) so that she didn't inadvertently offend anyone.It's been five years since my last visit in Brugge. If you don't want to offend anybody, just use English. As others have indicated, Brugge is full of English speakers. I don't know what this person means by "responsive" but suspect it has little to do with language and more to do with expectations in terms of "service mentality". WHOA! Some real anger there about the Flemish losing their culture and language. (I've spent a lot of time in Belgium, and although words starting with Vlaamse... appear a lot in print, I've never heard a Dutch speaker say "Flemish" when speaking English.) Your chances of running into a monolingual Dutch speaker in Brussels aren't very high, so if you want, you can use the default French. Example: I heard this from an American couple sitting near me in a restaurant in Brugge. I didn't catch exactly what the waiter said to another waiter on his way into the kitchen, but it was something like "Idiots at table 7".Miranda-The geographic language breakdown in Belgium is more like Flemish(Dutch) in the West, and French in the East. Hi Miranda, I'm Brugian (Bruges), so from the north part of Belgium. I asked a Brugian friend why it was not in english since english is commonly spoken and her response was because Belgium does not have one official language. Rationale. Most of the people there seem to be able to speak multiple languages, so I doubt you'll have any problems. Brussels, Belgium.
Generally north Belgium speaks Flemish and south B. speaks French. The schedules would be too long and cumbersome, so it was only in the local language. However, if you venture into Wallonia, English fluency is much lower there.
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