Janet Wilder wrote:
Stephen Farrow wrote:
Janet Wilder wrote:
I just picked up all of my documents from the travel agent today. We
will be doing 3 flights within Europe. One from Paris to Budapest,
one from Amsterdam to Seville (with a change of plane in Madrid) and
one from Seville to Barcelona.

They are all e-tickets. I won't have a printer so I can't get
boarding passes. Do we just go up to the check-in counter and show
them the copies of the schedules the TA gave us? I'm assuming that
they will not speak English.

The check-in agents will almost certainly speak some English.

Of course, if *you* had any manners, you'd try to learn at least a few
phrases of French, Spanish, Dutch and Hungarian before your trip. You
are visiting their countries, so it behoves you to at least try and
speak a little of their languages.


I do have manners.

That's debatable, given that you didn't appear to be prepared to meet
people in the countries you plan to visit halfway by learning a few
words of their languages.

I also have a program on CD with French, Spanish,
German and Italian, and I've been trying to learn from it for 6 months.
Unfortunately, I'm not very good at remembering what I've learned.

Then buy a phrase book and refer to it as you go, rather than fretting
over the possibility that people in other countries won't speak English
(which, at airport check-in desks in Europe, they most likely will
anyway). You don't need to be fluent in each language. You just need to
make some effort. All you need to remember are a few simple words and
phrases. It's *incredibly* arrogant and rude to visit a country without
learning at least a little of the language - and "I'm not very good at
it" is no excuse.

--

Stephen