I also work in a very international community, with a small minority Norwegians (in Norway). While we often communicate in English, I have to admit that I find it a bit strange that people choose to move to Norway and work in Norway, but don’t learn the language well enough to participate in a conversation at the lunch table.
Sure, often we’ll swap to English if a non-Norwegian speaker comes in, but sometimes I’m just tired and don’t want to bother with the extra effort. I massively appreciate the colleagues that bother to learn Norwegian.
iii@mander.xyz 17 hours ago
Depens on if they intend to move permanently, no? Most of my non-belgian colleagues don’t intend to stay in belgium long-term. Can’t fault them for that :)
When they do intend on moving permanently, I share your point of view.
thebestaquaman@lemmy.world 16 hours ago
I don’t think it really makes a difference, as long as you’re staying somewhere for any significant amount of time (i.e. months) it makes sense to start learning the language.
I mean, it’s common courtesy to try to learn enough of the local language to buy stuff and ask for directions when your just on vacation.
I was in Germany for half a year during my studies. To me it was obvious that I needed to learn the language from day one, because I had no intent of going around and expecting everyone else to adjust to me not knowing the language. I have a very hard time understanding how someone could move to a country for years, and still not learn the language because “it’s not permanent”.
iii@mander.xyz 16 hours ago
You convinced me on that one. Perhaps they should enough of the language for day-to-day niceties. The particular problem with Belgium is that this means they should learn both basic French and Dutch :-p Most french speaking Belgians don’t even do that.