If I were in you situation, I would begin with French as it's something you have already studied. It will come back to you. I spoke Italian fairly well once - now, when I have to think outside of English, the words come to my mind in German because that's what I'm studying now. But I know that if I spent a week or two where Italian was the only language spoken it would come flying back to me.

It's like riding a bike, it will come back to you.

How about putting a flyer somewhere with a contact e-mail where you can exchange English for French or German so that you don't have to pay anything?

As for the fear of making a mistake - you have have to try and get over that - making mistakes is how you will learn. It really is more important that you can communicate (for those times when somebody can't speak English) rather than that you speak perfectly.

The first thing I learned to say was that I don't speak German so well and that I'm studying it - sort of my way of saying - "Get ready to wrap your brain around what you are about to hear."

I've said some doozies myself. I told my son once when I wanted him to move over "Mach platz" - a woman near me starting laughing. I learned later that its really rude to say that to a human - apparently its something you say to a dog! It was actually pretty funny.

Try to relax and laugh at yourself. If you want to learn Swiss-German, get that book Hoi - its a great primer.

Good luck.