There seems to have been a few threads lately about the lack of English provision for expats in Switzerland. I know some expats who don't really have any interest in learning the language and I know other who are almost fluent in at least one local language. Where do you fit in?

I can order a beer in French, Italian and German - have I integrated

my language skills are truly rubbish and i only have my own sorry lazy arse to blame

I'm very comfortable in French, but I didn't choose Fluent as I tend to forego accent's on some letters (é, è, etc) and other small grammar mistakes in written language.

I have to agree with Nicky,I also can ask for the loo,and say in 3 different ways that I have limited German skills,but this is down to my Lazyiness as I have a BBC German course in a cupboard that has not been used.

The problem with languages is that you can lose them if you stop using them.

I used to speak two dialects of Chinese and have now lost the ability to speak one of them (but strangely can still understand it when spoken to).

My English has now surpassed all my other languages and is my favourite language in terms of its expressiveness.

French is my favourite sounding language (I'm a sucker for any girl with a French accent). I worked in France for a while and lived on French cinema as a kid so ended up speaking almost fluent French, but have now almost totally lost the language.

I used to speak a bit of Italian (Italian gf was great motivator) but this, along with the relationship, was rather short-lived.

German was the language I always hated and wanted to forget immediately after school, but now I find myself having to use it more. In fact, learning German has managed to obliterate my French as anytime I try to speak in French, I find German words appearing instead.

As many expats in Switzerland are working long hours and rather time poor, the cost/benefit of learning German can be rather low when you can get by perfectly well without it. It would take years to become as good as a native speaker in German and even then, you'd gain expressiveness only when speaking to German-only speakers as I'd argue English is a more expressive language overall.

The only time I have a burning desire to learn German is when I want to chat up a Swiss girl, but I guess the language of love is universal in any case!

Presently sound like an idiot child in Italian. A bit better at French. Zero German. Some vestigial Russian and Spanish. Can't even remember the Swedish I took for a couple of months.

It's difficult to say really. Speaking to average joe in a bar I'm often told that I speak German better than they do English, however having heard some of their spoken English I'm not really convinced that it's a compliment.

Within my job I'm competent with German, not fluent, but competent - as it should be after working for a German speaking company for two years. Maybe fluency will come after a couple more years - I hope so.

I have a better time "getting along" with Baseldüütch than with High German so I would say my skills are very basic. I can have a stilted convo with my mum-in-law but my sentence structure is that of a 5yo child I think.

While I took a year of French in school, after moving to Hawaii I took Japanese as I thought that would be more useful... both of which are nearly completely forgotten though (22yrs+ later).

However... I have dated a few Mexican guys and had a good friend as well as got on well with a few coworkers from Puerto Rico... I do not claim to be able to speak Spanish well BUT my familiarity with some terms makes it a "neat" communication device as my m-i-l speaks Italian and if we are struggling the "Latin" aspects can usually see us through.

I live in Basel and my German is very basic but I do understand more than I thought I would because of my (rudimentary) knowledge of Dutch...taking classes now and I am learning.
I do speak Italian fluent (??) though, at least I usually get compliments on it from Italians, I think I live in the wrong kanton

I learned French on the fly after moving here. Was able to understand and express the essentials in 6-8 months, and over the course of 3 or 4 years became quite fluent. That's according to my Swiss and French friends. Apparently I escaped the deadly Yank accent, which seems to be a plus.

My only regret is I never really applied myself to learn to write it. All the accents and crap are a pain, plus the same sounding word can be spelled about 10 different ways. German is much easier in that regard.

Now that I work for myself (and alone) for the past few years I struggle for words sometimes, but a bit of Absinthe seems to bring it right back.


Next challenge is Czech. Makes French look like babytalk (I'm sure many would argue that French is babytalk ).

My husband made me laugh this week. We had the parents visiting day at the kids school.

Our 3 year olds are in pre-kindergarten and he decided after sitting in on circle time for 1/2 hour that he was doing ok, he understood what was going on and knew what the teacher was saying.

The next day we were in the kindergarten circle time with our 4 year old, and he decided that he was not at kindergarten level - had little idea what the teacher said and no idea what was going on.

So my 37 year old husband has the german level of a 3 year old after living here 5 years!!

In his defence he works in an all english speaking workplace and his attempts to have lessons were interrupted by our rather unexpected arrival of 3 children in 18 months....

He always points out that he knows all the important words as he can read a menu fluently.....

I took 5 years of French in highschool and was able to speak it at least decently at a basic/intermediate level. Now not even bon jour , as Phil said, if you do not practice it, you'll forget it.

came with no German and moved from UBS investment banking to Swiss wealth mgmnt and business banking

had to be able to understand some at the start
then had to speak some
then had to write some
you get the idea

in 2 years went from basic hello, goodbye, numbers etc. to presentations to groups of 40 - including upper management. Am really comfortable in German and have friends with which I only communicate in German. It helps with the Police too they stopped a regular check in surprise when they saw I wasn't local and complimented me on my German and wished me a good night

mind you i'm not fluent and have no intention/desire to become fluent
call me lazy but i just can't be a***sed learning if it's das, der or die!

the key was immersion - had no choice - everyone at work was speaking, reading, writing etc. and it was expected - i'm really happy about it too

same things with my missus as an exchange student in Japan - from zero to fluent (finished 3rd last year of high school in Japanese including Kanji / Calligraphy etc.) in 10months cos not a single person spoke English!

yeah, kinda depressing when you look at it that way

Which is why I read Le Temps most days

Just a thought - our kids were born here and are in the regular Swiss system - so they'll have 2 mother tongues really

This is an incentive to learn as you can learn with them - and make sure they're not talking about you behind your back too

I wonder if this is an incentive for others?

Hi,

it always amazes me when you meet people who have been in Switzerland for a long period time and can not even speak or understand even very basic german or french. If you are only here for a short period but even then it is worth learning the basics.

I think the incredible ability of many swiss to speak very good english does put us all to shame.

Have fun

Martin

I have to admit, I'm being very lazy to learn German. I love to learn languages, but I hate German. I can live easily here with French, English and even Turkish, so I didn't try this time...

What is it with french accent? Many guys are going nuts when they hear it, but why?

I did some German at school and I've recently completed an A2 level refresher using one on one tuition. I've just started the B1 course and most of that material's new . . . I also have a conversation practice partner.

I don't really understand people who live somewhere but don't want to try and learn the language. I do appreciate it's more difficult for some than others though and certainly age plays a part.

Yes it does - but theres an incredible amount of English here too.. (at least in Neuchatel).... a number of products/advertising boards/signs have English catchphrases... eg: a stop sign is "STOP" not arrete(sp) or halt.... I think the sheer amount of English catchphrases, pop music, celebrities, movies makes it slightly easier for French/German to learn English that it is for a typical Brit, Yank or Aussie to learn French/German/Italian.