Dicko69 said:
A mate of mine wanted to live in spain, so he got an instructor, learnt the language and bought a place in valencia and moved there, said he got looked at funny when he spoke, turns out he learnt the kings spanish with all the pronounciation etc. ( Like talking the queens english)
Isnt that the same for every country?
I obviously learned English at school, but later on realized that while it is nice to be able to have a conversation with the Queen it doesnt help if you run into "normal" folks with all the different accents etc.
When I started my first job I had a colleague from Ireland who was a really nice older bloke. On my second day at work I met him on the way to the office and he started to talk to me. How I liked it so far etc....so just some casual small talk. I didnt understand a word and looked like a complete idiot as I had to ask him to repeat pretty much every sentence due to his accent.
8 years of English at school obviously don´t prepare you for the real world. ;)
If someone learns German at an English school he gets taught "Hochdeutsch" (like the queen´s german just without...erm queen) I would assume.
Good luck understanding people in Germany.... Regional accents are as common over here as they are in the UK and some words even have a different meaning depending on where you are. Can lead to some funny surprises...
I wonder anyway why education (at least over here) is not really focused on what you really need in daily business. We read fucking Othello from Sharespeare in English lessons but couldn´t survive on our own in England without making a fool of ourself....