I’m about to sound like the ignorant American I am, so I apologize in advance! We’re looking at a trip to Germany, and possibly Prague, and we’ve noticed that a lot of the hotel names are French and a couple hotels that aren’t named in French have replied to comments with things like “Bonjour! etc etc” What’s up with this? Is French just the most commonly spoken common language, even in Germany and Czechia? (I know that Germany and Czechia have their own languages, of course.) Or is it something else?
As others have said, no, French isn’t particularly widely spoken in Germany or Czechia. My guess would be that France has a reputation for haute couture, so it’s not uncommon for restaurants, hotels, cafes. etc. to take on a little French flair in a similar way to how coffee shops like to become a little bit Italian!
Obviously for a big hotel it’s pretty likely that they will have French guests and quite a few French speaking staff, hotels are a bit like that - it’s not uncommon to hear the person at the front desk switching between 3 languages while interacting with guests of different nationalities, and most Europeans will speak their own language, at least some English, and probably some other European language. For example, I’m Scottish, and I speak English fluently, a little French (enough to deal with the day-to-day on holiday!) and a good bit of Norwegian.
I hope you have a lovely holiday, remember to respect local customs, and try to speak a little of the native language if you can - they’ll probably switch to English nearly immediately but they’ll appreciate the gesture!
Thank you! We’re really looking forward to it. It’s such a beautiful country, and the people seem lovely. My daughter has been learning German for a couple years, but I definitely need to work on mine before we go.