"I Don't Speak English"

I have certainly learned that the French version of "I don't speak English" is far from the truth!! When I say that "I don't speak French", I really mean that unless you are interested in hearing me count or name my colors, I really don't speak French! When they say that they don't speak English, they just mean that it's a little rusty but they really know an amazing amount! I had one conversation today at Max's soccer practice with a woman who "doesn't speak English" about everything from soccer to schools to life in America to how the Catholic schools work in France versus America! She also told me that she bets the children all love our kids at school because Americans always seem like "movie stars" to the French! She said that when they had exchange students at their school when she was a kid, she expected them to come in looking like Farrah Fawcett! I finally met our next door neighbor tonight as well. She is another one who "doesn't speak English" so she has been "nervous to meet us". Turns out that her daughter is on Calvin's basketball team and we could have been carpooling!! She is very nice, very outgoing and eager to get to know us. Her English was a little limited but we could talk about our beautiful neighborhood, where our children go to school, what our husbands do, where she works, etc. - much more than my colors and numbers in French!! She is a physical therapist so you know that she is "good people". Very exciting. So, my observations as an ex-pat are that we as Americans are doing our children a very big disservice by not really teaching our children a foreign language! These people all say that they learned English in school and haven't used it since! How many of you could brush off the language you learned in high school and actually have a conversation in it! I know that I couldn't!! Oh, before I forget, one funny observation that I meant to make when we returned from Paris is that in the restaurant in the Eiffel Tower, the caesar salad was listed as "an American salad"! Don't we always think that we are eating something "exotic" or foreign when we eat a Caesar salad? Today was a lazy day at home with no school for anyone and the only activities being soccer practice for Max this morning and basketball practice for Calvin this evening. Max's soccer coach had actually written himself a "cheat sheet" with directions in English so that he could help Max out on the field when he is issuing instructions to the other kids in French. Pretty nice guy! Here is a picture of the tide out at my favorite point coming into our village and one of my favorite houses down the road from our house.... Sorry the colors are not what they should be as I took them with my cell phone versus my real camera!