The thirty that matter
A short list covers nearly every exchange a visitor has.
- The courtesies come first: hello, good evening, please, thank you, excuse me, sorry and goodbye.
- The rescue phrases are "I do not understand", "I speak only a little" and the polite way to ask whether someone speaks English.
- The transaction phrases are "I would like", "how much is it", "where is", "a ticket to" and "the check, please".
- The numbers from one to twenty and the tens up to a hundred cover prices, platforms and times.
- The emergency words are help, doctor, police, pharmacy and "I am allergic to".
Learn these as whole chunks and skip the grammar.
Making it stick
Short daily sessions beat a long weekend of cramming, so ten to fifteen minutes a day for three weeks is the target. Say everything aloud, because your mouth needs the practice and listening is what fails first at a real counter. Flashcards on a spaced schedule do the memorizing efficiently. Spend the first hour on the pronunciation rules. Spanish, Italian and German are pronounced almost exactly as written once you know them. Where the script is different, learn it when that is feasible. The Korean alphabet takes an afternoon, and Cyrillic or Greek takes a weekend, after which signs and menus become readable. For Chinese or Japanese, memorize a handful of characters instead: exit, entrance, the restroom signs and the name of your destination.
Manners carry more than vocabulary
In France, greeting a shopkeeper with bonjour before anything else is the rule, and skipping it reads as rude. Use the formal form of "you" with strangers where the language has one. Make the attempt in the local language first and let the other person switch, since people forgive bad grammar far more readily than the assumption that everyone speaks English. When you do use English, speak slowly in short sentences with no slang and no idioms, and do not get louder.
Let the phone help
Download the offline language pack for your translation app before you leave, so it works without data. The camera mode reads menus and signs. Keep your hotel's name and address in the local script on your lock screen or on paper for taxi drivers. For prices, hand over your phone's calculator and let the seller type the number.
Tip Learn one sentence of sincere praise, such as telling a cook that the meal was delicious. It is the phrase you will use most and the one people remember.
