If you're in the UK then speak English!

Perhaps she was speaking pakistani and the other passenger made the remark as a joke. Just to embarrass the man telling her to speak English.

bet you can count to ten, say good morning and good night in Welsh Jalima

I read it started with a native red indian speaking navarro in a walmart queue.

and be rather pointless speaking Welsh to a non Welsh person
Oh, I don't know, DGD has been doing that to me for half the morning

Rosesarered said nobody would understand a word , she was wrong

I think that goes without saying...no one's disputing that fact.

A Welsh person speaking to a Welsh person in England would be understood , and be rather pointless speaking Welsh to a non Welsh person

I too wonder if it is apocryphal
I think it is, I heard it quite a long time ago!
I don't think anyone in Newport would say that - surely?

DGD has been teaching me some Welsh today
Don't ask me to repeat any of it

phoenix we were overseas years ago and a woman came up and gabbled to me in a foreign language; I said, sorry, I didn't speak her language. She then spoke very slowly as if I was an idiot (which I was) because she was Scottish with a very strong Glaswegian accent.

In the1980s in USA there was research with immigrants who did not learn tospeak English. They decided it was people who did not feel accepted by the host community who found it hardest. It has got to do with having the confidence to let the other culture in. ( The academty word was egopermiability) Not sure of the research, it was in a book when I was studying.
It is also hard for many children who enter school with all their basic preschool vocabulary being in a home language and the built on language of school is in a different tongue. There is no cross.over of the language needed to build concepts. That is why we used to use mother tongue and English in the classroom....probably out of fashion now, but it worked.

My DIL speaks Hungarian at home to their 2 year old. DS has picked up quite a bit of Hungarian so uses both at home. GS knows to speak English to the rest of us. DIL speaks very good English herself.

Welsh may be spoken anywhere in the UK or indeed the world......but nobody will understand a word. If speaking Welsh in England, why would a translater be needed, no Welsh person cannot speak English. I imagine you were joking anyway Newquay

I am among those who think that in this country sometimes in our effort to help people we actually inhibit some people from learning English because there is no need to.

I also have a concern that in some immigrant communities women are actually discouraged from learning English by the men in their family to stop them developing any activities outside the home or to be able to go into their childrens's school or even the doctor, with out another member of the family being present to act as interpretor.

However that is still not a good reason to stop people talking among themselves in public in their native tongue.

Why? No need for anyone to be in a box- surely?

Thank you Gran Jura-I'll get back in my box now

But I actually agree with Newquay that translators and interpretors should be the responsibility of the person requiring it- unless for true refugees- as is the case here.

midgey- why not? Some people choose a religion not because they are 'born with it' but because they find it attactive and true to them.

My mothertongue is French, but I always spoke English when I lived in UK, unless family or friends came to visit. Now we live back where my roots, are, DH has made huge effort to learn FRench, which has earned the respect of all- but we speak English together, sometimes when we are out, in shops, or restaurants, if we are out as a couple. Of course we speak French if in company. We watch UK TV most of the time too.

WE both speak both languages every day, jumping constantly from one to t'other depending on context or whom we speak to- both have books on the go in both languages- for us it's totally 'normal'.

We have friends here who speak 2 separate languages to their children, eg dad always speaks Danish, for example, and mum always speaks Italian, if together they speak English as the common family language, and the kids speak French at school, and then learn German from aged 10.

Newquay what you say is ridiculous. We have a house in France as well as England and when we are in France we talk English to each other, even in public places. That does not mean that we speak no French, nor that we do not use French when dealing with banks, utilities etc.

The majority of people in the world speak two languages. For most their second language is English. There is no reason why people whose mother tongue is not English, but speak it as a second lamguage should be dragooned into speaking only English in public.

Perhaps you are a polyglot and in every country you visit you speak only the language of that country when within its borders, but I doubt it. The British are, generally a nation of monoglots, but we shouldn't judge people from other countries by our low standards.

Back in 1975 when my toddler was in Birmingham Children's Hospital, a fellow parent was a Welsh-speaking Sikh. When people already speak two languages, English and their native language, they often find it easier to pick up another.

No idea midgey , I know Welsh Muslim women

Why couldn't a Welsh woman become a Muslim? Just a thought.

There are fourth generation immigrants living in Wales

Overthinking again!

I just wonder whether a niqab wearing woman would have lived in Wales long enough to have picked up the very difficult (I think) Welsh language and speak it so fluently. I know there would be second generation immigrants in Wales, but still...

Newquay, you have no authority to give permission for Welsh to be spoken in Wales only, Welsh is an official language of the UK so Welsh can be spoken in the four countries of the U.K.

I do think it reasonable that anyone wishing to reside in a country, be able to have a basic ability to speak and read the language, other wise simple things like warning signs etc, would have to be in multiple languages.

This also applies to Brits, who decide to live abroad, we have friends that live in Spain and are almost proud that they don't speak any Spanish, or need to.