Language
 

Will be in Vietnam for 3 weeks soon. I'm considering buying an electronic language translator. The ones I have looked at online are either beyond my price range or worthless. I'm curious whether more Vietnamese would understand English or perhaps more Vietnamese would understand French. (?) I know many will speak English, especially in the tourist areas, but the question is, do more Vietnamese understand French or more understand English?
I will of course will bring a small Vietnamese-English hand-book along but I'd rather have a cool electronic translator if I can find one that does decent Vietamese-English. Any thoughts?

In my experience, only the older generation of Vietnamese speak French, the younger either speak English or just Vietnamese. As the country is hugely on the young side, my impression is that more of the country speaks English as their first foreign language than speak French. However, in major tourist areas I would really not worry about it to get around, you won't have a problem. It is certainly polite to learn the basic phrases like hello, good-bye, thank you, etc in Vietnamese, but other than that I would not worry about it.

I think those electronic translators are excellent, they really helped me with German pronunciation when I was living in Switzerland, and I can see for a tonal language like Vietnamese they could be quite helpful, but for a brief trip they may not be worth the cost. If there is one with multiple Asian languages (Thai, a Chinese dialect) that might be worth the expense as it would be useful for future trips.

I've just returned and you don't need a translator. Nobody speaks french, only the old ones. All the hotels speak english. Don't worry. Alana

I agree with the others...don't bother with the electronic translator...you won't need it.

I found Vietnamese to one of the more difficult languages I've ever encountered, due to the tones. I don't think I was able to pick up more than 2-3 words during a 1 week stay...and I've been told by many that I'm good with foreign languages.

You'll manage with just English. I did speak French to an older shop keeper.

Thumbs up. That's what I needed to know. I won't bother with the translator or my rusty French.

Thanks!

We travelled on our own to Hanoi last year and found many people spoke at least some English. There was only one time where we got totally lost, had to ask for directions and couldn't find anyone who spoke English. With a bit of patience, sign language and dusting off my high-school French, we were quite easily able to find our desired location.

I lived in Vietnam for two years when I was much younger, Vietnamese is easier to figure out than Chinese, Thai or Cambodian because the written language uses most of the same alphabet French or English speakers use. When I returned after a long period of time I was surprised how many more Vietnamese could understand English.

You can read something in Vietnamese and use a Vietnamese English dictionary to figure it out. Try that in Thailand or China - you have to be able to read that language to figure out what the words are.

You could pick up a small cheap Vietnamese - English dictionary and keep it with you. If there is a language difficulty you could simply point to the word you want in the dictionary and the Vietnamese person could read the Vietnamese equivalent. Vice versa, they could point out a word in Vietnamese and you read the English translation.

Always learn how to say thank you, hello, excuse me and a few numbers would be helpful too - but the numbers are the same anyway in writing.

In Vietnam, many years ago, I got a lot done with GI terms like "Tee Tee, Boo Koo, Dee Dee Mau, Dinky Dau, Numba One, Co Dep Wa and Numba Ten!" Any real Vietnamese words I picked up was a bonus!

Hal

English and french are fine.

I just returned from VN. I don't know if this was accurate, but one of our guides said that 85% of students study English; only 15% study French.

My experience was the same as the other posters. Indeed, some young Vietnamese were cute about how eager they were to get a native speaker to help them. I was approached in front of a temple in Hoi An by a young man with a list of ten English sentences. He wanted to record me saying them, first slowly, then speaking at a normal pace.

About 10 minutes later I came around a corner and saw the same man with four other young people, all listening to his recording of me. They were very cute when I stopped to chat. I was impressed with their diligent efforts.