No I don't hide anything. Nor do I choose to wear a flag. In my experience, no one much cared who I was or where I was from.

If you really want to look like a native and not a tourist, do this: wear a suit and tie, and every morning go into an office tower and stay there all day.

Hey, did you steal this from one of my posts about 2 - 3 years ago?

>>If you really want to look like a native and not a tourist, do this: wear a suit and tie, and every morning go into an office tower and stay there all day.<<<<

I do not hide that I am American, that I was born a Canadian, that I am a woman, a tourist, that I have auburn hair, that I AM SPENDING MONEY IN THEIR COUNTRY!! No, I do not hide it and the day that I feel I have to hide it, I'll just stay home..because if anyone is so ignorant as to think that because I'm an American, I agree with every decisions the politicians make -- then they are not worth my time or my $

I certainly don't try to hide anything, I'm not ashamed of it (American), but I don't believe in nationalism, etc., anyway. I think the need for some people to wear flags and wave them very strange. The whole flag thing I think is weird, anyway, to get so worked up over that bit of cloth.

I have studied several foreign languages, speak French the best, but can get by in Spanish. My accent in French is better than Spanish, but no one would mistake me for a native. However, I do agree with the idea that some people just naturally can sound more authentic in foreign languages than others, it's just some talent. I am musical, but don't know if that is really related or not. I think music is more related to math ability, but that's another story. Both my parents were language teachers, so I grew up around it, a bit (Spanish, French and German), but neither one of them sounded native, either.

However, one thing I have noticed is that I think it is actually fairly rare for someone to sound like a native, regardless of how fluent they are or how long they've studied. I have encountered some French people who sound American (but few), however, I know many many French people with distinct accents even though they are totally fluent in English and have lived in the US maybe 20 years or more. They just never lose it, although I'm sure it changes a little. What is sort of funny is that I know a native Frenchman who didn't move to the US until he was around 35 years old, I think, and now he speaks French with an American accent (he's around 60 now). I was talking about this with a mutual Parisian acquaintance in Paris at a party once, and he said the same thing -- that Jacques sounded American now, and we both started laughing.

I think unless you study language a lot or travel a lot or something, you may not recognize nationality, though, even when obvious. I was surprised when I was in Krakow last year, for example, that a vendor referred to a woman as probably American when she had a very distinct British accent, there was no mistaking it in the slightest. I have a suspicion he may have said that because she was Black, and somehow he associated that more with being American, I don't know, but I can't think of why. Various people in France, cabdrivers, etc., have asked me whether I am British when I'm speaking French, and I don't know why as I am from the American Midwest and only studied French in the US and France. But clearly if a Parisian cabdriver asks if I am British, and he is dealing with tourists and foreigners all the time, it can't be that easy.

No one has ever mistaken me for Parisian when I'm speaking French, except American tourists, actually, although my French teacher at the Sorbonne said my pronunciation was "pas mal". Which was effusive for her.

No, I don't try to hide my nationality. Why should I? As Popeye says, "I yam what I yam." I apparently look both German and approachable, because I am frequently asked for directions when I visit there. Or perhaps it's just that all frumpy women "of a certain age" pretty much look alike no matter the nationality.

I wear pretty much what I wear at home, except not the tacky t-shirts that I wear around the house.

Perhaps I am so self-absorbed that I don't notice, but I rarely come across the loud and obnoxius Americans of popular imagination. I do see people whose dress is the classic American tourist look, especially with the shorts, funny hat and the camera. But they seem no more or less obnoxious or loud than anyone else.

Well, somebody who calls herself "Brazilnut" certainly is not trying to hide her nationality, right???

I have encountered some obnoxious Americans, but they are a tiny minority. I have encountered obnoxious people of other nationalities, and estimate that they constitute the same proportion of the visitors from their countries.

There is a separate issue of cultural difference, and it can lead to misunderstanding. People of some culture groups are habitually louder than other groups, and that can be misinterpreted as bad manners. Many Spanish people are loud, whether in Spain or visiting another country; Italians are almost as loud. People in countries where the tradition is to be quieter can be unsettled by this, and might take it to be bad manners.

America is a large place with regional differences, and some Americans are loud while others are quiet. The loudness of some is taken by some as bad manners where, in truth, it is no more than a cultural difference.

Actually, "Brazilnut" could be someone from Tannu Tuva who likes Brazil.

On his last trip to Italy, my husband wore the typical tourist uniform - blue jeans, white athletic shoes, and a cheap red/blue polyester windbreaker from Sports Authority. Waiters, train workers, etc., all spoke to him in French. Only after he identified himself as American did they switch to English. So my guess is, European tourists (even the French) dress badly, too, while on vacation, and the other European countries are used to it. I wouldn't fret about it. They were still polite and happy to sell us meals, admit us into their museums, and drive us in their taxis, even after discovering we were (gasp!) American.

Or Brazil nuts.

I will not soon forget the sound, from the top of Nohoch Mul in the Mayan city of Coba, of the Italian grandmas at the bottom asking their husbands or children how they were enjoying the view. You could have heard them from Miami.

It's true - people in Europe won't laugh at you any more than people in your own home town ... ahem.

proud to be an american.

Interesting observations about language, Christina. I've never known a French person who was fluent - and I mean totally fluent - in English to speak it without some hint of a French accent and in most cases with a heavy accent. On the other hand I know at least a handful of Americans, myself included, who can pass for French anywhere, anytime because we speak pretty much accentless French (a word of two here or there might give us away if it's a new word we're nto familiar with). I grew up speaking French around bon a fide French people, so it's no wonder, and I am also very musical and have that "ear" for languages that people talk about. But now that you mention it, I really have never met a French person who spoke English without a fairly marked French accent.

And although some people get on a high horse about "ferrin accents", most of us, most of the time, tend to find an accent rather charming.

The trick is that our English accent can turn one Italian word into another (and one French word into five others ...) The same can be true for their accents in English. Context usually - but not always - helps.

I do remember being in Paris at my hotel when a friend stopped by. The staff, with whom I had spoken every day, asked me later where my friend was from. I said, "Paris." They were surprised - they said he had such a beautiful accent, and they felt most Parisians, such as they were, did not.

The difference in his case may have been that his father was lebanese/french and his mother french/english. They both have "blended" accents, I;m told, and he undoubtedly learned their very nuanced speech patterns and accents.

I am Asian American (Chinese) and although I've never been to China, all of my siblings,cousins, and Asian American friends who have gone say that the natives can automatically tell that they're from America before they even open their mouths....

Missypie,
Last time I was in Paris with my bf (who is Dutch) a waitress asked us if we were American. I'm not sure if people there automatically assume that I'm from Asia when I'm just walking around by myself.

Funny story: I went into a Chinese restaurant in a more rural part (no minorities in the area) of the Netherlands and the whole Chinese staff came out to see who the Asian person was that just walked in. They stared at me for a while and then one of them quietly asked if I was Japanese....so it's just totally random.

I was in Argentina on a business trip and my hostess asked me to please introduce myself as an American and to stop revealing the name of the place where I was born and where my roots are. I am a naturalized US citizen but I do not look anglo at all, my mother was Andalucian and my father from the Carib.

While I honor and value my US citizenship, I am who I am an would never hide it.

My hostess considered the US a "Chic" place and therefore a more important visitor. Wrong request!

I have no idea why someone would even try to hide their nationality.......and I love the quote from fnarf999 (or lyb) about wearing a suite and staying in the office - how true. I will once again be wearing my white American tennis shoes with my big American hair, smiling with my shiny American teeth and attempting not to totally destroy yet another language that is different to me....no flaunting, no hiding - just me enjoying the sights and sounds of a beautiful country other than the one I was born in!

I agree with the statements about musical people having a talent for languages. My husband is a professional singer. He took one year of German, way back in the '70s, yet can get by very nicely in German speaking countries. I, on the other hand, took three years of Spanish and have listened to countless hours of Spanish language learning CDs, and my Spanish is really pathetic.

What's funny about DH is that because classical musicians sing in so many languages, he can pronounce things (e.g. street names, restaurant names) beautifully whereever we go. He may not know what it means, but his pronounciation is great.

With respect to the stereotypical obnoxious American tourist, don't you think other Americans notice it so much because we can understand the obnoxious things other Americans are saying? I really haven't encountered that many obnoxious American tourists in Europe, but I do recall a guy in a shop in Venice speaking very loudly about how "These people are just after our money." It could well have been that the German and Japanese guys in the shop were saying things that were as bad or worse, but if they were, I couldn't understand them.

but I do recall a guy in a shop in Venice speaking very loudly about how "These people are just after our money

That was most likely a fact.

Shop owners generally are after your money. That's the reward for paying rent, stocking the merchandise, and putting up with the public all day!

It's not that the tourist was wrong, just stating the (painfully) obvious. And there can't be a tourist "destination" in the world where the prices aren't higher on the most traveled road than they are a few blocks away.