Some time ago a Flemish Belgian friend of mine and I went dancing at the Ghent Festival, an event that attracts people from miles around, including northern France and all of the Benelux countries. A French-speaking gentleman asked me to dance for a long sequence of dances, and we had a pleasant but rudimentary conversation in French. I was very proud of myself.
"Who was the guy who thought you were a goddess and kept dancing with you?" asked my friend afterwards.
"I think he's French," I replied. "I suppose he could be a Walloon [French-speaking Belgian], but he kept speaking French to me even after finding out that I was an American. A Belgian would most likely have switched to English automatically when he heard that."
"He spoke French to you? He's definitely French," my friend said loftily. "No Belgian would do that."
Flemish and Walloons don't get along very well and have low opinions of each other's language skills, but they have even more contempt for the language skills of all non-Belgians!
- Rebecca
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