All These Foreign Festivals - One Huge Question

[TomDB]

Next year (2010) i plan to go to a festival outside of the UK for the first time ever. I'm a bit apprehensive though, obviously i'm an Englishman myself, do these festivals speak a word of English? I'm thinking of going to Rock Werchter or Open'er i dunno yet, what are these European festivals like, can you understand the rules and how to get places when you get off the Eurostar etc?

[AlexDorweiler08]

Anywhere in benelux is gonna be dead easy to find your way round. Werchter is very international, loads of brits about and i'd say 95% of the people there speak english too.

For Open'er, can't really say, but from the polish I know they're very friendly and will help you out with anything, even if this would require some sign language to understand each other - It's the general festival atmosphere really! Open minded, loving and just generally good times anywhere

[Squig]

Poland (or anywhere in Eastern Central/Eastern or Southern Europe) can be tricky in the sense that not everybody speaks English, but most young people have an at least decent, in most cases, excellent command of the English language. As long as you don't expect Shakespear Recites and don't mind asking people for help translating you should not have a problem at all. In Scandinavia and Benelux anybody you meet will be totally able to converse in English. To put it differently, a French/German/Spanish speaker who doesn't speak English is probably worse of in England than a Brit going anywhere with young people in Europe.

Edited December 26, 2009 by Squig

[moz4pm]

I went to Open'er this year and I would not recommend it. They only serve watered down heineken, bands only play from 5 till 2, there's not enough shelter from the sun. On the plus side its very cheap but there was zero atmosphere, god awful food and not many people spoke english. However I would highly recommend visiting krakow, one of the most wondeful cities i have had the chance to visit, going again in june en route to Metallica in Warsaw

[alexmole]

Next year (2010) i plan to go to a festival outside of the UK for the first time ever. I'm a bit apprehensive though, obviously i'm an Englishman myself, do these festivals speak a word of English? I'm thinking of going to Rock Werchter or Open'er i dunno yet, what are these European festivals like, can you understand the rules and how to get places when you get off the Eurostar etc?

[Flaminglippy]

I went to Open'er this year and I would not recommend it. They only serve watered down heineken, bands only play from 5 till 2, there's not enough shelter from the sun. On the plus side its very cheap but there was zero atmosphere, god awful food and not many people spoke english. However I would highly recommend visiting krakow, one of the most wondeful cities i have had the chance to visit, going again in june en route to Metallica in Warsaw

[Buglet]

To put it differently, a French/German/Spanish speaker who doesn't speak English is probably worse of in England than a Brit going anywhere with young people in Europe.

[smythy]

Next year (2010) i plan to go to a festival outside of the UK for the first time ever. I'm a bit apprehensive though, obviously i'm an Englishman myself, do these festivals speak a word of English? I'm thinking of going to Rock Werchter or Open'er i dunno yet, what are these European festivals like, can you understand the rules and how to get places when you get off the Eurostar etc?

[alexmole]

Ignore any negativity, ok so people have bad experiences at festivals abroad but ive been to open'er (09) and Exit (08) and they were superb, youll find a handful of english out there anyway and the majority of people who go can speak english to and were nothing but friendly to me and my friends. had no problems whatso ever and the festivals are brilliant.

enjoy

[moz4pm]

but it was only heineken, a drink i now know to be the worst lager available in the world, dont believe me, go to the shop, by one bottle of Polands premium lager Tyskie or Zyviec and one heinekin, you'll soon notice the difference.