If I get introduced to someone new, and they hear I‘m American, they immediately assume I can‘t speak a word of their language. They start speaking English automatically.

I sometimes prank them, too. When checking into my usual hotel in Brussels one time, I was introduced to a new assistant manager who was from Sweden. She immediately spoke English, since Americans are incapable of learning Swedish, right? So I told her no problem, all she had to do was hold up the palm of her hand vertically 1 centimeter from mine for 30 seconds and the language fluency would transfer. She had to think only in Swedish for those 30 seconds for it to work. She laughed at the notion, but went along with it. After about 30 seconds, I said OK that‘s close enough, and she could now speak Swedish with me. She said she didn‘t think so, but I insisted (still in English) that she start speaking Swedish with me. So she said a few words, and I answered her in fluent Swedish. Her eyes opened wide and her jaw dropped to the floor.

Hur har du gjort det?? How did you do that? I just said no one ever believes that my palm language fluency transfer works, but she had just seen it work in person.

I could no longer keep a straight face and laughed. I told her I had spoken Swedish for decades, but since I was American, I would never know Swedish, would I? I told her I bet she had met dozens of Americans who spoke perfect Swedish, but she never thought they were American because her pre-formed opinion prevented her from thinking that some of us were just as capable of learning her language as she was of learning ours. She admitted she had never given the possibility a thought, but it made a lot more sense than my „palm telepathic transfer method.“

about her in Afrikaans. Being her native language she shocked the shit out of them when she thanked them for the comments in perfect Afrikaans... Ha!!
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I was with a colleague in a hotel in Zürich, waiting in line for the breakfast büffet, when two smartly-dressed German businessmen gave us a dirty look and commented that the hotel let in far too many American tourists. Since we were also there on business, and not for tourism, I spoke up and remarked in perfect German, "yeah, some of whom happen to speak fluent German." Totally embarrassed, the one who made the remark, came back with a lame, "well, I didn't really mean it like that."

One time, my younger daughter was at an after-school day care center at her elementary school here in Germany. My wife was busy with something and I was home that day, so she asked me to go pick our daughter up. I said sure, and went to get her. When I got there, I told her to pack up her things and get her coat. I always spoke to our girls in English in an effort--successful, by the way--to raise them bilingually. So, when I went to get her, I spoke in English, as we always did. A Turkish kid heard this, and wondered what was going on.

"What was that?" he asked in German.
"English," I answered back in German.
"She knows English?" he asked in awe.
"Of course she does," I answered.
Puffing up his chest, he said, "well, I know something you don't know."
"Could be," I answered. "What would that be?"
"Turkish!" he said, proudly.
I answered, "Sen ne söyledin? Ben çok iyi Türkçe konuşyorum!" (What did you say? I speak Turkish just fine!)
The kid was so shocked, that he answered (luckily in German--my Turkish in reality is minimal), "how come you know that?"
I responded, also in German, "how come you automatically assume I DON'T know that?"
The teacher on duty, never having seen this kid at a loss for words, ever, admonished him, "you see, Zarkan? You should never assume things about people you don't know."

I doubt I caused some long-lasting fundamental behavioral change in the kid, but he DID stare at me open-mouthed as my daughter and I left for home. The teacher told me later on that it was the only time she had seen this kid at a loss for words.

French, Spanish, and Bahasa Malay. The last from when he was in the Peace Corps. Whenever I am with him, it seems we don't go twenty minutes before he is speaking to someone in one of those languages. It's always a treat.

But living in Germany, a country already bordering on nine others, I have concentrated on European languages. As it is, they never expect Americans to know anything, and I can hold a coherent conversation in eight European languages besides English. Besides the obvious ones (French, Spanish, Italian and German), I can also get along fine in Russian, Swedish, Dutch and Catalan. Though a number of Americans know some Russian, either from old family connections or college studies, we are definitely NOT expected to know Dutch, Swedish or Catalan, and I have a trove of stories where I have left some people just as surprised as the Koreans in the video.

and get fluent in the language there. Sigh. Next time around maybe.

Having lived in Catalunya as a teenager was definitely an experience of a lifetime. France was brief, but I learned more living with a French family for six weeks than many learn in four years of college. And now, living with my German wife in Germany, has broadened my language horizons considerably—not only in German, but in Dutch, Russian and Turkish. The small bits of Kurdish and Alawite that I know were also learned here.

...and their quick responses. They say that children have the most facility learning foreign languages for neurological reasons. The older you are the longer it takes.

However, the dialogue here is quite basic, and represents a basic to intermediate level of conversation.