There is one undeniable huge advantage about English being the international language: everybody understands it. There's also a big disadvantage. Everybody understands it.
Perhaps I should elaborate. For anglophones, or English-speakers, it's a wonderful thing because we can go abroad anywhere and count on most people being able to speak our language, sometimes even fluently. In some ways, it's nice for non-anglophones, as well, because they only have to learn one foreign language and they can travel pretty much anywhere. Certainly, if you meet anybody in the air force or who flies at all, their English will often be impeccable -- I remember being very amused going up in a helicopter on one occasion and listening to the air traffic reports (all in English, obviously) and overhearing an American pilot arguing with somebody in air traffic control because his plane wasn't ready to take off. No matter where you go, you're bound to see English somewhere. In Brussels, for example, a fair amount of advertising is done in English. In the metro, they give all the announcements in French, Flemish and English (for some reason, they leave out German, which is the third official language of this country).
However, there are some downsides to being a native English speaker abroad. One is that -- especially in Paris, for some reason -- you're always going to meet people who are like, "oh, it's an American" (even if you're English or Australian, which kind of grates). And they then go on to add something like "you never bothered to learn our language" (or they imply it) and you get given the cold shoulder. Or you hear them complaining that English-speakers never bother to learn their language, and then you try to speak to them and they reply in English and don't even give you a chance to try your hand at their language. And then you hear them complaining again as you walk away. And the other thing: if you're an English-speaker abroad, you can NEVER complain about anything in the privacy of your language the way that you could if you were, say, somebody from the Basque country visiting China. EVERYBODY UNDERSTANDS. If you want to complain about something quietly to your friends, you have to be telepathic. Or you have to wait until you get back home. Otherwise, the consequences can be rather embarrassing. Not that I'm trying to encourage people to complain, of course, but you get what I mean... I hope.
While going abroad as a tourist and speaking English is all very well, if you're going to live in a country for any length of time, you can't just expect to rely on English. You have to know at least one of the official languages of the country (where there are more than one). Even in Belgium, there are some people who expect you to know two of the official languages, but where there are problems, they can... usually... be resolved in English... but still, it's best not to rely on it.
The only exception to learning a native language seems to be if you've come over as an Erasmus student to one of the universities. Chances are you'll fall in with numerous people from all corners of the world and the only way you can communicate is in English. When that happens, a form of pidjin English is likely to occur (unless there's a native anglophone in the group). Everybody in the group understands each other, but most anglophones (while they also understand) will sit there raising their eyebrows or scratching their heads at some of the expressions. (Seriously, it's really interesting -- you can see the development of language at work.)
Sometimes, though, I wonder if it was worth the bother of trying to become fluent in French. Admittedly, I'm here to teach English, but everywhere I go, I have to hide the fact that I'm from the UK or I'm not allowed to speak anything other than English. It can get a little aggravating at times. I don't mind it if it's to help out lost tourists or what have you, because their English is often better than their French (and I don't really speak Flemish). But going out with friends, going to parties... as soon as I get introduced as "my English friend--", bang go my chances for speaking in French for the evening. If you live abroad, you'll find the same thing. Everybody wants to practise their English. It's very nice of them, but then... well, you wonder why they complain that anglophones never learn their languages. If they aren't going to let us speak their language, of course there's going to be a part of us that says "why should we learn it?" Seriously, the last few times I've been out in town, I've had to pretend I'm Swedish and speak no English at all so that I can speak in French. And so that I can escape from creepy perverts on the metro, but that's a story for another time. Even in my French class, I try not to say where I come from. The last time I did, I wasn't able to speak French during class breaks or walking to the metro. I just got bombarded with English and comments on my accent.
On other occasions, looking around at the English-speaking tourists and being mortified at the way that some of them just expect the world to be fluent in English, I sometimes wish that the international language was Esperanto. I'm not joking. That way, I'd be fluent in three languages and nobody could complain that somebody "hasn't made the effort" to learn their language. I wouldn't be prevented from speaking other languages when I want to, and I also wouldn't get weird looks from people for speaking a foreign language. Really, it's got to the point where the American stereotype has been transferred to the British. I'm not happy about it. Personally, I like being able to speak in other languages, even if it's only a few words. For one thing, it's polite. For another, non-anglophones love it.
And then again, I count myself lucky that my first language is one that's spoken all over the world. It makes things like watching films and reading books very easy. You can find "original versions" in most places, but they're also translated all over the place, so it's easy to start picking up a language if you pick up a book or a film you know and decide to watch it in, say, Spanish. It's even in music. A lot of countries listen to English songs. People may not understand them, but they know them and sing along to them in gusto. One of the only foreign songs that every English-speaking person knows is Alors, on danse, which, if I remember correctly, was sung by a Belgian and doesn't contain a single English word. So, yeah, English is an incredibly useful language -- because it's the international language. If you speak English, you'll never really be lost. Except for when you go out into the countryside. English tends to hang around in the cities. As soon as things start looking green, signs probably stop showing English.
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