I am curious... I am American learning to speak Russian. If I traveled to Poland, would I offend anyone if I spoke Russian to them? Am I better of with just speaking English?
most Poles over 35 yrs should be able to understand it quite fluently.
my dad, who's in his mid 50's, learned it up until high school, and even though he claims to not have spoken it 'fluently' since then, he speaks very well in russian today! my mother's first language was russian, then polish, but my parents usually converse in polish.
I was able to speak russian when I was a young child, since my mother spoke to us primarily in russian back then. unfortunately upon moving to canada, she for some reason decided to speak only polish, and I alas forgot most ot it. :(
Only in recent years how I gained a very strong interest in wanting to learn to speak russian fluently again.
It's quite easy for me, actually. :)