When native speakers reply in English...

[anna3101]

Have you ever been in this situation...

You are abroad, in that nice country whose language you've been learning, so excited to finally test your newly acquired skills.

You go inside the shop and proudly say "Good morning, I'd like a bottle of mineral water, please" - in a foreign language of the country in question, of course.

Maybe your accent is not that great. Or maybe you are still struggling with words and mix them up a bit. Either way, the shop assistant smiles and says in perfect English:

"It's all right, I speak English! Sparking or still?"

And your good mood goes like "pffff"

I've had many situations like that in Berlin this year, when I was desperately trying to practise a  bit of my beginner's German and friendly people were invariably replying in English, even if they were happily chatting to each other in German just a second ago.

What do you do in such situations? Do you give up or just go on trying?

[Tyrell]

Happened to me once. That wasn't exactly the scenario though. It was more of like, "Good morning, I'd like a bottle of mineral water, please."
And then they reply "Sorry?" and then you repeat what you just said and they're just like, "...Sorry?" and then you just give up, said "Nevermind" and leave the store.
I think it's safe to say that I wanted to die at very moment from the embarrassment  Never again.

[DivaDee]

Simple, what you do in that situation is tell thank you, but then explain to them that you've been studying really hard to learn their native tounge and that you know they've also probably been working really hard to learn english or use to study it in school, but you really wanted to put your knowledge to good use and not let it go to waste and if they want both of you can talk to eachother in eachother's native tounge and just either of you mess up you can correct eachother... Not only will it put your skills to good use but you also might get a new friend... 

[宇崎ちゃん]

Either pretend you don't understand them when they speak English, or continue speaking in the local language to force them to speak their language too.
I've had a Japanese language exchange partner before, to which I clearly stated the 'no English rule' applies throughout our entire chat.
At one point the person suddenly switched to English to explain the meaning of a word I didn't understand, but then I reminded them about the 'no English rule' in Japanese and I kept speaking Japanese.
The person gave up and continued the conversation in Japanese, until it was time to switch to Dutch (because that's what language exchanges are all about).

[kurdapia]

I think that is a bit frustrating for me. Imagine my enthusiasm to practice what I learned and here comes a friendly native replying in plain English. I do appreciate the effort but my confidence just dropped down and I felt like a total stranger trying my hardest to apply what I learned. I will try the next cafe perhaps or the sidewalk and look for someone who obviously does not speak in English. 

[Trellum]

Yes, I often heard people in the Netherlands seem so eager to practice English, but in reality most of them tried to speak dutch to me when my level was still 0    I'd have tried to answer back in dutch, but I hadn't even started studying the language back then.  So I stick to English and oh boy... was I happy!  Now that I speak some dutch I hope they don't try to pull that on me again... when they hear my dutch is not so good!  It's the worst thing ever!

[anna3101]

Yes, I often heard people in the Netherlands seem so eager to practice English, but in reality most of them tried to speak dutch to me when my level was still 0    I'd have tried to answer back in dutch, but I hadn't even started studying the language back then.  So I stick to English and oh boy... was I happy!  Now that I speak some dutch I hope they don't try to pull that on me again... when they hear my dutch is not so good!  It's the worst thing ever!

I wish you luck! When I was in the Netherlands and tried to produce some sentences, they replied to me in English in 80% of the cases If I went now, I'd just go on stubbornly trying to talk Dutch to them anyway. You should probably do the same

[Lingua Franca]

This can be very disheartening but they are just trying to help you. If you explain to the them that you are trying to learn their language, you will find that their posture will change completely and if they were helpful before, from that point on, you will treated like a king or queen which ever be the case.