Oh dear. I've lived in France, and am bilingual in French. Yes, the French WILL be rude, if they perceive you to have been rude... So if you wander into a shop without a polite "Bonjour Madame/Monsieur" then you will be accepted coldly and they will return your lack of respect for their cultural niceties with an equal lack of respect. But the Dutch, being nice about it, maybe their flat societal structure means they feel entitled to be rude, to everyone, and at times that borders on exploitation. I've been one of a few English speakers at more Dutch meals and events than I care to remember, and absolutely no compromise has ever been made to accommodate my lack of the language, I'm just left to nod and smile and try and keep up. Fine, it's their country, but my Dutch ex partner asked me to host birthday parties for him in my home in London, 20 people sat down at the table, and there were only two people at the table with English mother tongue, but the one language we could all communicate in was English, and so everyone who wasn't Dutch DID! The Dutch, who were about 8 of the total number - all sat together at one side of the table, and spoke loudly in Dutch throughout. Not in the Netherlands, not in their own home, but in MY home, in London.... My Dutch partner's daughters would come and visit, for a weekend, then stay a week, they treated the house like a hotel, colonised the family sitting room, and left a tip, ignored my children, and while I made efforts to arrange joint activities, they and their father consistently refused to engage, and refused to speak English....They had, briefly lived in London too, when one of my friends realised they'd been at the same school as her daughters, she immediately invited them over for drinks and dinner, the Dutch girls sneered "why would we want to socialise with people like that!" The universities have a 'sorority system' which functions around class, partying and booze, my partner's daughter's sorority invited all the fathers over (not the mothers, they were excluded) for an annual father/daughter knees up....It's an old university and an old sorority, apparently this is a tradition of that sorority, and the fathers all clubbed together to buy them a wine fridge in thanks! So much for that 'egalitarianism' more like Downing St in the Boris Johnson years, someone ask Sue Grey to inquire!. One of the girls, barely sixteen, showed up with her boyfriend to stay for a weekend (ie a week), they spent most of their time shagging in my son's bedroom, this didn't even raise an eyebrow, instead their father was very proud of the fact that they had learned 'English manners' which meant that at the end of their stay they said 'thank you' and gave me a bunch of flowers. We all felt utterly erased in our own home. I have never been made to feel so invisible, and while the Dutch - in my experience at least, are very vocal about how brilliant their 'open, direct and honest' culture is, there is nothing open about being in someone's home ensuring they are not included in conversations or activities. Very depressing, there's a surface of 'hail fellow well met' but ultimately the 'openness and individualism' borders on selfishness. The tolerance of young teens getting black out drunk (AT A SCHOOL GRADUATION) introducing short term sexual partners who are complete strangers to them, let alone the host, into our home, and the attitude of 'you're just uptight English people' is actually the definition of rude. Because what is rudeness but a lack of empathy, and all of this demonstrates a lack of empathy and curiosity about any culture other than their own. As for 'all Dutch speak English, if you measure it against the English ability to speak Dutch, absolutely, their English is excellent, if you measure it against any other European countries, it's no different, in my experience at least, and among this, highly educated social group, all graduates, a LOT of them had barely any English. That relationship is over, as you've probably guessed, ah the Dutch sexual libertarianism, Tinder dating while proposing marriage! For all the effort they made to get to know us we might never have existed... while I am now fully appraised of every aspect of their lives, their brilliance and their successes, and also fully informed, thanks to that legendary 'openness' of all my numerous English faults! Never again! Nice place to visit, wouldn't want to live there. I appreciate this relates to a (quite large and highly educated) group, and there are lots of lovely Dutch people, but I'm going to be even more 'English' next time I meet a Dutch person, smile, and walk on by.