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There are several ways to cope with travel in countries where English is not spoken:

• Just smile a lot and use gestures. It is amazing how far this can take you; many people are extremely tolerant.
• Try simple English: Keep sentences short. Use the present tense. Use single words and hand gestures to convey meaning.
• Try any other languages you speak. Older Chinese often speak Russian, some Turks and Arabs speak good French or German, and so on.
• Learn some of the language. See our list of phrasebooks for a start. At the very least, know how to say "thank you" and to find a toilet.
• Learn some of a regional language. Russian for Central Asia, Arabic for the Middle East and North Africa, French for some parts of Africa, Spanish for Latin America. This may be easier than trying to learn the local languages and is more widely useful.
• Nearly anywhere, if you stay in heavily-touristed areas and pay for a good hotel, enough of the staff will speak English to make your trip painless. It may not be as cheap or as interesting as it could be, but it will be easy.
• Nearly anywhere, you can hire an English-speaking guide and translator--especially if you take care of it beforehand

Even in really out-of-the-way places, you should at least be able to find hotel staff and guides who speak the regional language well.

A few English words may be understood anywhere, though which ones will vary from place to place. For example, "OK" and "bye-bye" are used in Chinese and many Chinese speakers also know "hello" and "thank you". Unless you are dealing with educated people, however, that may well be the extent of their English.

French words also turn up in other languages. "Merci" is one way to say "thank you" in Persian.

English idioms may also be borrowed. "ta-ta" is common in India, for example.

Abbreviations like CD and DVD are often the same in other languages. "WC" for toilet seems to be widely used, both in English and on signs, in various countries, though never in English-speaking ones.

Words from the tourist trade, such as hotel, taxi and menu, may be understood by people in that line of work, even if they speak no other English.

Some words have related forms across the Muslim world.

• "Thank you" is shukran in Arabic, tashekur in Turkish, shukria in Urdu.
• The word for peace, used as a greeting, is shalom in Hebrew, salaam in Arabic, salamat in Indonesian.

Even if you use the form from another language, you might still be understood.

Some loanwords may be very similar in a number of languages. For example, "sauna" (originally from Finnish) sounds similar in Chinese and English among other languages. Naan is Persian for bread; it used in several Indian languages, though the recipe varies.

The word for tea is approximately "chai" across most of Asia (Hindi, Russian, Persian, Turkish, ...), "cha" in standard Mandarin and Cantonese (albeit with different tones) and "teh" in the Minnan dialect (in fact, the English word tea was derived from teh).

These are words that some travellers report are widely understood. Other travellers find that claim dubious.

Criteria for (non)inclusion of a specific word/phrase is still under development; for now, just follow your intuition.

• air conditioner
• airplane
• auto/automobile
• apartments
• bank
• bikini
• block
• boss
• boyfriend
• bus/autobus
• bust (as sculpture and as breast)
• cacao
• catalog/catalogue
• catastrophe
• cheque
• chips
• cigar
• cigarette
• cofee
• compliment
• contrast
• credit card
• dentist
• deposit
• discount
• expedition
• GSM -- mobile phone
• guide (person)
• fridge/refrigerator
• grill
• hotel
• jacuzzi (may be misjudged as Yakuza!)
• mackerel
• mask (noun)
• metro
• microwave
• money
• no
• nonstop
• OK
• operation
• operator
• paprika
• parfume
• penthouse
• private
• problem
• salad
• salami
• sauna
• sex
• shampoo
• souvenir
• station
• steak
• stop
• stuart
• taxi
• telephone
• temperature
• therapia / therapy
• toilet
• tour
• tourist
• track
• tram/tramway
• trolleybus
• visit
• WC
• yes