I've heard that Indian non-Hindi speakers are more likely to converse in English, than in Hindi at work.

Just like in Canada, here in Belgium French is important. If someone wants to have a good job in Brussels, it's indispensable to be bilingual, or at least have a good proficiency of French.

> If someone wants to have a good job in Brussels

Is it a good example, since the population of nowadays Brussels is predominantly French? How is it in de facto Flemish cities?

I think in a completely general sense, English, Spanish and even French give a learner a lot of bang for the buck.

JayB, I'm surprised you left out French considering its geographical spread. There are over 100 million French speakers in Africa, pockets of speakers in North America and it is an official language in a few European countries. Also, if you are at all into literature, French is one of the most important literary languages in the world.

Think my old French teacher also once said - with much pride - that France had more Nobel prizes for literature than any other country. If there is a language to learn as a fan of literature, French pretty much comes top of the list.

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I think between English, French and Russian (not to mention German, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese), you've got enough quality literature for a handful of lifetimes. My man is to explose these along with Latin and Greek, but I'd love to find the time to delve into Sanskrit, Persian, Chinese, Japanese etc.