I am a fluent English speaker who spoke not a word of Dutch for my first few years in the Netherlands. Got contract work, friends, and in the end language and citizenship.

One example is anecdote, not data, but I know an awful lot of EU and non-EU people both in the big cities and more regional places who landed without any local language and made successful lives and integrated effectively here.

There are harder places to do this but it’s getting easier by the year, especially in the countries that need people who speak other languages for global trade.