When speaking in another language, one wrong slip of the tongue can make for a potentially embarrassing conversation. But an embarrassing conversation is better than an offensive one, which is the other direction it could go. It all depends on the emotion that is behind the words.
A foreign person in another country can be a threatening prospect to some people. It’s not that they hate foreigners, its that the human brain is wired in such a way that we immediately and unconsciously react to something or someone foreign to us.
This is why it’s important to remain emotionally stable, or simply calm. Emotions are a universal human language in and of themselves. Calm emotion portrays an easiness and sincereness of character.
The challenge though is in actually remaining calm. When going through the effort of speaking in a foreign language we can forget about what we are doing with our emotional control. But it’s arguably our emotions that communicate more anyway.