to foreign countries —> abroad
foreign countries —-> other/different countries
foreigners / foreign country’s people —-> people from other countries
* It was the first time I had been to foreign countries
* There were many foreign country’s people at my school
* Foreign country’s people give their opinions freely
* I talked with foreigners
In all these cases, in English it’s not usual to use the word ‘foreign’. One reason is that it’s not very polite, and the other is that it’s misleading (since it often assumes that ‘foreign countries’ are a single place and the people are all the same).
- If you are talking about ‘going outside Japan’, you can say ‘going overseas’ or ‘going abroad’ (but don’t say ‘to abroad/overseas)
It was the first time I had been abroad/overseas
- If you are talking about people from more than one country you can say,
There were people from many (different) countries at my school
- If you are contrasting people from some other countries with people from Japan you should be specific about which countries you are talking about and/or use words such as tend to or many/some to show that you are not stereotyping ALL people from those countries).
People from Saudi Arabia tend to give their opinions more freely than people from Japan
OR
Many students from other countries tend to give their opinions more freely than students from Japan
AND
I talked with people from other countries.
