This corpus-based study debates German-, French- and Spanish-speaking tourists' language experiences during web review writing esp. on hotels in Dutch-speaking Flanders (Belgium). French- and Spanish-speaking tourists more explicitly emphasize their ‘ethnolinguistic face’ than German-speaking tourists. Spanish-speaking tourists are at the most positive pole, French-speaking ones at the most negative one. Mother tongue or international link language use (by default, English) are functionally distinct options; English use may even entail face-threats. Comparison of data with staff-linked evaluation and hotel ratings, reveals the particular and independent role of language in hotel reviews.