It might not be the word itself that is bad but just how you used it at that time might have been impolite... But that's no reason to be upset! You are learning and mistakes happen all the time! /// For example, the word "fat" is a perfectly fine word with lots of perfectly fine uses, but very few people would like you to call them fat. It's not always the word itself, but how you use it. I think one of the hardest things about language learning is knowing all the meanings that come along with a word. /// And don't worry too much about having used the word "foreigner". It's true the word itself is not a bad word. But it does sometimes carry negative connotations depending on how it's used or how people interpret it. I think in this case it's partly because Japanese translates all non-Japanese as "gaikokujin"(?) which has the English translation "foreigner" but there are often better words you could use in English, but knowing which and when to use them can be a very automatic/intuitive thing for English-speakers and they don't always realise that other people don't have that intuitive knowledge of English vocabulary. Don't worry too much about it. You will learn how to use different words and when they are appropriate as you learn! :)

Lily, You are not stupid, you are learning and you have just learned a very important lesson. Don't trust people unless you know them well. (I got caught the same a long time ago - people think it is funny to tell you wrong meanings for words and get you to say them. If you are not sure you can use translate.google.com to check words. It isn't perfect, but it will give you a good idea if a word is good or not. Foreigner is not a bad word - it describes someone from another country. Hope this helps Bob

I'm sorry. I don't use "Foreigner" in the future. I'm stupid. So sorry.