PAL is different even between European countries, but a PAL video should work OK in another PAL region, as the way the data is put on the tape is the same, it's the way it's then sent to the TV that might be different.
The difference is the frequency of the sound part of the transmission, in the UK & ireland PAL-I is used, the parts of Europe that use PAL use PAL-BG. I hit this snag recently with a new DVD recorder, which was built in Europe and shipped to Ireland without the internal setting being changed, which resulted in it recording a picture OK, but no sound.
On the VCR, the sound data is recorded by one head, and the picture data by the rotating helical head, so the "difference" between the PAL settings has been removed by that stage.
So, a tape should be OK. If you took the VCR to another country, there is a very good chance that it would not work correctly in that country.
Hope that helps