[miniteen]

(Original post by thomaskurian89)
Why is that?

For the exact reason you stated above. The Chinese learn English from a very early age. For every white person who speaks good Chinese, there are millions of Chinese who speak just as good English. So just the language I don't think is that important. You need an understanding of the culture, history, people etc.
Another reason is that in general, the people who study a language for very superficial reasons (and not a genuine liking for the language - i.e. manga lovers studying Japanese or people solely interested in China's booming economy studying Chinese etc.) will give up very quickly when they start finding the language hard. It's one of the reasons why the drop out rates for these courses at uni are so high.
Finally, if you're learning a language only for business purposes, you need to understand that you need a very very good understanding of it. It's not like you're going down to your local chinese takeaway place and saying "wo yao nage nage... he nage" (I want that that... and that.) And to get to such a level, it takes years of hard work and exposure to the language. Not just 2 hours a day for 2 months. And here again the first statement is very true: you'll be competing with millions who are fluent in Mandarin and have a high proficiency in English - in most cases better than your Chinese.

[xander93]

(Original post by gemma sweetman)
My school is offering after school mandarin classes next year, once a week. I want to go down the science route later on in life, is there any point me spending my time studying it? Any comments will be appreciated


This was posted from The Student Room's iPhone/iPad App

Most people I know who started Mandarin dropped it. Saw it as a fun thing to do, only to realise how difficult and taxing it was. Don't start it unless you really mean to take it far.

[Hackett]

How possible would it be to learn very basic Mandarin, like the odd sayings in 3 months? (I go to HK in Oct) Are there an y good ipad apps out there?

[Ray of Light]

Mandarin is an amazing language, but it is incredibly difficult on all levels: the pronunciation, the pinyin, the actual calligraphy... I spent around 30 weeks on it and I know some phrases but if you are to learn it, it really requires full dedication and concentration.

[Cultureyard]

I'm in beijing right now interning at a language school and studying an intensive Chinese course. I've found it much easier than i was expecting I think because I've been surrounded by people speaking the language so you can hear the tones and pinyin. Might help to listen to Chinese music and watch mandarin films or just come to beijing