How To Bullsh*t People

This morning I had some free time due to an unfortunate accident, so I thought I'd read the headlines and study if I can't do anything else. Our centralized giant search engine called G👀gle has a news feed and scrolling though it, I came across an article that offered to update you on the 5 easiest languages to learn on your own for free.

I love languages and am happy to learn new ones and practice them, so I thought let's see this list. I'm going to quote it below.

1. Mandarin

I hate posts with GIFs, but I must make an exception as this was my exact reaction when I saw Mandarin making the head of the list, being named as the easiest language to learn on your own for free. 😱 I thought my eyes are playing pranks on me or I must have misunderstood something. But continuing reading the article, I had to see I was not wrong, they really said that.

Mandarin is often considered one of the world’s most difficult languages to learn, but there are a few reasons to show that this is just a myth.

Start with the fact that it has relatively few grammar patterns — most of which are straightforward.

There are also no tenses in the Chinese language and Chinese words do not alter their form or conjugate like English verbs.

If you don’t know the stroke of a specific Chinese character, you can use the phonetic writing system of Chinese characters to text or write.

As Chinese has four tones and one natural tone, singers or those recognise tones well will find it easier than someone who is tonedeaf.

It’s also best for someone who is surrounded by Chinese-speaking people. If you have questions, you can get answers immediately, accelerating your progress.

Practising your Mandarin with Chinese friends will also be invaluable. source

I am among those that has considered Mandarin as one of the hardest languages, but after reading the article, I learnt that according to the author of the article, that's just a myth. 😳

source

The article I mentioned above was posted 6 days ago, on the 26th of April, 2023.

I thought let's run a search on what are the most difficult languages and the truth is, each list is different, but Mandarin is almost head of the list or in top 4 in almost all lists for a very good reason. You most likely heard the expression This is all Chinese to me, which is not just a saying. Chinese, Mandarin is indeed difficult.

A phone call interrupted my reading and when I wanted to resume reading the headlines, due to an automated refresh, I got some new articles in my feed, among which, this one -> Tongue twisters? A look into the most gruelling languages to learn and master. After reading the first one that shocked me, I was definitely interested in this one. Here's the list of languages they say are the hardest to learn.

1. Arabic
2. Basque
3. Finnish
4. Hungarian
5. Japanese
6. Korean
7. Mandarin Chinese

At this point I started laughing as you can't do anything else when seeing the two article one after the other.

source

If you didn't get the point, let me spell it out for you. It's the same platform, studyinternational.com stating both, only 6 days apart. Once they say Mandarin is one of the easiest languages to learn, then they say it is one of the hardest languages to learn for English speakers. Can't be both in my opinion, but what do I know, right?

Millions of expats speak, read and write Chinese, though it has a reputation for being one of the hardest languages to learn for English speakers.

Chinese has earned that reputation for being difficult primarily due to its tones and writing system.

Mandarin is a tonal language with four tones.

What adds an extra challenge is there are many words that sound exactly the same except for an added tonal change which alters the meaning entirely.

This means that the same syllables with different tones can have two completely different things.

The written form is equally harsh. You would first have to recognise the characters. source

Now I don't mind news outlets contradicting each other. It happens all the time, but the same outlet stating different things in 2 articles 6 days apart is ... what can I call it? I'll let you decide. In Hungarian we say Right hand doesn't know what left hand does and that seems to be the case here.

The Truth?

The truth is, the difficulty of each language depends on the individual. Some are born with a talent of learning almost any language without any difficulties, while others will never learn a second language, even if they would have 2 lifetimes at their disposal. Thar's the brutal truth.

Now let's see what it means to really learn the language. Some are happy to learn a few words, master the street language, just enough to ask for direction or to order. I've seen this countless times, tourists with tourist guide books in their hand, breaking their tongue in pieces to be able to read what they want to ask. This is fine, I don't think less of them for doing so, on the contrary, it's nice of them for trying. The problem starts when you get an answer and don't understand what you are told as street language is very different from what you learn in the classroom or from those books.

I saw a documentary made in Chinese schools that said it takes 7 years to learn to write. I don't know if it's true, most likely it is. I ran a search and this is what I found.

Required Time to Achieve the Advanced Level

It takes about 4-7 years (roughly 2200 to 4000 hours) to become fluent in every aspect of the language, if you spend at least an hour and a half to study every day. However, it’s quite common for learners to become more fluent in some areas than others depending on how they allotted their study time. For example, you might have excellent Chinese speaking skills but have limited reading and writing ability. source

How Important Is Writing?

We live in a digital era. Ticket buying, shopping, ordering, banking is digitalized, just to name a few areas. China has made sure to control most of its population through the major e-commerce platforms for a good reason and if that's not enough, CBDC is real over there, so mastering reading is kind of a must, if you want to be on the safe side.

How To Bullsh*t People

I see these type or articles, promising an easy way, the same as those ads hyping body correction suits they say it makes you slim. No such clothes will ever make you slim, just maybe look slimmer, by squezing your body in those clothes. Or the weight loss pills or teas that promise you huge results in a week or two, yet all they do is eliminate water at the beginning but you still remain with the fat on you.

So take everything with a pinch of salt as not everything that shines is gold. Also, if you want to do something, do it right.