Porquè quieres aprender l'espanol? Porquè el chino no me gusta.

I can't remember if the egg came first or the chicken did: if Brendan started to learn Chinese because he wanted to go to China or if he wants to go to China because he is learning Chinese. Trouble is he can't remember himself. About two years ago he started a course in the local school. After the first term, the course was cancelled because the subject was too difficult. In a class of 20 people, only 3 were disappointed, Brendan among them. He convinced the other two and the teacher, LiPing, to keep up the lessons privately and meet up in each other's houses. Since then, Tuesday became Chinese night, a much more sociable affair now that the lessons are held at home, involving great amounts of green tea and fortune cookies, (or scones, depending on the mood), and occasionally even music.

At the end of the first year one of the students gave up and Brendan said he only then realized 'how much he didn't know'. Finally learned the characters and the tones, (the same word has 5 different meanings depending on intonation going up, down, flat or no intonation at all: "Ma1 ma4 ma3 ma", meaning: "mother, to curse, horse, question mark"= Did mother curse the horse?), now he could start learning Chinese.

As well as the lessons with LiPing and Ian, the other brave scholar, Brendan used a Chinese course online for grinds: http://chinesepod.com.
level or like In the beginning he just used the free dialogues, then he subscribed for the script of the dialogues and the grammar. Last summer he used their premium package with one to one conversations over skype with a teacher. At present he has reached an intermediate level, or as LiPing more beautifully put it: "If you compare learning Chinese with climbing a mountain, you are halfway up." The experience is so intense anyway that to get it out of his system Brendan has started to blog about how difficult it is to climb that particular mountain: http://peelingmandarin.blogspot.com

As with English we'll get by in Oz and NZ (or will we?? See Glossary), and my esposo covers China, I was left with South America and Spanish. I have started a beginners course in the local school and then with the few braves that wanted to keep going we have continued with private lessons in each otter's houses. The class is a bit larger than the Chinese one, but not by much: Cheryl, Gillian, Sean, Mark, Jez, I, y Maria, nuestra profesora. I do my grinds through http://spanishsense.com. It's not like climbing the Kilimajaro, I'd rather compare it to the Inca Trail...

Listening to: Asian Dub Foundation, 1000 Mirrors