Why is Chinese So Hard?

Here's a good article by an American professor about why Chinese is so incredibly difficult. It's quite long, but funny and very, very accurate.

http://www.pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html

If I could pull out a couple of bits...

"A Spanish person learning Portuguese is comparable to a violinist taking up the viola, whereas an American learning Chinese is more like a rock guitarist trying to learn to play an elaborate 30-stop three-manual pipe organ."

"In fairness, it should be said that [classical] Chinese gets easier the more you attempt it. But then so does hitting a hole in one, or swimming the English channel in a straitjacket." (My brackets).

"Someone once said that learning Chinese is "a five-year lesson in humility". I used to think this meant that at the end of five years you will have mastered Chinese and learned humility along the way. However, now having studied Chinese for over six years, I have concluded that actually the phrase means that after five years your Chinese will still be abysmal, but at least you will have thoroughly learned humility."