It's a fool's mission of course. Ridiculous. It's Chinese, Allen, a language of ancient pictographs that are translated differently for the lips and ears by different populations in China. Trying to "pick it up", learn "conversational Mandarin" feels pretty silly. Not exactly like doing the Romance language tango and using French and Spanish as the basis for understanding Italian, which was the drill in Torino for the Winter Olympics in 2006.
So I don't really expect to come out of the 8-week class being able to speak the language with any skill. It is just another part of the Total Immersion Schauffler Theory of World Travel.
I figure anything I can do to get used to Chinese history and culture will help, not hurt, as we roll towards the Beijing Games. Read Chinese books, eat Kung Pao Chicken, watch Chinese movies, whatever.
There's another reason it could be a foolish waste of time to spend two hours a week for two months sitting in a community college mandarin class. At the Olympics everything will be in English (even though French is the official "Olympic Language"). We'll be operating in the familiar Olympic Bubble and there likely will be no need to understand a single word of the local language.
But I am going off to school anyway and actually I'm quite excited. Maybe even a touch nervous! Not sure why that should be, but it's true. Butterflies.
Butterflies.. Now just how would that concept translate to written and spoken Chinese? Maybe I'll find out.

296 days to go..