The Huffington Post – Nick Norton
“In my junior year of college I decided to do something drastic – change majors. I originally was an urban studies major, but was having some issues in a tough economic course. I’m a prelaw student, so I took a risk and changed my area of study to Asian studies with a concentration in Mandarin Chinese. I’ve been studying Chinese since my freshmen year of high school, but I never focused on it too intensely. But with grad school just around the corner, I figured why not really become fluent in Mandarin. Plus by learning a new language like Chinese, I’m opening myself up to a whole new world of culture and experience. This is the summer before my senior year of undergrad, and initially I was really stressed out about why I wasn’t becoming fluent in Mandarin more quickly. After all I’ve been studying Chinese on and off for seven years now, and I still feel like a newbie. So this summer I’ve made the commitment to myself, to make learning my second language a type priority.”(more)