I studied Mandarin Chinese for five years in elementary school (1st-5th grades) and I loved it! We studied a lot of the culture at the same time, which was really neat. Unfortunately I remember next to nothing (I can only count up to 999, and say hello/thank you), which is really a shame. I've been meaning to try and pick it back up because I kept having massive flashbacks when I was taking Japanese in high school. I also really really really want to travel through China at some point in my life, and it would be awesome to, you know... Be familiar with the language. I traveled Europe a few summers ago and learned the hard way that it can be kind of tricky to communicate in countries where English isn't the first language, and English is all you speak :I